Mastering the AI System Design Methodology
Mastering the AI-First System Design Methodology is a must-attend talk for developers and architects seeking to elevate their system design capabilities in the era of intelligent systems. In this dynamic 90-minute session, attendees will embark on a comprehensive journey through the foundational principles of modern system design—now reimagined for AI integration—with a practical focus on the C4 model and its application to AI-enabled architectures.
This session is designed to equip professionals with the frameworks and tools necessary to build scalable, efficient, AI-aware systems that deliver lasting impact in a rapidly evolving digital ecosystem.
We'll begin by exploring the critical importance of understanding business requirements and stakeholder intent—an essential step in designing systems that align human values with machine intelligence. From there, we’ll guide attendees through a structured, AI-augmented design methodology: from stakeholder engagement and context modeling to system decomposition and refinement using LLMs and generative AI assistants.
Each stage will be brought to life with real-world examples, hands-on exercises, and interactive discussions—demonstrating how AI can accelerate ideation, automate documentation, optimize decisions, and identify design flaws early in the process.
Special focus will be given to incorporating empathy maps, value chain analysis, and customer journey mapping, enhanced with AI-driven pattern recognition and predictive insights. These tools enable deeper understanding of user behavior and business dynamics, resulting in more responsive and adaptive system architectures.
Whether you're a seasoned architect embracing AI-driven transformation or a developer ready to future-proof your design thinking, this talk will deliver actionable insights into building robust, intelligent, and human-centric systems. Join us to reimagine system design through the lens of AI—and become a key innovator in your organization’s AI-first journey.
The Importance of System Design
- The role of system design in software development
- Examples of project successes and failures
Overview of System Design Methodology
- Introduction to System Design Methodology
- The C4 Model: Context, Containers, Components, and Code
Deep Dive into the Methodology Stages
* Engage with Business Stakeholders
* Techniques for engagement and prioritization
* Case Study: A startup's journey to understand market needs
* Identify Vital Business Capabilities
* Mapping business capabilities
* Case Study: Streamlining operations for a logistics company
* Understand the Internal and External Personas
* Using empathy maps and customer journey mapping
* Case Study: Designing a healthcare app with patient and provider personas
* Develop a New Value Proposition
* Crafting value propositions
* Case Study: Innovating retail experience with a new e-commerce platform
* Define Solution Architecture
* Detailing architecture and capability modules
* Case Study: Architectural overhaul for a financial services firm
* Define Component Process Flows
* Visualizing interactions and process flows
* Case Study: Enhancing the order fulfillment process for an online retailer
* Review, Refine, and Finalize
* Consolidating insights and preparing for implementation
* Case Study: Finalizing and launching a new feature for a social media platform
About Rohit Bhardwaj
Rohit Bhardwaj is a Director of Architecture working at Salesforce. Rohit has extensive experience architecting multi-tenant cloud-native solutions in Resilient Microservices Service-Oriented architectures using AWS Stack. In addition, Rohit has a proven ability in designing solutions and executing and delivering transformational programs that reduce costs and increase efficiencies.
As a trusted advisor, leader, and collaborator, Rohit applies problem resolution, analytical, and operational skills to all initiatives and develops strategic requirements and solution analysis through all stages of the project life cycle and product readiness to execution.
Rohit excels in designing scalable cloud microservice architectures using Spring Boot and Netflix OSS technologies using AWS and Google clouds. As a Security Ninja, Rohit looks for ways to resolve application security vulnerabilities using ethical hacking and threat modeling. Rohit is excited about architecting cloud technologies using Dockers, REDIS, NGINX, RightScale, RabbitMQ, Apigee, Azul Zing, Actuate BIRT reporting, Chef, Splunk, Rest-Assured, SoapUI, Dynatrace, and EnterpriseDB. In addition, Rohit has developed lambda architecture solutions using Apache Spark, Cassandra, and Camel for real-time analytics and integration projects.
Rohit has done MBA from Babson College in Corporate Entrepreneurship, Masters in Computer Science from Boston University and Harvard University. Rohit is a regular speaker at No Fluff Just Stuff, UberConf, RichWeb, GIDS, and other international conferences.
Rohit loves to connect on http://www.productivecloudinnovation.com.
http://linkedin.com/in/rohit-bhardwaj-cloud or using Twitter at rbhardwaj1.