Reony Tonneyck
Design Systems Aficionado
Empowering people's lives through what I design while fostering a culture of kindness + mindfulness with those around me.
Enjoy the chill track while you settle in...
A little about me ๐
Hi! I hope this finds you well. I've been a designer for 15 years in various domains, including cybersecurity, education, and data analytics.
My role at Command Zero combines design systems + shaping the direction of product design.
Previously, I was shepherding Design Systems at Khan Academy. While there, I developed a strong interest in WCAG Accessibility guidelines to help make the internet a more inclusive place for all! It's become a critical part of my design principles.
Among others, I led design system efforts at multiple start-ups, along-side leading product design + contributing to front-end development.
Co-founded the Friends of Figma, DC area community group and became a Figma Community Advocate!
Otherwise I'm...
A family man โข Supporter of local/small business โข Gamer โข EV enthusiast โข Doing yoga, hiking, and enjoying good food (in that order)
Looking for my work? Scroll on down.๐
My Work
๐ป After 6 months, v2.1 of my Wireframe Kit is finally here! ๐It's been a labor of love over many months, particularly during some challenging times in my life. Despite that, it brought me immense joy and inspiration while building it.It's always an invaluable learning experience along the way. Huge thanks for your support! ๐ซถ Until the next one...
Last updated Sept 2023
My Values
Empowering
Purposeful
Trustworthy
Inclusive
Adaptive
My Principles
1) Serving you, not the system
Community before rules. Support over governance.Be of service to your consumers by making their lives easier, not more difficult. Of course, the system needs guidelines so it doesnโt implode. But avoid the system becoming the โbestโ or โonlyโ way to do something. Design systems are about people.
2) Show, donโt (only) tell
Best practices are way more effective (and efficient) by showing actual examples, especially when maintaining and adopting them.My favorite way to do this is by building a "Patterns" template library directly in Figma. This ends up being a nice way to create a visual collection as well!
3) Aim for unity, not uniformity
Consistency for the sake of consistency can hinder a systemโs adoption and product scalability, causing a blocker on itself.When a system is easy to use and modular, people will naturally end up using it in similar ways, resulting in a consistent user experience.
4) Discard the unnecessary and refine what remains
The more you add, the more you have to maintain. Itโs also much easier to add versus remove something.Ask yourself (and the team) โ โIs this absolutely necessary? Can this be reused across products, brands/themes, and platforms? Will consumers be able to discover this?โ
5) Embrace an inclusive mindset
Accessibility (or A11y) has become a passionate topic of mine in recent years (especially thanks to my time leading design systems at Khan Academy). A11y should naturally be part of your requirements and lifecycle, not simply a checkbox at the end.Oftentimes, Iโve found that this can get everyone to think outside the box and create innovative solutions. Additionally, accessible experiences can help ensure that they're usable by more people. This can be a big plus for businesses, which means they can reach a larger audience.
โน๏ธ Note |
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~ 6% of Americans end up with temporary or situational impairments. That's roughly 20M people. 1 |
An estimated 1.3 billion people, about 16% of the global population โ experience significant disability. 2 |
6) Donโt lack faith in your consumers
I have to occasionally remind myself that if I stop trusting the designers to use the components accessibly or โcorrectly,โ it can create a โchoke holdโ force move on their creativity. ๐ซต This might seem like a bright idea at first, but Iโve found that in the long run, it causes reluctance and (dare I say) detaching from the system.The system should empower others with the knowledge and tools to solve problems without being โhand-heldโ by the design systems team.
7) Composability over control
This one has been challenging to verbalize, so bear with meโฆFor context โ "Composability" refers to the ability of design system components to be easily assembled, combined, and reconfigured to create larger, more complex designs (or organisms if weโre talking about atomic design). That means components are modular and flexible, ideally.
As with many things in life, balance is key, but finding that sweet spot is tough.Too much composability becomes a hassle to use (and maintain), often causing components to be โover-engineered.โ Something I try my best to avoid. Too little of it, and the system feels rigid, limiting creativity.John Resig once told me, โDeviations will only cause more tech debt, which causes less opportunity for the design system team to focus on creating new components or bug fixes.โ This really resonated with me and is a great business perspective on this principle.
Footnotes:
1 Source: United States Census Bureau, Limbs for Life Foundation, Amputee Coalition, MedicineHealth.com, CDC.gov, Disability Statistics Center at the UCSF
2 FastStats - Disabilities or Limitations (CDC)