Google Case Study - Gabe Campbell
Lumin Digital • 2021 - Present Google • 2020 - 2021 BMW • 2018 - 2020

Unifying 50M Users Under One Design

How I led visual unification across engineering-driven teams, creating consistency and coherence for products serving over 50 million daily users through design system leadership.

50M+ Daily Users
5 Product Teams
98% Consistency Score

The Challenge

Google's emerging products division was brilliant at engineering but struggling with design coherence across teams.

Five different teams. Five different design approaches. Zero consistency. Users were confused when moving between products, and the brand experience was fragmented. Each team had developed their own patterns, components, and visual language in isolation.

As an engineering-led organization, design often took a backseat to functionality. We needed to prove that great design could enhance their technical excellence, not slow it down—while navigating the ambiguity of emerging AI products.

The Solution

A unified design system that celebrated engineering while elevating the user experience.

🎨

Visual Language

Created a cohesive visual system that worked across all products while allowing for product-specific needs and emerging AI capabilities.

🧩

Component Library

Built 234 modular components that engineers could easily implement without sacrificing their development velocity or innovation speed.

📐

Design Principles

Established clear principles that guided decisions and helped teams make consistent choices independently in ambiguous situations.

🤝

Cross-Team Process

Created collaborative workflows that brought engineering and design together from concept to launch, crucial for AI products.

The Process

Leading through ambiguity to create order from chaos.

Week 1-4: Discovery & Alignment

Interviewed 25+ engineers and designers across teams. Discovered deep mistrust between design and engineering. First design review was brutal - "This will slow us down by months."

Week 5-8: Failed Prototype

Created rigid design system. Teams rejected it immediately. Realized I was solving the wrong problem - they needed flexibility, not rules. Pivoted to modular approach.

Week 9-16: Building Trust

Embedded with engineering teams. Learned their workflows, pain points. Co-created components WITH them, not FOR them. First successful implementation in Assistant team.

Week 17-24: Scaling Success

Other teams saw Assistant's velocity increase. Voluntary adoption began. System evolved based on real usage. Engineering became biggest advocates.

Week 25-44: Full Implementation

Rolled out across all 5 teams. Established design review process. Created self-service tools. Teams shipping 73% faster with better quality.

The Transformation

From chaos to coherence in 11 months.

Before
✕ 5 different design languages
✕ No shared components
✕ Siloed team decisions
✕ Inconsistent user experience
✕ 3-week design cycles
After
✓ Unified design system
✓ 234 shared components
✓ Weekly design syncs
✓ 98% consistency score
✓ 5-day design sprints

Design Leadership

Influencing without authority across a 12-person cross-functional team.

🎯

Strategic Alignment

Presented design system ROI to VPs. Showed how consistency would accelerate AI feature development. Secured buy-in by speaking their language: velocity and scale.

🏗️

Systems Thinking

Designed components that could adapt to unknown AI capabilities. Built flexibility into the system for features we couldn't yet imagine.

🧑‍🏫

Team Development

Mentored 5 junior designers in systems thinking. Created "Design System Champions" program. Designers became force multipliers across teams.

📊

Measuring Impact

Established metrics beyond pixels. Tracked development velocity, user task completion, support tickets. Data proved design's business value.

The Unified Visual Framework

Blue
Red
Yellow
Green

The system balanced Google's iconic colors with sophisticated neutrals, creating a professional yet approachable aesthetic that worked across all products while accommodating emerging AI interfaces.

The Impact

Measurable improvements in both user experience and team efficiency.

98% Consistency Score
73% Faster Implementation
5→1 Design Languages
234 Shared Components
"The design system didn't just unify our products – it unified our teams. Engineering and design finally spoke the same language."
— Engineering Lead, Emerging Products

Key Learnings

What unifying 50M users taught me about design at scale.

Start with empathy, not enforcement.

Understanding why teams made different choices was crucial to finding solutions that worked for everyone. Authority comes from value, not title.

Make it easier, not mandatory.

The system succeeded because it made teams' lives easier, not because it was required. Adoption through attraction beats compliance.

Embrace engineering culture.

By speaking their language and understanding their constraints, design became a valued partner in innovation.

Design for the unknown.

Building flexibility into the system allowed it to accommodate AI features we couldn't yet imagine. Ambiguity is a design constraint.

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