Mindset Change Doesn’t Happen Over Night

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(compelling music)

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- Hello, this is "Digital Accessibility:

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The People Behind the Progress."

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I'm Joe Welinske, the creator and host of this series,

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and as an accessibility professional myself,

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I find it very interesting as to how others have found

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their way into this profession, so let's meet one

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of those people right now and hear about their journey.

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(compelling music)

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Well, hello, here we are again.

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I'm Joe Welinske with an episode where I have

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the opportunity to speak with an accessibility practitioner,

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and today I'm pleased to be speaking with Miriam Nabinger.

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Hello, Miriam, How are you today?

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- Hello, I'm doing well.

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How do you do?

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- Good, well, it's early for me in my day on Vashon Island

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which is near Blink's Seattle headquarters.

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Where are you talking to us from?

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- I'm based in Vienna, Austria,

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so a bit like later in the day today.

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- Yeah, all right, well, it's a lovely city.

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I've been there and had a good time I think on two visits

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to Vienna, so hopefully we get back again sometime.

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- That'd be lovely.

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(overlapping speech)

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- It's good to have you here on the program.

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We do like to meet people from all around the world,

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and so it's good to be able to visit

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with an accessibility practitioner from Vienna.

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So probably the best place to start is if you could tell us

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a little bit about yourself

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and the work that you're doing right now.

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- Sure, so right now I've been a freelancer

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for the last two years.

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I mainly worked in UX design,

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but also on the side as an accessibility specialist

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and as consultant for companies, and right now,

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I'm trying to make a full-time business out of this.

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And my mission is actually to empower companies,

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but also actually the designers, developers,

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program managers, testers on how to implement

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and create more accessible products,

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and I want to teach them this.

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So right now I'm just building the community.

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I'm trying to get in touch with a lot of people,

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learn a lot of new things.

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I've done it for a few companies already,

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and it's just something that I really enjoy.

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I want to teach people what I love

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and what creates the passion in me,

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and this is one of the things.

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- Well, I'm gonna wanna ask you a little bit more

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about your current accessibility work,

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but one thing that would be interesting to know

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if you have some information is what accessibility is

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like for business in your part of the world.

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Are there any things that are specific

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or unique to Austria or that area of Europe

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that you feel might be different in culture or requirements

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from other parts of the world that you've noticed?

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- I think Austria as a country in terms of like,

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accessibility and also like, LGBT for example,

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we're a bit behind sometimes, because I know that

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we do have many accessible public spaces

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and also digital spaces, but it's just on the,

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personally I think it's on the lower end of the spectrum.

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Like, it's not actively communicated,

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and there is not any awareness in any other business

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than public, which is, I think it's a shame.

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I know it's similar in other countries as well

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that it's just not as broad of a topic

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except if it's in public,

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but I wish it would be more active here,

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because the awareness is not there, to be honest.

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They just know they need to do it

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for public and for governmental things,

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but anything else is just kind of guessing,

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and I wish we would do more for that.

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- Well, it sounds like it'll both be more opportunities

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for you to do that work,

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but also a lot of hard work to help make people more aware.

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- Yeah, like creating the first step

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of awareness is I think the hardest step for me now.

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- Yep, well, you know, I go,

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still go through that all the time.

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So one of the things I do is work with our clients

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to help them understand the importance

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of investing in accessibility, and it's still, you know,

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a lot of education to, you know get to make that part

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of the budget and make people understand

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that there's a good business case for it

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in addition to other factors.

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Well, I do wanna know a little bit about how you found

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your way to accessibility.

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We try to make this program a model for others

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to see how they can fit into this profession.

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So where did it start for you

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where you first became aware of accessibility

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and then decided that was where you wanted to do your work?

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- It's actually like, it was more like I fell

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into it more or less, like it was an accident,

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or like a coincidence actually, because I've worked

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at IBM for four and a half years,

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like, close to five actually, and during my time

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as a designer there, we had an introduction

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to accessibility training from one of their teams.

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They flew in someone from Washington DC,

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and they gave us like, an introduction to accessibility.

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And back then it was like, I haven't seen it before,

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and it was so interesting to me.

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First I was very impressed,

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and it opened my eyes to a lot of things,

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because I later noticed that there are so many overlaps

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between usability and accessibility.

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And right now I strongly believe that accessibility is

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at the core of usability, it won't work otherwise,

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and so I had this class, learned a lot from it,

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and a year after, they asked me if I would be willing

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or interested in creating an internal learning

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for our cross-functional team, and I did that,

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and it was one of the most amazing things I've ever done,

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because it was for me so exciting,

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and I just loved sharing this importantness

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with other people and teaching them how to do it.

