Finding Your Place in a Crowded Space

Origins

Figma was founded back in 2012 by Dylan Field and Evan Wallace, two computer science students who met at Brown University. Field was the chair of the Computer Science Department Undergraduate Group whilst Wallace supported him as teaching assistant.

Both Field and Wallace undertook internships at prestigious organizations such as Microsoft and LinkedIn. Following this, Field became a Thiel Fellow, meaning he received funding and mentorship from a team led by serial entrepreneur and venture backer Peter Thiel, to create a startup.

Whilst considering multiple options, Field landed on the need to build a browser-based graphics editor.

The aim was to make design available to anyone, anywhere all on a browser. The vision was to break down design in collaboration, allowing teams to work together in real-time without over-engineered or cost prohibitive software.

At first this appeared an already crowded space to get into, but when looking deeper, there was a clear and untapped need within the graphics and design market for simplicity, teamwork and greater democratization, and Field believed he was the one to address it.

Key events in Figma’s history

Figma and arguably it’s most established rival, Adobe planned to merge, which was eventually blocked by regulators due to concerns about their potential to monopolize the design and creative industry.

When this merger fell apart, Figma began filing documents for a potential IPO (initial public offering) in 2025, which would bring them to the public markets and will no doubt attract greater public scrutiny over how the business is run.

The fact that market leader Adobe took Figma seriously enough to want to merge, alongside Figma’s market valuation of $12.5 billion in 2024, it’s undeniable that the team at Figma are doing something right when it comes to product market fit and organizing their teams to execute consistently and effectively.

So, how did they refine their product to captivate their audience?

You’re doing breakfast wrong

Let’s face it—most breakfast options just don’t cut it.

Toast? Too light. Cereal? Mostly sugar. Skipping it altogether? Not ideal.

If you want real fuel to power your day, it’s time to upgrade to Huel Black Edition. This ready-in-seconds shake is packed with 40g of plant-based protein, 27 essential vitamins & minerals, and 0 artificial sweeteners—just science-backed nutrition to support your muscles, digestion, and more.

Oh, and did we mention? It’s delicious.

Right now, first-time customers get 15% off, plus a free t-shirt and shaker with code HUELSPRING, for orders over $75.

Find your fuel

As you would expect from a team that aimed for the right product market fit, Figma focussed on understanding user needs at a deep level, investing significant time and resources on the experience of their early users including identifying and doubling down on features that were working particularly well, whilst acknowledging and promptly addressing areas that needed improvements.

Creating an opportunity to collect real-time feedback and turning around responses to valuable feedback are hallmarks of teams that want to succeed in building exactly what users need, to gain mass adoption and delighted users.

Figma did not disappoint, as this is exactly what they did, by capitalizing on detailed user feedback and putting the mechanisms in place to innovate with new features and releases at a pace that was difficult for competitors to match.

The power of community did not go unnoticed, as Figma focussed on building a loyal fan base and making sure the fans were listened to and involved in the evolving product development lifecycle.

Bringing users on the journey is a very powerful tactic that helps both parties, as the product delivery team gain valuable information early, before investing heavily in features that may not gain traction, whilst committed users who give feedback grow their affinity with the brand and are more likely to stay with the product and promote it to others.

As Figma caught traction, some key stand out features emerged, which enabled a snowball effect and eventually became catalysts for mass user adoption:

Real-time Collaboration

• Allowing multiple users to work on the same design simultaneously from any location without having to download specific software.

• Live feedback and note taking. Different types of team members from designers, software developers and wider stakeholders who have a say in the look and feel can all contribute or take direction for build all in one place. This reduced the risk of errors and increased efficiency when teams were iterating design and development.

Cross-Platform Accessibility

• The ability for Figma users to work from any device on any major operating system enabled such a powerful tool to become accessible to virtually anyone.

• This was made possible by Figma being browser-based, and lowered the barriers to entry from a hardware perspective as it could run on most computing devices.

• Identifying and acting on the preference for users to work together simultaneously on designs helped adoption, and also highlighted how much more time efficient working together on a design can be for teams. This was due to the reduced errors and faster turn around times of design iterations.

• Anyone could join without having technical abilities, or without the need for extensive tuition on how to use the software.

Design systems and components

• Figma made it much easier to create, manage and collaborate design systems and component libraries, reducing workload for related projects by creating consistency. Any changes were made instantly, which also reduced workload and maintained accuracy.

In an effort to position themselves for further greatness, Figma have also made strategic acquisitions, buying out Modyfi in 2025. The AI-enabled design platform allowed Figma to expand their offering with advanced AI and further real-time collaboration capabilities.

There are times when speed to market may involve acquiring products that fits the strategy of the business, and more importantly, integrating talented people who fit the direction and culture of your business.

Speaking of team culture, what is it that makes Figma tick?

Figma prides itself on a culture of collaboration and not standing still. It’s clear that their culture is lived out in the product itself, which is built for collaborators who innovate together.

Key elements of Figma’s culture include:

Sustainable growth:

• Many silicon Valley businesses are known for burn out, presenteeism and sometimes toxic cultures. Whilst I’m sure Figma isn’t perfect, their focus on team wellbeing is certainly a trait that helped them thrive.

