Cyral Design Style Guide
Establishing design consistency and development efficiency
Project Overview
Duration
1 month
Team
Lead Designer (me), 3 Front-end Engineers, Engineering Manager
Platform
Figma, MaterialUI
As Cyral's first design hire, I inherited a product with significant design inconsistencies and inefficient design-to-development handoffs. The engineering team was spending excessive time interpreting designs and recreating similar components. I created a comprehensive design system that standardized UI patterns, accelerated development cycles, and established scalable design practices for the growing team.
The Challenge
The project presented several key challenges:
- •Inconsistent UI elements across the product with 12+ button variations and misaligned spacing
- •Engineers recreating similar components without reusable standards, leading to technical debt
- •No documentation for design decisions, causing confusion during implementation
- •Lack of scalable design practices as the company prepared for rapid team growth
Research & Discovery
Through comprehensive research and user testing, I uncovered key insights:
Component Audit
Identified 47 unique component variations that could be consolidated into 12 standardized components, with buttons alone having 12 different styles across the product.
Developer Friction
Engineering interviews revealed 40% of development time was spent on UI implementation and design interpretation, rather than core functionality.
The Solution
Design Token Foundation
Established systematic color, typography, and spacing scales that could be consumed by both design tools and code, ensuring perfect design-development alignment.
Component Library & Documentation
Built a comprehensive component library with usage guidelines, code examples, and accessibility standards structured around engineering team needs.
Implementation Partnership
Collaborated directly with front-end engineers to build components in code, establishing governance processes and adoption strategies across product teams.