Supporting accessibility in content, user experience, and organizational culture

Everyone knows that creating accessible content and digital experiences is the right thing to do—right for users, right for businesses, right for society. And yet. Accessibility is still mostly an afterthought, is generally limited to the bare-minimum effort, and is the first thing to get compressed or rushed or entirely cut when there’s budget or schedule pressure.

Why do we have such a hard time upholding our values? Creating truly accessible websites requires that we do more than just using semantic formatting and adding alt tags to images. If we want to build accessibility into our digital experiences from the ground up, we have to start by addressing the ableism embedded in our organizations and work culture.

In this talk, we’ll explore:

• How to recognize the ways ableism in our workplaces gets in the way of accessibility work
• The most effective approach for getting the whole organization (including leadership) committed to disrupting these patterns
• Actions individuals can take to make a difference, even if their colleagues aren’t backing them (yet)

Who should attend: This will be most beneficial for those people who believe that this problem exists and want things to change, but have no idea how to make that happen. We also hope folks who are targets of ableism will feel more included and validated.