• When individuals suffer, the whole team suffers, therefore it is important for teams to take care of the wellbeing of their team members, to help them, and of course to enable the team to thrive. Great products are not delivered by individuals, but by motivated teams aligned to a common and inspiring purpose.

Inclusivity and ongoing learning:

• The team hold weekly “Tech Talks”, to bring people up to speed with the technology landscape, mentoring for new starters to enable them to settle in to what is expected, and clear open feedback.

• Having a culture of open feedback is essential for continued improvements for individuals, teams and the products they deliver. I’ve been part of teams where feedback is sugar coated and the desired impact of the feedback is not achieved for fear of hurting someone’s feelings.

• The consistency to keep delivering innovation requires healthy and focussed teams, therefore it is vital that the wellbeing of the team is properly managed, to support the need for sustained innovation and delivery cadence.

“Lift your Dreams”:

• This part of Figma’s culture encourages seeking and acting on mentorship, supporting each other and building team success, over individual success.

• When done right, this is a powerful mindset, as it requires inclusivity and selflessness.

• In order to achieve this cultural theme, team members must also not be too precious about their feelings or egos, and instead focus on their ongoing contributions to the success of the wider business.

Figma organizes it’s product delivery teams to help them live out the culture and bring it to life in the features and innovations they release. Key aspects of their delivery approaches include:

Rapid Iteration:

• You may already be used to the term MVP (Minimal viable product), which depicts the minimal outputs a team needs to release for useful benefits without waiting for the full solution, however, have you heard of MAPs?

• For Figma, MAPs are Minimally awesome Products. They are early features that work VERY well, and can be built on iteratively thereafter. This says to me that just delivering something that works is not good enough, it needs to be “Minimally Awesome!” This shift in mindset empowers teams to aim for excellence in every release, however small or early in they are in the product lifecycle.

Cross functional by nature:

• At Figma, product managers, designers, engineers and all other team members from different parts of the business work together closely and are not removed from each other’s roles in the product delivery.

• Rather than focus on departmental needs, the priority is on the product needs, and for the team to work as one, irrespective of where they fit in the organization structure. This reduces the overhead caused by departmental bureaucracy, and improves speed to market.

Transparency and inclusiveness:

• The culture of inclusiveness and trust is brought to life in how the teams organize themselves to deliver with excellence.

• Ways of working involve trust between team members to own and deliver their work, openness to call out and resolve problems, and knowledge share amongst members of each team and across teams, so that anyone in the company can learn from anyone else.

Customer Centric:

Most businesses that provide a service will tell you they are customer centric, but what does that mean in reality? It should assume they focus their whole business around what matters to the customers and ensure their services are continually evolving to serve their customers as proactively as they can.

In reality, many businesses say they are customer centric but allow bureaucracy or lack of innovation to dictate how effective their services can become.

Figma, does take its customer centricity very seriously.

They apply a voice of the customer initiative to collect, analyze and act on user feedback from a diverse range of channels.

The feedback loops are a clear way to listen to actual customer concerns and needs, ensuring backlogs and plans prioritize those over the desires of an executive or Product Manager.

As part of this process, employees at all levels make sure they interact with users and actively observe how the product is being used, rather than being removed from the action. This focus on direct user engagement extends even to the CEO.

An underserved “niche” market can be much larger than you think

It would have been very easy for Figma to concede that the design tool market was already owned by larger players who commanded large premiums for complex professional design teams. Just because companies like Adobe had already “won” the market, it didn’t mean the users were completely satisfied with the products.

There were many shortcomings with the status quo but the issues were implicit, as there were very few alternatives for professional designers to lean towards, creating a perception that everything was just fine, and that there was no market for disruption.

Figma had the intuition and skill to see the opportunity and build an improved product that was easier to use, but they also had the foresight to identify the implicit yet significant needs, and build the systems to address them.

What needs exist in the solutions you are building that can lead to opportunities to improve or even recreate your products?

Technology and problem must both exist to succeed

If browser-based working were not possible, and internet bandwidth did not allow, Figma, as with countless other software companies, would not have been possible.

There are may occasion where great ideas did not succeed due to poor timing. They were simply too early, for example, one of the first social media companies was Friendster, which released in 2002. They struggled to gain traction due to the slow performance of internet speed as a result of the infrastructure still being in it’s infancy. By the time internet speeds improved, competitors such as Facebook were set up to innovate more rapidly and ultimately dominate.

Figma timed their entry correctly, as browser technology and internet bandwidth allowed them to provide the level of service that users demanded in order for the product to work.

Wellbeing is real

It is actually possible to work at pace, innovate fast and take care of your wellbeing all at the same time. It appears to work for Figma, even though many of their peers may apply more pressure on their teams, yet innovate less frequently.

The key is focussing on the absolute priorities, rather than working on many initiatives at once. If you’re not sure what your priorities should be, get closer to your customers, they will be happy to let you know!

I suspect this is how Figma remains truly customer centric, gains product market fit, and balances the wellbeing of their team, as they appear to be focussed on the right priorities based on interacting with customers, whilst being mindful of team wellbeing.

More from CLP: