Figma administration: What no one will tell you…
I didn’t actually set out originally to become a Figma administrator (much less the primary one) in my company, HP Inc. The need and circumstances just arose as they sometimes do, and now I am the primary point of contact for over 12,000 users. I found that there is next to nothing written on this topic aside from what appears in Figma’s how-to documentation, so I thought I’d kick things off.
It’s been about six months now, and I’ve learned a lot from my travels. With that, I’d like to share a few things that I have found to be critical and should help you whether you are administering a small team of under 10 people, or an enterprise of thousands of users.
Manage your (and everyone else’s) expectations for the role
No matter what kind of organization you work in, Figma administration will take more time than you expect…way more. Unless your company hired you specifically to manage Figma (which is very rare), you will probably be doing this alongside your regular job.
At a small company, the work may begin with the occasional seat upgrade or new user request. A seat here, a user there…no big deal, right? Then a handful of users becomes hundreds, and hundreds become thousands. Not long after, that “small” responsibility can become a full-time job in its own right. At an Enterprise scale, you may spend four to six hours a day, several days a week, working on Figma-related issues.
Make sure your manager and leadership understand what the role actually involves. Keep them informed about your workload, progress, recurring requests, and emerging risks. Eventually, your organization may need someone performing a design operations role, or specifically dedicated to Figma (and other software you control) or even several people contributing part time. The more your leadership understands the work, the easier it will be to get help when the time comes. Trust me, eventually you’ll need that leadership buy-in.
Focus on fundamentals, not features
If you are going to be able to help anyone as a Figma administrator, you need a thorough understanding of the fundamental constructs of Figma.
Notice: I didn’t say “thorough understanding of Figma.” To be a decent Figma administrator, and to not waste a lot of your own time, and the folks you‘re trying help, you need to have a good grasp on larger topics to answer questions like these:
- “Someone left our team without transferring workspace administration. What do we do?”
- “How can I recover a former teammate’s draft file after the account was removed?”
- “What is the difference between a Full seat and a Dev seat?”
To answer these questions, you need to understand key concepts, like organizations, workspaces, teams, folders, permissions, seat types, and ownership. Designers can ask their managers or teammates how to build a component. You are responsible for making sure the larger system works for them.
You also need to stay on top of changes, because updates move quickly in Figma. Terminology changes; features move. Something that made perfect sense last month may suddenly be called something else. It does happen. For example, just a month ago (as of the writing of this article) “Folders” were called “Projects” and couldn’t be nested. Imagine my initial confusion when someone asked me to help them set up a “Connected Folder” for some agency users.
Know how your organization works
How broad is that advice? “Know how your organization works.” Let me narrow it down: you need to understand how your company handles software management, legal and security requirements, procurement, and organizational structure.
Organizational structure
How do teams, business units, budgets, and billing groups relate to one another? This context helps you route requests, assign costs correctly, and explain why a “quick change” may need four people and three approvals.
Software management
How does your company manage software? Is license management centralized? Does each business unit handle its own tools? Or does it all come down to you and perhaps your manager keeping track of a handful of seats? Know who can approve changes, who owns the budget, where your authority begins and ends, and (often most importantly) where authority hasn’t been defined.
Legal and security
Are there policies — or even laws — you need to follow for cybersecurity, confidentiality, information assurance, data handling, or external collaboration? In a large organization, the easiest administrative option is not always the option you are allowed to use. Learn the boundaries before you slam into them. If you’re in an organization with specialized legal or IT experts, consider reaching out to them.
Procurement
How is software purchased by your company? Is it as simple as your boss handing you a company card and asking you to buy a few more seats? Maybe. In an enterprise, however, you may be dealing with purchase orders, contract schedules, finance teams, procurement departments, and lengthy approval processes. Plan ahead. Purchasing software can take much longer than you think, and contracts run on schedules and deadlines whether you are ready or not.
Take advantage of the overview
There will come a point when you realize something: as a Figma administrator, you can see an extraordinary amount of what is happening across your organization. Think about what that means, especially if your company has large-scale design operations.
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You have a one-of-a-kind view into how design work happens across your organization. Used responsibly, that perspective creates several opportunities:
- Operational insight: You begin to understand how budgets, purchasing, security requirements, and business units connect.
- Cross-functional relationships: You are sitting at the intersection of design, development, software management, finance, procurement, and project management. You will end up building an unusually large network almost by accident.
- Pattern recognition: After seeing enough teams and requests, you will start noticing where people get stuck, which problems repeat, and where processes could be simplified.
- Organizational influence: You become a connector rather than merely a participant: someone who can bring the right people together and advocate for better systems for everyone.
There are so many times in life that we feel like cogs in a greater machine. This is one of those instances where a role grants you the ability to influence or make changes to improve systems for everyone.
People Admin and the Activity Panel: Your Best Friends
Each tool has a specific purpose, but together they answer the two questions administrators face constantly: What is happening now, and how did we get here?
The people and activity admin are two areas in the Figma administrator interface that you will use every day.
- People admin: This area gives you an overview of each user in your team, their seat type, billing group, when they last accessed Figma, and a quick listing of all of their recent activities. I am here every single day, upgrading or downgrading seats, seeing if a user belongs to a billing group, or downloading a CSV to perform any additional detective work.
- Activity panel. I often get asked the same question: “just how much can you see in Figma, Jason?” Well…pretty much everything. The activity panel shows a wide -range of events that can be searched by user and date range. Can’t remember when you upgraded someone from a View seat to a Full Seat? The activity panel has you covered. Are you wondering when a specific setting was changed? Yes, you can do that. Wondering when someone last viewed a document, or made changes? You better believe it.
Plan for scale before you need it
The structures that work for a small group can become incredibly painful at the enterprise scale. Take time to plan your billing groups, naming conventions, ownership practices, and escalation paths before growth makes them difficult to change. Future you will be grateful.
Document the things you do repeatedly and review your settings regularly. Create a rhythm for checking seats, billing assignments, permissions, external access, and key administrative settings. A short, consistent audit is much easier than a massive cleanup after problems have been piling up for months.
Stay current. There are questions…lots of questions. Take advantage of training from Figma, your peers, and your own company. You do not need to memorize every answer, you just need to know where to find a reliable one quickly.
Reach out to others
Figma makes plenty of resources available through its website, but as an administrator, you probably have more help available than you realize.
- Figma Representative: If you have an organizational or Enterprise account, you likely already have a Figma partner. They can often answer questions about billing, technical support, general questions, or connect you with people who can. If you’re just getting started in an administrative role and have a Figma partner assigned to your company, I would recommend reaching out to them and connecting at your earlier convenience.
- Your fellow administrators: It might go without saying: sometimes you need to lean on others within your team. If there is more than one individual managing Figma, or your organization contains seasoned Figma pros, it may be beneficial to reach out for help, especially when you’re just getting started.
- Your users: Users are often a goldmine of insights. As I said previously, as a Figma administrator, you’re going to eventually see patterns pop up in the usage of the software, requests training, or just general questions. These insights will let you not only know your user base better, but also craft resources and solutions that better cater to their needs and make everyone’s lives easier.
- Your cross-functional partners: Know the people who manage procurement, finance, security, legal review, identity systems, and software portfolios. Many Figma problems cannot be solved inside Figma.
Get help when you need it and give help when you can. Administration works best as a network, not as a solo activity.
Prepare for a case of mistaken identity
I can’t tell you how many times our users mistake us for true departmental software managers, procurement personnel, or finance professionals. In this role, we wear many hats. We may be talking to a group of users about their seat needs, purchases orders, or billing groups, all in one hour.
When other designers and developers realize that you are not a procurement or finance professional, they are always amazed. Once again: design operations is a full-time job, in addition to your normal full-time job. You do not need to become an expert in every discipline. You do need to know enough to identify the real problem, explain what happens next, and connect the requester with the right resources.
People often know less than you think and so will you. Have patience.
I deal with ignorance every day. Most often, the ignorance is my own. Maybe this is the former college professor in me talking, but I think we have unfairly turned “ignorance” into an insult. At its core, ignorance simply means that you do not know something yet. Think about the first time you’ve learned something, and the light bulb in your head turned on.
As a Figma administrator, you will receive requests about nearly every subject imaginable. In a few months, you may learn more about how Figma operates than many users learn in years. At first, however, you will not know many of the answers. That is okay. You will learn. Be patient with yourself, especially in the beginning. Be patient with your users, too. They are usually just trying to solve a problem and do their jobs as well as they can.
Conclusion
Figma administration is not simply a collection of settings and support emails. It is a strange, cross-functional mixture of platform knowledge, governance, procurement, communication, investigation, and service.
The work can become much bigger than you expect, especially as adoption grows. But here is the upside: the role gives you a rare view of how design operates across an organization. It puts you in a position to improve the systems, relationships, and processes that make that work possible.
So go into it with your eyes open. Learn the fundamentals. Understand how your organization works. Build relationships before you need them. Plan for scale. Stay current. And above all, have patience with your users, with the organization, and with yourself.
You’ve got this.
Author: Jason Occhipinti
Editors: Aaron Schmelzer, Andrei Garcia
Illustrations: Natalie Metzger
