A Simple Design System Canvas for Resource-Constrained Startups

Have you ever noticed how many new tech startups are popping up lately? We are in the middle of a major digital shift, and the growth of new businesses in Indonesia alone is incredible. But behind the scenes, I saw a recurring problem where many of these startups operate on a very small scale. They rely heavily on digital platforms to run their daily operations, but they constantly hit a wall when it comes to funding and human resources.

I realized these small teams needed a practical way to keep their websites and apps looking consistent and friendly for their users. Good design systems help create consistent interfaces and better user experiences, but building one can demand time and resources that a small team cannot easily spare. At the time, I was also watching people around me compete to establish startups, with some succeeding and many others struggling to survive in an increasingly competitive environment. To me, that made the question feel particularly relevant: If every resource matters, what does a small team actually need from a design system?

Finding the Essentials

To explore that question, I reviewed how established technology companies build their design systems in practice. I examined design systems from Apple, Gojek, Google, IBM, Mailchimp, Microsoft, and Shopify, identifying 12 visual elements that appeared consistently across them. However, a small startup does not need to reproduce the complexity of a global enterprise, so I wanted to understand which elements were actually essential for smaller teams.

I interviewed 12 professionals working in various UI and UX roles across startups in Indonesia to compare those observations with their actual workflows and experiences. We discussed which parts of a design system were fundamental to their daily work and which were less important. Interestingly, several features I initially expected to matter, such as dark mode, were considered unnecessary, while only a small number of participants considered a theme color essential for a basic design system.

Solution

The findings led me to narrow the framework to three fundamental visual elements comprising 11 essential components. These three core elements are color, typography, and illustration. I then turned those findings into a visual mapping tool inspired by the Business Model Canvas, which I called the Simple Design System Canvas.

The Canvas was my proposed solution to the problem I had been investigating. Instead of asking a small team to construct an elaborate design system from the beginning, it gives founders and designers a way to define their essential visual guidelines on a single page. I have continued using it whenever I need to establish a design system quickly, including during hackathons and while working on a startup with my friends. I have also introduced it to close friends and mentees when it fits their needs.

What started as an exploration of how small teams could work with limited resources eventually became a design product that remained useful beyond the research itself. For me, that is what made the investigation worthwhile. The research did not simply describe what a resource-constrained startup might need. It gave me enough understanding to create something I could actually put to work.