Designing for accessibility helps everyone use your product easily. You can raise team awareness by hosting workshops that show what it’s like to have different disabilities. Sharing guides, articles, and real-life examples can also help. Encourage your team to try assistive tools to understand users better. How do you teach your team about accessibility? Share your ideas!

Educating your team on accessibility isn’t just about sharing guidelines. Start with hands-on workshops that put team members in the shoes of people with disabilities. Next, make sure everyone has access to comprehensive resources: articles, case studies, and accessibility best practices that they can refer back to. Finally, encourage empathy-building activities by getting team members to regularly use assistive technologies like text-to-speech tools or voice navigation. When your team has a deeper, lived understanding of accessibility.

Benchmarking - finding similar designs & execution in other products if it meets design intent. DMU - simulation to identify best possible accessibility in terms of tools, attachments. Process development - identification of FTG to support product Uniqueness Training/ Hands on - Unique products could have altogether new, advanced process development, same can be established through hands-on.

To effectively educate your team on accessibility in product design, start with a focused workshop that covers the fundamentals of accessibility, including relevant guidelines like WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) and the importance of inclusive design for all users. Incorporate hands-on activities where team members can experience accessibility challenges firsthand, such as using screen readers or navigating with keyboard-only controls. Provide case studies that highlight the benefits of accessibility in improving user experience and increasing market reach.

Adopt a strategy focusing on empathy and continuous learning. - Provide your team with accessibility resources such as guidelines, checklists, and best practices. - Integrate accessibility into your design process to inspire the development of inclusive solutions. - Conduct workshops that allow team members to experience the challenges faced by users with disabilities. - Encourage activities that build empathy, enabling team members to use accessibility tools. - Promote a culture of open communication where team members can share their ideas on accessibility. - Consistently review and update your designs to meet current accessibility standards. - Create an environment that values empathy, continuous learning, and innovation.

- Training and Awareness: Conduct focused workshops on accessibility topics, use real-world case studies, and introduce tools like screen readers and simulators to build empathy. - Resources and Tools: Create an accessibility handbook, integrate tools like Lighthouse, and provide pre-built accessible design components. - Process Integration: Make accessibility a required step in workflows, involve users with disabilities in testing, and conduct focused reviews. - Culture Building: Assign accessibility champions, promote empathy through simulations, and reward accessibility achievements. - Continuous Improvement: Use KPIs, a progress dashboard, and feedback loops to refine designs regularly.

The most effective accessibility learning I’ve been fortunate to be part of, is that our team hired an accessibility consultant, and she first had us meet users in-person, who were affected negatively by our poor accessibility standards, Product Management process, code and design. To have users who are visually, hearing or physically impaired explain and demo their daily web-challenges directly was beyond impactful and resonated so powerfully, it remained top of mind from that point on. Post those meetings were accessibility sessions where we reviewed policy, our code, user journeys, gaps etc., and then started planning goals, standards, process and the underlying required changes.

In my current role as a Denior UX/UI Designer, I’m leading the efforts on making our designs and website more accessible and user-friendly. I’ve been working with the team to build both awareness and empathy for accessibility by sharing practical tools, like checklists and design guidelines, to make it easier to get it right. We also do regular accessibility reviews and keep an open feedback loop to continuously improve. Real-world success stories have been a big part of showing how accessible design isn’t just good for users—it’s also great for the business.

Balancing innovation with market needs means blending creativity with practicality. Start by understanding your audience’s needs and staying updated on market trends. Use an iterative design process to adapt and improve as you learn more. How do you balance innovation with meeting market demands in your design work?

Have sessions to explain the importance of accessibility, including its legal, ethical, and business benefits and will Share real-life stories or testimonials from users with disabilities to emphasize how accessibility impacts their experience. Encourage the team to experience products using accessibility tools (e.g., screen readers or keyboard-only navigation).