In addition to his technical expertise […], he has the ability to inspire his team and create solutions that have a lasting impact across the organization.
Francisco Sánchez Engineering Manager, Pearson Section: A guide by Alberto Calvo
The path to a unified experience language
More than systems, it takes empathy, trust, and shared understanding. Faro reflects on how people learn to see, define, and build together.
Finding direction
This guide brings together lessons from years of real work. Building, breaking, and rebuilding systems with people who care about quality and connection. It’s a space to learn how brand, design, writing, and engineering meet, influence one another, and shape the experience as a whole.
Like any language, its value comes from those connections. The parts matter, but the meaning grows when they work together. When a system can adapt across products, platforms, and contexts without losing its identity, it becomes something teams can trust and grow with. The next sections look at these connections through three dimensions that shape how languages develop and evolve.
Foundations Soon
The guiding star of every system, capturing the spirit behind our decisions. It’s the place we return to when we need to realign, reset, or remember why we build.
Patterns On the horizon
The routes we travel as understanding takes form, where principles meet expression and shared intent becomes tangible through the details that shape every interaction.
Learning from experience
I built my career by moving between Brand, Design, Content, and Engineering and helping them work together. My time at companies like Maze, Cabify, or Sketch showed me how much craft, communication, and care a team needs to create work that feels coherent and supportive.
I made plenty of mistakes along the way. I learned from people who saw things differently, from teams that challenged my assumptions, and from a community generous enough to share its lessons in the open. Faro is my way of giving something back. It’s a place to share what I learned about staying curious, raising the bar, and helping others do their best work together.
Exploring hidden treasures in Iceland
- Francisco Sánchez Engineering Manager, Pearson
Alberto is an inspiration because of his passion for striving for the best. His enthusiasm and dedication motivate everyone around him, including myself.
Fran Pérez Product Designer, DuckDuckGo His proactive approach and ability to think critically about both the big picture and the finer details made a significant impact on the success of our projects.
Harvey Johal Director of Platform, Maze
Putting clarity into motion
That way of thinking grew into a clearer vision during my time at Cabify, where I helped spark a shift in how teams worked together. Brand, Design, Content, and Engineering began to align around one shared language that connected every touchpoint. Acting as a catalyst between teams, I worked to build coherence across products, platforms, and channels through Marshal, the multi platform and omnichannel system I led behind our apps, website, and campaigns, which became the foundation for the 2021 brand redesign.
The real magic happens when disciplines work together to create a unified experience language. Graphic heavily inspired by Trent Walton.
Around that time, Patrycja Rozmus’s talk on multidimensional design systems gave words to what I was already practicing. Systems reach their full potential when all disciplines move together with shared purpose.
At Maze, with the trust and sponsorship of Roger Bretos, our VP of Experience Design, and an incredible cross-functional team, we could take that thinking further. We strengthened the relationship between Design, Content, and Engineering, building a culture where ownership and learning were shared across disciplines, where ideas took shape together instead of moving in sequence. Here’s what the team says about the experience:
He helped us move from isolated choices to seeing how things connected across the system. As we shaped the foundations together, the work made sense in a way we all shared and the decisions that followed became easier.
Philip Bordallo UX Engineer, Assembled Alberto’s design approach has a strong ethical foundation, welcoming all disciplines. Through his leadership, I gained a whole new perspective on what it means to be a designer, which has forever changed the way I approach my work.
Aleksandra Kosicka UX & Content Design Manager, Justpoint He proved to be an incredible mentor, offering coaching and guidance while showing deep knowledge of design foundations, team collaboration, and genuine care for the people he worked with.
Luis Recuero Product Designer, Maze
You don’t need every dimension in place to begin. Start small, stay intentional, and keep the horizon wide. Systems grow through collaboration and care, and once they do, they shape culture as much as they shape the experiences we create.
Sharing what we learn
This space gathers old conversations, articles, and talks that explore how systems thinking, collaboration, and care shape better experiences. Each piece reflects a different moment in my journey and offers lessons from practice, shared openly for anyone who might find them useful.
Faro doesn’t have all the answers, and it will keep evolving, just like the systems and people it speaks about. New ideas will take shape here: reflections on practice, shared lessons from others, and small discoveries from everyday work.
If any of this resonates, I’d love to hear from you. Share your perspective, challenge a thought, or simply say hi. The best ideas usually start as conversations.