Getting from barrier-free to delightful
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Why can’t we make it easier to be accessible?
Why can’t we aim for great user experiences that are also accessible? Creating accessible technology has to go beyond minimal compliance with standards that meets the law but may not be usable.
We need a bigger goal: creating delight for everyone. We’ll start by exploring what makes a delightful experience and how a good balance small pleasures and anticipated needs supports accessible UX in both big and small ways. Like any UX, this concern for users has to be part of every design decision.
But we also need to think about what it takes to make this happen. It means incorporating a wider range of people into user research and usability testing, and making accessibility a core requirement, not an afterthought. But most of all, it takes tools that are designed to support accessibility. We’ll look at some of the progress… and some of the failures that hold us back.
Hopefully, you will leave inspired to be an accessibility superhero and delight everyone who uses your products.
Whitney combines a fascination with people and an obsession to communicate clearly with her goal of bringing user research insights to designing products where people matter.
She’s written two books on the subject – A Web for Everyone, Storytelling for User Experience, and Global UX – to help practitioners keep users in mind throughout the creative process.
She’s also passionate about civic design and democracy as a design problem. She and Dana Chisnell lead the Center for Civic Design, working with election officials to make it easier to vote, from automatic voter registration to clear ballot design.
