Accessibility Initiatives
Digital accessibility is a complex and multifaceted topic, and there were no experts at Wayfair when we started having conversations about it. I was passionate about accessibility, but didn’t know the best practices for inclusive design. Working with colleagues, I formed a team to address this gap by putting together resources, facilitating regular conversations, and sharing our insights outside of the company.
Role
Lead Organizer
Employer
Wayfair
Focus
Research, Guidelines, Education
Platform
Web
Goals:
Develop a baseline understanding of accessibility
Understand where we are excluding people in our experiences and processes
Actively engage people with accessibility needs in our product development lifecycle
Mindset
Designing with accessibility in mind drives innovation.
“When we’re finally able to question the systems that disable us, everyone involved stops seeing our bodies as the problem.”
- Liz Jackson
Accessibility Framework
Clear measurement system
My colleague Riana Quinn and I presented a framework for inclusive design and research practices at UXPA Boston in 2022.
We also published a medium article sharing the framework and our list of accessibility guidelines.
Accessibility practices and learnings should be shared, so we can all improve our approach and teach one another.
We created a clear, concise checklist for teams to use to measure the accessibility of each feature or new design before it launched. We added visual examples showing what did and didn’t pass WCAG criteria, and held overview sessions reviewing the checklist with different teams.
Initiatives:
Accessibility checklist and training
Monthly learning sessions
Onboarding session for new designers, content strategists, and researchers
Learning sessions
We led monthly trainings for over two years, including panels, how-to’s, deep dives into specific topics, and screening external talks from the disability community.
The talks were well attended and received, with an average NPS Score of 8.89/10
Public Engagement
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