Principles and Introduction

Background

In 2019, the Strategic Communications Branch established the Digital Transformation Program to improve the experience of people using Queensland Health websites.

This program was an opportunity to take a step back and focus on the needs of Queenslanders who rely on online information and services from Queensland Health. With over 50 websites in the portfolio, many of which are outdated and inconsistent, there are many opportunities to address the factors that currently impact people’s experience.

It was identified that a key challenge for the development, standardisation and support for websites for Queensland Government Departments was the lack of a Design System. The federal government had introduced the DTA's Design System and acted as an inspiration for other states and territories to follow suit, with NSW and SA leading the pack.

The recommendation from the Qld Health team was for a Design System to be developed or adapted and adopted. In reviewing existing Design Systems, it was determined that we should start from an existing Design System and then refit to suit our proposes.

In the process of this work, Qld Health reached out to Department of Housing and Public Works, and it was determined that the work undertaken by Qld Health could be looked at as a proof of concept for wider Qld Government adoption. With that lens in mind the Qld Health Design System was developed with a whole of government focus.

What is a Design System?

A Design System is a collection of reusable components, guided by clear standards, that can be assembled to build any number of applications and provide a consistent look and feel across an organisation’s digital properties.

A Design System typically contains the following:

• a library of pre-designed components to use as building blocks to build your site
• guidelines on the best practice use of components, usage of colours, fonts, branding etc based on Brand foundations
• guidelines on content design (including style manuals).

A Design System allows us to simplify the process of building websites, removing wasted effort in establishing basic principles of look and feel and allows us efficiency in the maintenance of our web properties.

Why does Qld need a Design System?

The Queensland Government, like any organisation, needs to project a unified and consistent visual identity both internally and externally. Typically, organisations lead this consistency with brand guidelines, but a Design System picks up where your brand guidelines leave off.
It's a living resource that provides a central repository of design components intended to make your design teams more efficient and your digital products more consistent and creates consistency and harmony within the product and brand ecosystem.

• It creates a unified language within and across teams
• It creates visual consistency across (potentially siloed) products, channels and services
• It provides an economy of scale by stopping designers and developers re-inventing the wheel (building 26 different versions of a button, text field)
• It simplifies accessibility by having a suite of tested and accessible components
• It quickens development by providing components, patterns and templates that can be picked up and used by development teams

How was the Design System developed?

The Qld Gov Design System originated as the Qld Health Design System and was based originally on the Digital Transformation Agency’s Design System built for the Australian Government. This Design System was launched in 2018 and serves as the basis of many federal government sites.

The Digital Transformation team took a version of the DTA Design System as our base and then conducted a comprehensive review of each component against Design Systems in each state and territory within Australia as well as international industry leaders such as the UK Gov Design System and commercial Design Systems such as Google’s Material Design, IBM Carbon etc.

Through this process we’ve incorporated a best of breed approach to our Design System, expanding on the original components and developing best practice implementations with a focus on accessibility, usability and putting user needs first.

The Qld Health Design System has now been adopted to form the base of a Qld State Design System, working in concert with the Customer and Digital Group of the Department of Communities, Housing and Digital Economy.