Inclusive Design

When it comes to designing experiences, my favorite topics are accessibility and localization. They are critical when trying to make sites or products more inclusive to a broader audience.

As I was learning more about these topics, I found there wasn’t much information out there from a designer lens. Any existing resources were very dense and intimidating to read through. This has blocked designers from learning and including it in their work.

To help, I collected information, organized it, and reframed it in a way that designers could make sense of it. I’ve trained dozens of people in the UX field on both of these topics.

Below are some highlights and samples from teaching these topics.

Days, and created a Skillshare class on it. I hope by making things a little less daunting more people make it part of their design process.

People trying an accessibility empathy activity
At a Global Accessibility Awareness Day workshop, I had participants try an empathy activity on vision impairments.

 

Accessibility + Design

I frame accessibility into the main aspects of UX: comprehension and navigation. For each, I talk about assistive tech, design best practices, and tools or resources for design. For workshops, I have a few interactive activities to help build user empathy.

Highlights

A review from my Skillshare class:

Amazing! I work as a front end developer and I’m positively sure I’ll use knowledge gained in practise at work. It’s just a very good course, engaging, helping to understand and sympathise with people who rely on assistive technologies. In addition, Michelle has a very pleasant voice which makes the class all the more enjoyable.

 

Localization + Design

I teach designers how they can make their UIs flexible to adapt to many cultures. While translations are a big part of it, there’s more to localization. It includes non-text elements such as money, date/time, color, iconography, and grammar. I also teach designers about the implementation process and product strategies. This gives them a better chance of being successful including it.

Highlights

  • UXPA International 2018 conference
  • UX Y’all 2018 conference (slide deck pictured)
  • 2021 Trained the Citrix Product Design Org (~60 people)

 

Here’s a link to the Last Week Tonight with John Oliver episode I mention. Warning, some content is explicit.