Accessibility is a gift to all
Accessibility in digital learning has long been in the ‘too-hard basket’, creating complexities in learning with multiple versions of experiences and strong concerns that ‘everybody else’ will suffer a poorer learning experience as a result of meeting the requirements.
"I mean, I've been deaf since birth, but yeah, I wouldn't want everyone else to have a bad Learning experience because of me," a spokesperson from the DEI team reported. "I honestly don't think it's too much to ask for some sub-titles or a transcript on the thousandth CEO intro video, just quietly."
The good news is, all of that has changed in the last few years as guidelines become clearer and technology has evolved to support the requirements into the fabric of their code.
"Look, it is exciting, but to be honest we were always doing it - we've had voiceover on every single word in our modules since the 90's," said a representative from the L&D team, "I am still a bit disappointed that we can't do a drag and drop, we've really had to dig deep to think about how to boost the interactivity without it, but luckily there are still lots of accordions, flip cards and tab features to ensure that people still learn something!"
To understand how the broader organisation we're experiencing the changes, we spoke to Moose, an administration officer with 20 years under his belt in role, "I've got no complaints. I can just open the transcript on the videos and skip past them a lot quicker now, I used to have to let it play through while I went out for a smoke. I was a real pack a day guy back then."
Since implementing accessibility AA level design and development, the organisations we spoke to reported an increase in the satisfaction rating in employee surveys. A representative from HR said, "We've never had such great feedback on learning, and the requests for more use of video are through the roof, we've extended our budget for next year! It feels really good to be inclusive."
How can we design better for all ?
The first step is mindset.
It baffles us here at The Benchmark to hear that the narrative of ‘it’s too hard’ or ‘it will diminish the experience of all’ is still alive and well.
The next step then is education.
This might be at a senior or decison-maker level (see above) but if you have any role in planning/scoping, designing or developing learning, you should be up to date with how to design, develop and test for accessibility. After all, in all seriousness, inclusive design is better for all and has some real benefits for the broader organisation.
