Five interconnected levels
Diagnose: Design Process & Culture Audit
This should be much broader than reviewing Figma files.
A Design Culture & Maturity Scorecard across dimensions such as User curiosity, Problem framing, Research, Product thinking, Craft, Collaboration, Experimentation, DesignOps, Design systems, Measurement and Leadership. Plus: Current state → desired state → gap → action.
Where design sits in the organisation
Who owns product/design decisions
Designer-to-PM / engineer ratios
Seniority and capability mix
Role clarity
Dependency on founders/product heads
Where ideas originate
How problems get defined
Whether discovery happens before solutioning
How research is conducted
How requirements become designs
PM–Design–Engineering handoffs
Approval bottlenecks
Feedback loops after launch
UX quality
UI consistency
Information architecture
Interaction patterns
Accessibility
Design-system maturity
Are designers order-takers or problem solvers?
Are they allowed to challenge briefs?
How frequently does the team speak to users?
Are hypotheses explicitly stated?
Are failures discussed?
Are product decisions backed by evidence?
Does leadership reward curiosity or speed alone?