Design Like a (Recovering) Eldest Daughter
Recently, fellow product designer Deepak Krishnan and I got into some very nerdy design shenanigans. We're out there collaborating, ideating, having a ball. Folks, we're making a process checklist!
I am so many of the eldest daughter tropes.
As a recovering eldest daughter, I've learned not to manage other people's lives [pause for applause]. But I manage the heck out of my own. I have no less than 3 spreadsheets open on my personal laptop at all times. My most used app is my calendar. I maintain a zettlecasten. For better or for insufferable--I'm a earnest bundle of ambition who needs all the process structure I can get to make my dreams come true.
This is nowhere more true than in my work as a designer...
Problem statement:
In 2023, I began facing a hard truth. I was struggling to manage the scope of what a mature design role demanded. After years of growing in craft, I still couldn't juggle it consistently--from going to high-fidelity too fast to missing constraints and finding myself in ideation Groundhog Day. And taking another UX course online wasn't going to help.
Criteria:
I slowly built accountability into place, but that effort lived in scattered checklists and calendar events. This year, I decided to go after one robust source of truth. I wanted something I could pull out at the beginning of any project and start tearing through. The hope was to create something deep, granular, and personal.
The Results
The final list is an amalgamation of design best practices, soft skills learned on the job, and some excellent insight from other designers. It also incorporates all the delightful red tape and internal practices that keep big organizations aligned. Sans that, I hope to share it as a Figma template soon.
In the meantime, here's an abbreviated version. My goal in sharing this was to distill my thinking. As a junior designer, I benefitted from many other folks' process videos, templates, or checklists. I had the vague hope that someday I'd find the one. Delightfully, I guess this is it!
Design Process Checklist (EP)
Before You Start Design
Starting off on the right foot is all about crew alignment and clarity. For the love of all that's holy, don't move forward until you've nailed the problem statement. Seriously—don't budge an inch.
Tasks here fall into a few big buckets:
Design fundamentals: Personas, problem definition, technical constraints, yada yada. It's basic, but I've only come to appreciate them more over time—particularly good problem definition.
Relationship building: You set the tone for communication on a project. Take time to prep before meetings, ask thoughtful questions, and put effort into how you present your work. I've never regretted building a quick deck or writing a charter to clarify thinking.
Personal project management: Every designer is also a project manager—particularly if you are a freelancer, as I was for years. I like Notion, but you do you!
Information Gathering
Identify the primary user. Don't know where to start? Try NNG's personas guide.
Define the problem you'll solve.
Set concrete deliverables:
Determine fidelity level
Identify if a prototype is needed.
Clarify detail level for edge cases.
Define MVP journey and stretch goals.
List known technical constraints.
Get to know the devs and their spec preferences. Open a conversation that you will cultivate every step of the way.
Review past explorations or Figma files.
Decide if research help is needed (and if it fits the timeline)
Check for existing competitor research.
Define design handoff deadline.
Set a personal deadline with a buffer time. Always set more than you think you need.
Outline interim checkpoints—and write them down!
While You Design
Finally, the part I thought I'd be doing when I decided to become a designer!
Ideate, ideate, ideate.
User journeys
Wireframes or sketches. I usually stay in Figma now, but Miro and Whimsical are also great!
Define error and empty states. ChatGPT is a secret weapon for error states—once I've got a user flow, I'll ask it to poke holes.
Double-check accessibility (see: WCAG A11y checklist)
Share in-progress designs with another designer, ask for their critique.
Meme your work. Yes--you read that right. This was a game-changer for sharing updates with the team.
Track feedback across channels.
Make sure your work is visible even when you're OOO. I've recently taken another designer's suggestion to pin the latest and greatest to the top of any communication channels I manage with devs & PMson.
Save versions to document before/after changes.
Track scope changes and why they happened
Flag any parts of the design that need post-launch metrics.
Continue to sync with devs regularly.
Catch and incorporate any lingering edge cases.
Clean up your Figma files! I use the plugin Super Tidy constantly—it's a lifesaver.
Aside: When sharing work with stakeholders, prototypes are king. However, most of my best work is currently happening in writing. My Figma files are getting text-heavy—lots of outlining, flow notes, and edge-case thoughts documented as clearly as possible. I started doing this more when I realized that, like AI, I'm excellent at hallucinating how things will "work out." Writing it down prevents magic thinking.
Handoff
If you're here—yay! Both in the process or in reading this long-ass post. Handoff differs wildly across teams, but this is where you get to enjoy all the communication work you've done along the way. Developers should already have a solid idea of where they're heading.
Create an info/orientation page in Figma.
I've gone back to this YouTube video on design handoff multiple times. It's great!
Have a final check-in with devs to answer questions and review specs.
Save notes on ideas that didn't pan out (but were interesting).
Document anything that expanded or blew up the scope.
Post-Project
Celebrate your work--share it, write it up, and hype up your collaborators.
Thank the folks you worked with (genuinely! publicly!)
Add the project to your portfolio. Hopefully, this will be pretty easy since you've been taking copious notes the whole time!
Schedule a retro with your PM and devs.
Set reminders to track adoption, usage, or other success signals.
Conduct a quick solo retro: What worked? What will you tweak next time?
Thanks for reading. Always iterating.
📚 Reading List: