Good design is inclusive and inclusive design is good for all
Designing and creating a great experience can be hard, but it’s even harder to design and create one that considers all users and their diverse and accessible needs in mind.
Designing with accessibility in mind increases customer reach, connects businesses with new audiences, and helps unlock opportunities.
Meet Harry, who was seriously injured playing sport 24 years ago and, as a result, is now a quadriplegic. Walking home after my yoga class, I would pass him, his wife Pam, and their dog every day. Despite Harry’s confinement to his scooter, he always smiled. While he could move his hands slightly, it was clear Harry had difficulty maneuvering and managing everyday life.
Hearing Harry’s story shifted my perspective on how we tackle designing better user experiences. Imagine the struggles Harry has to endure when trying to use a digital device or access information online. Harry needs a lot of equipment to be mobile - alterations to his home, physical therapy, and his mobility scooter.
We’ve made changes to the environment in our cities such as ramps, handrails, and lifts, and while these have assisted Harry with his physical challenges, what are we doing to assist Harry with his digital challenges?
Harry’s needs are at the extreme end of the complexity scale. However, by creating inclusive digital experiences — all benefit. If we embrace each other’s differences, we can make this world better for all of us.
To practice human-centered design, we must be inclusive of human diversity. We must design, build, and test without preconceived notions that people are all the same.
One-fifth of the estimated global total, or between 110 million and 190 million people, experience significant disabilities. 1 in 5 people. One billion people, or 15% of the world’s population, experience some form of disability.
Ref: The World Health Organisation
We often assume the number of people who would benefit from inclusive and accessible design practices is small.
This is not true. In fact, Harry is just one of the 4 million people in Australia that have some form of disability.
Remember ’disability’ doesn’t just refer to a physical disability. There are many types of disabilities, impairments, obstacles, and differences such as:
- Permanent disability, such as loss of a limb, sight, hearing, or speech
- Temporary disability such as wearing a cast for a broken arm, or misplacing a pair of glasses.
- Situational impairments, for example, when we move through different environments, such as a noisy environment where you can’t hear well, or when you are driving and you can’t look at a screen.
- Human differences such as language, culture, gender, age may also affect our abilities
The Persona Spectrum
Microsoft Design uses the Persona Spectrum to understand related mismatches and motivations across a spectrum of permanent, temporary, and situational scenarios. The tool helps to foster empathy and to illustrate how a solution scales to a broader audience.
The Persona Spectrum aims to build experiences that unify people and embrace individuality. These experiences are rooted in the interaction between people and objects in the world around us. Seeing disability differently and understanding exclusion helps us extend a solution for one person into a solution for millions of people.
Lack of accessibility features may be harming businesses
Many businesses are frustrated by the lack of embedded accessibility features and the absence of future plans to integrate these features. One such customer has launched a “Where people work” campaign, driving their teams to embed accessibility features and ensure their experiences are accessible.
Think back to Harry. If he worked for your organization, would your products help or hinder him? How would you refactor your approach and design for inclusion?
We’re blocking businesses from using digital products
Large organizations have seen how their business benefits when they hire diverse teams and empower their workforce. By empowering their workforce, they empower every person on the planet to achieve more.
“When people experience difficulty accessing or using products and services, then they are often not included in the design process. This can result in disregarding a significant percentage of the population as well as costly retrofits for products and services, which can reach up to 10,000 times the cost of introducing inclusive design earlier on.”
How does this extend to social sites like Instagram?
Apps such as Instagram, Snapchat and Facebook are blocking people with disabilities from participating because there is an assumption that people who are vision impaired would not use a photo and video sharing social networking app.
“Oh, well, they don’t care about pictures.’ But we do.” When culture is moulded on social networks, it sucks to lose out on a shared social language because you can’t see the images everyone is talking about.
Ref: ‘May be an image’: what it’s like browsing Instagram while blind
When designers, developers, and product managers, design for inclusiveness and accessibility from the start, they create something that will reach a far larger audience with less overhead.
“Platforms, including Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok, didn’t take that route during initial development and are instead constantly playing catch-up to improve their accessibility.”
Let’s talk through some great examples of inclusive design.
Here are some great examples of inclusive design that you will likely be using and familiar with. Inclusive design can boost innovation to create better products and services.
The electric toothbrush
Did you know that electric toothbrushes were first created for patients with limited motor skills but are now mainly used by people who don’t have motor skill issues?
Subtitles on digital displays
Subtitles were created for those who are deaf or hard of hearing but are also now used by those in noisy places, for translation purposes, for those who want to view the headlines without the noise. Interestingly, a UK study found 80 percent of people using subtitles were not deaf or hard of hearing!
Coles has introduced a low-sensory quiet hour experience in 173 stores — reducing noise, lighting, and other in-store distractions. These changes are designed to help make a difference to customers who find it challenging to shop in a heightened sensory environment.
Are you passionate about this topic too?
We have precise needs from our customers and our community, so ask yourself — how can we better understand what’s important to people like Harry, our customers, and our end-users?
We must commit to integrating and practicing:
- Acknowledging exclusion
- Learning about diversity and accessible design
- Designing and testing inclusive of human diversity
Resources
- Microsoft inclusive design — Microsoft Design
- Accessibility, Usability, and Inclusion
- Disability Inclusion Overview
- The 7 Principles
