Digital A11y Compliance: A Guide to Getting Started
At Deque we like to say that we have to “meet the client where they are. Every organization is different – different development process, different flavors of Agile, different structure, and, of course, different accessibility needs. We pride ourselves on working together with our clients to figure out solutions that work for their unique needs and challenges. But amid all these variations and idiosyncrasies, there is a clear, common path that most organizations follow on those first accessibility compliance projects.
We created Digital Accessibility: A Guide to Getting Started to outline that common path and answer some of the questions we have encountered time and time again with our own clients.
If your team has an important web or mobile accessibility compliance deadline on the horizon and zero accessibility experience, this guide is for you. If you hadn’t even heard of “website accessibility before last week, and you don’t even know what questions you should be asking, let alone where to start, this guide is for you.
What’s in the guide?
In our guide, we outline…
- The questions you need answered before you dive into hiring vendors or buying software licenses
- Detailed information about the steps common to every early accessibility compliance project
- Assessment
- Remediation
- Validation
- Explanations of how the Deque team approaches each step to guarantee the successful completion of your web or mobile accessibility compliance project
- And some insider tips to help you sound extra smart in your next accessibility project meeting
Our project has a very particular set of requirements for web accessibility. Are you sure this guide is right for me?
In a word: yes. In a few more words: the basic steps of any early accessibility project are pretty much the same whether you’re worried about Section 508, ADA compliance, AODA, the Air Carrier Access Act, or a special amalgamation of custom requirements, the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), and the rules from Fight Club. Your project may require testing for different rules or special use-cases, but you’ll work that out with whoever performs your assessment, and you’ll still follow-up your assessment with remediation and validation.
This guide sounds super helpful! I’m going to download it right now!
Oh, thank you – you’re too kind! We’ve done our very best to provide something that is truly useful and informative for every organization that’s getting ready to embark on their first digital accessibility project. And if you’re convinced by our particular approach to accessibility assessment, remediation, and validation, we hope you’ll contact us to learn more about how we can help you and your team along the path to digital accessibility.
Are you looking for a more grassroots approach to accessibility? Check out axe – our free, open source automated accessibility testing tool. You can download an axe browser extension or take a deeper dive with the axe-core API. Follow that up with some manual testing with the NVDA screen reader and you’ll be streets ahead. You can also get started with our Accessibility Fundamentals training.
