How AI and Automation Go Hand-in-Hand with DesignOps

Look at it this way – have you ever worked on a group project? Then you know things can easily become chaotic when working in big enterprises with multiple design teams across different departments. DesignOps is here to simplify design work and make sure everyone’s on the same page.

Improving efficiency with DesignOps

You could say that DesignOps, with the help of tools, brings automation into the design process. Let’s take a look at design systems as an example. Instead of every designer creating their own buttons or card components from scratch, they can simply reuse existing ones. This saves a lot of time and keeps things consistent across different products.

With a clear workflow and shared tools, everyone can be on the same page – not just within the design team but across other departments. Efficient communication means less delay and smoother work. Who wants to attend another meeting, anyway?

If you think DesignOps could be a good fit for your team, check out our recent blog post, where we break down what DesignOps is and all the key benefits for your business.

The role of AI in DesignOps

It might feel counterintuitive, but AI is making a big impact on the creative process in design, speeding up everything from user research to wireframing. You don't have to start from scratch anymore and stare at the blank screen because AI can provide a good head start by generating initial wireframes or designs that you can easily iterate on.

In the early stages of design, tools like Figma Make and MiroAI can offer inspiration and wireframing suggestions. For example, you can input a prompt, and the AI will generate a wireframe concept for you. This not only saves time but helps designers focus more on refining and improving the design rather than starting from zero.

When it comes to user research, automated notetakers can analyze your user research data and help identify patterns. AI can even assist in unmoderated user testing, asking follow-up questions based on users' responses. This can help simplify the analysis phase and uncover insights more efficiently.

AI also shines during the design phase. Tools like Stark automatically scan designs for accessibility issues, offering suggestions to improve inclusivity. As for generating style guides, AI can look at your existing design and create a style guide based on it, saving designers time and effort.

AI tools are also beneficial where there's a need for quick, efficient design processes across multiple teams. Platforms like Attention Insight can even perform eye-tracking studies to see where users focus most on a webpage, helping optimize designs based on real user behavior. Benefits like this especially come into play when working with big enterprises. For us, this was helpful when working with BMW.

However, when it comes to later stages, especially with more complicated environments like the initial customer journey, AI has some limitations. Still need a human to get the job done!

Using AI tools isn’t about making things easier but about DesignOps teams implementing the right AI tools into the workflow to enhance the design process, ensuring teams work efficiently and productively. Used the right way, AI tools can be game-changers. 

AI tools in action

You might be thinking, isn’t design a creative process? Wouldn’t AI tools take away from creativity? Oftentimes, when you’re starting out with an outline, you’re doing very similar things. Look at using AI like starting with a template and working your way upwards. When it comes to my design processes, I’ve had a couple of experiences where AI really saved me time and effort.

For example, for one project, I had to create an initial customer journey, and instead of starting from scratch, I used an AI tool. I fed the tool all the necessary project details, and it quickly generated an outline for me. Then, in Figma, I was able to use a template, which made building the customer journey super quick. Without that AI help, it would have taken me much longer to reach the same point.

Another example was a more complex project where we were implementing an AI bot based on a knowledge base. Instead of scrolling through tons of links or searching endlessly, the AI bot could directly answer any questions about the tool. It provided step-by-step guidance, so if someone was unsure about how to do something, the bot would walk them through it. This made the whole process much smoother and helped people understand the tool faster.

In both cases, AI sped things up and made the work more accessible for everyone involved. It was a win-win.

When it comes to integrating AI and automation into the design process, it’s all about staying informed and finding the right tools that truly add value to your workflow. There are so many new tools coming out all the time, so it’s important for DesignOps and design teams to keep an eye on these developments. The key is to identify which tools actually make the team more efficient and help improve the overall design process.

Challenges and future trends

Integrating AI and automation into design workflows certainly comes with its own set of challenges, especially when there's some resistance to new technologies. Don't think AI will magically solve all your problems. You first need to have the right data, train the team, and have human oversight over AI to ensure the output is spot-on.

The key to success is choosing the right AI tools and making sure they’re built with quality data. If the AI is fed bad data, the results will be just as bad. Designers also need to get comfortable with these tools and understand how to use them effectively. Most people hate changes. Let them test the new tools and experiment. Even if there’s resistance at first, once people see how much faster and more efficient these tools can make repetitive tasks, they’ll come around.

One trend to watch out for is the shift away from focusing solely on screen design. Instead, design will become more template-based, relying heavily on existing design systems. This approach will make processes faster and allow designers to explore their creativity within more structured guidelines. There’s always something new to learn when working with limitations!

With all that said, while implementing AI into design teams and workflows is inescapable, it’s important to remember design itself won’t be replaced by AI anytime soon. In the future, AI might be able to create designs based on a system you've set up, but the role of a designer will still be crucial. Designers will shift towards managing stakeholders, gathering requirements, and building robust design systems AI can use.

Ultimately, the creative aspect of designing cannot be done without a human touch, and AI will be here to merely help streamline the process and make things more efficient.

Nothing without a human touch

At the end of the day, robots can’t replace humans. Not yet, anyway. When it comes to DesignOps, it’s important to focus on enabling designers to keep the human touch in their process while working efficiently together with AI tools. While AI can be an amazing tool for brainstorming or testing out new ideas based on user feedback, it should never take over the collaborative, human-to-human exchange that’s so crucial in design.

As designers, we still need to engage directly with users, understand their needs, and keep the conversation going. Automation shouldn’t mean isolating ourselves from the people we're designing for. AI can enhance the process, but it can’t replace the importance of those real, human connections. After all, robots don’t know what we want, and that’s what designers are finding out – but they can help us get there.