Jonathan Hassell's IWMW-13 plenary on BS 8878

1. Stop Trying to Avoid Losing and Start Winning:
How BS 8878 Reframes the Accessibility Question
Prof Jonathan Hassell, Visiting Professor London Metropolitan University,
Director of Hassell Inclusion, Lead-author of BS 8878 (@jonhassell)
IWMW 2013
27th June 2013

2. The current pain…
• Most organisations are terrified about accessibility
• They don’t understand people who are disabled… who always seem to ask for
the impossible… at crunch times in a website’s time-constrained development
• They feel whatever they do is probably not enough, but don’t know how far
they need to go
• And they don’t know if there’s anything in it for them other than risk mitigation
• Worse, if they get anything right, it’s usually only for one product,
or one version of a product…
• Or it’s because of one committed, passionate individual… whose eventual
departure leaves them needing to start all over again

3. ‘what I want is to strategically embed inclusion
into [my organisation’s] culture
and business-as-usual processes,
rather than just doing another inclusion project’
Most common request
from Heads of Diversity & Inclusion
Vanguard Network 2011
Where I think you want to be…

4. ‘Adapting to responsive web design has required a
complete redefinition of how we approach the web at Jisc
infoNet. It's had an effect on every part of the service;
not just in web development but from content management
and creating resources, to our processes, workflows and
how we manage web projects.’
Abstract of David Cornforth @ JISC InfoNet’s talk
straight after me here at IWMW-13
As you’d like to be with many other web issues…

5. But the accessibility world’s solutions often seem
piecemeal and tactical, not strategic

6. And often seem like competition
for your time,
rather than linking in with any
other useful web strategies
Social & search strategy
Mobile strategy
(apps,responsive
design)
Open
data
strategy
User
experience strategy
Content
strategy

7. So how do most do accessibility?
Do the bare minimum… then all hands to the pump to fix things…

8. But to fix it,
you don’t just need to do this..You also need to do this…

9. And you need to fix the problem in the process, not the product,
to prevent it re-occurring

10. You need to make everyone involved in making your products
engaged and responsible, not just your ‘accessibility superhero’
Designers Writers
Project Mgrs Product Mgrs
Finance Legal Marketing Strategy
Research & TestersDevelopers
Snr Mgrs

11. ‘Most internal web teams in higher education agree their
web strategy is being held back by the culture and
organisation of the institution. Unfortunately [they] feel
unable to bring about change. They feel like a small cog in
a very big machine…’
Abstract of Paul Boag @ Headscape’s talk
at 14:45 today, here at IWMW-13
This is hard…

12. It’s even harder if you’re not clear
why you should do it in the first place…

13. We need to reframe the accessibility conversation…

14. Source: DFEE
11mdisabled
people
12molder
people
(of pension age)
7
m
adults with low-
literacy levels
(<age 11)
Opportunity: the commercial business case
– maximising reach

15. +
=
Help for embedding:
motivation… competence… process…
+

16. Created by accessibility experts
from:
The people behind BS 8878…
Training already delivered to:Reviewed publicly worldwide by:
• 328 accessibility experts
worldwide
• incl: experts in
personalisation, aging, mobile
accessibility, IPTV, inclusive
design, usability, user-
research and testing,
disability evangelism

17. Rob Wemyss
Head of Accessibility
Royal Mail Group
BS 8878 has given us a framework
to help reduce costs and improve
our quality when delivering
accessible web products for our
customers.

18. Helps you handle real-world challenges…

19. Real-world challenge 1: how much is it going to cost?

20. Real-world challenge 2: can we measure ROI?

21. Real-world challenge 3: will it constrain our innovation?

22. Real-world challenge 4: will inclusive design give us all we need?
Comment: at 08:24am on 14 Jul
2010, thrifty wrote:
* The background colour is
forced to white - high contrast
contributes to eye strain &
headaches. Perhaps a light grey
would help here?
Comment: at
08:05am on 14 Jul
2010, chris b wrote:
…
Awful 'UK
News/World New'
panel - … Terrible
contrast too
between the text
and dark
background.

23. Real-world challenge 5: we can’t do everything for everyone, so…?

24. Real-world challenge 6: procurement not in-house creation
Accessibility reqs
Accessible deliverables

25. Real-world challenge 7: whose job should it be…?
Designers Writers
Project Mgrs Product Mgrs
Finance Legal Marketing Strategy
Snr Mgrs
Research & TestersDevelopers

26. Allows you to choose the
right guidelines for your
product & audience…
Rather than making you mould
your product to rigid
guidelines…

27. Uses WCAG 2.0 for what it’s
good at… Not what it isn’t…

28. not just a compliant one
• Well-known American pioneer of
Inclusive Design
• Sam Farber’s wife, a keen cook,
suffered from arthritis…
“Why do ordinary kitchen tools hurt
your hands?”
• First 15 products launched in 1990
• Sales growth over 35% per year from
1991 to 2002
• The line has now grown to over 500
products
• Over 100 design awards received
Helps you build a better website…

29. If you need support & training – I’m happy to help
Bespoke workshops on organisational or project basis…

30. © hassellinclusion
• the full guide on how to transform your organisation
to achieve the consistent creation of web sites and
apps that are usable and accessible to all your
customers, at the most efficient cost
• with practical case-studies from leading
accessibility experts worldwide, including:
• Brian Kelly (UK),
• Jennison Asuncion (Canada),
• Debra Ruh & Jeff Kline (USA),
• Andrew Arch (Australia)
• David Banes (Qatar)
• Axel Leblois (UN)
For information on the book’s publication, free
access to video case-studies, and a chance of
winning the book… send us your details
via the form on the next slide
Or, if you want to help yourself, read my forthcoming book
- available summer 2014

31. e: jonathan@hassellinclusion.com
t: @jonhassell
w: www.hassellinclusion.com