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And then I figured, okay, this is actually what I wanna do.

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And in the years following, I tried to implement a lot

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of these things into my daily product cycle

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and the product design cycle I do.

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And now I really wanna get the word out and teach

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other people who might not be that aware of it yet,

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especially like, for example, the developers,

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they don't learn it in school,

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and I wish someone would be there

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to actually tell them how do you do it

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so that it's like a long time investment for them.

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- Well, so it sounds like you, it was nice

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that you were able to be at IBM where you had

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that initial person come in to talk about that,

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but then after that there's a lot involved

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in learning about accessibility, and finding out

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how to to do all the various things that are involved,

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so how did that work out?

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Did you lean on resources within IBM

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to be able to to build it up in your projects?

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Or how did you build up your own career now

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or your own knowledge about it?

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- Well, what I did primarily at the beginning,

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I studied the IBM accessibility checklist a lot,

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because I do believe that they have great resources there,

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and it gave me everything I needed to get started,

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and have like, actual examples I could actually use

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to tell other people like, "Hey, this is how it works."

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And I studied the guidelines a lot,

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also did the Google course, and just,

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it was a lot of learning by doing.

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And I tried to teach myself, okay,

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how do I use the screen reader?

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How do I actually test, and what are the possibilities?

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So there was a lot of research on my part involved,

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and it was a lot of learning by doing,

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and then also asking other people as well

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as like, people who actually work in the sector,

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as well as disabled people, and asking them

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about their experiences, if there's something I can learn.

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And even now I'm like, I learn something new every day,

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because it's just something I'm not used to.

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- And then after that, was that when you began

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your own work right from the position?

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- Yes.

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- Well, I mean that's, I started working

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for myself early on in my career,

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and I remember it was a lot of work,

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and it was kind of scary to be doing that.

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I know it's more common today for people early

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in their career to you just decide to do their own thing,

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but how has that adjustment been going from, you know,

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a very large prominent organization

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with a regular paycheck to doing this type of work

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where it's really up to you to find your own way?

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- It was a journey, (chuckles)

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because I quit my job the beginning

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of the pandemic more or less,

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and I was like, okay, I guess this is how I do it.

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It was a big change, but I had to pick up,

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I'm very grateful that I had a lot of knowledge

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and awareness from my time at IBM,

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but I was also very grateful of discovering

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so many new things about myself

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and also about how I actually want to work,

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and where I want to put my focus on next.

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It was a big change, (chuckles)

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and it's still something that I need to get used to,

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but it's like, I think it built my character,

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but it was not that easy, but I wouldn't miss it now.

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- And so, you know, with the projects that you've worked on

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on your own, what is, you know, like, a typical project

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like, or what's a typical week

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in your work life for this type work?

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- That really depends on how many different clients I have,

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like, how many different areas I work with.

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The latest one was like, a Swedish startup.

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They came to me because they said they wanted to change,

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improve the accessibility of their design system,

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and also about the website,

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because they had like, a new rebranding,

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but they're not happy with the rebranding.

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So we took the time to actually sit down like, "Hey, okay,

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what's actually the problem, and where do you want my help?"

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And it was, I made an audit for them in terms of like,

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what's the CURE accessibility of their product.

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Then they came to me like, "Hey, can you actually

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also teach us the basics and also like what we can do?"

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So there also like a learning involved for them,

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for their whole design team in this case,

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and also for the developers here.

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I gave like an introduction to accessibility

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and also to certain custom role segments,

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and I gave them a list of resources, recommendations.

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And in the few months afterwards,

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we went through the implementation together,

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and we discussed,

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I was always there if they needed any questions.

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So I gave them like a roadmap on how they can improve

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and what they should take care of,

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and I helped them in achieving this.

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- And from what you've learned from your practice so far,

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what are the areas that you've found to be

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the most challenging to be able to help your clients?

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- I think it probably culture, because it's,

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they know if they have a check place, what to do,

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but personally is more like a mindset change

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and having the right culture in the company

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that's beginning, that's both accessibility

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and inclusion, and I had a hard time discussing that

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with them and them getting to accept it, actually,

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because they already have their culture,

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and then they need to change it, so that was a bit tricky,

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and I still believe that's a tricky part,

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because mindset change doesn't happen overnight.

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- Well, in the time that you've been involved

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in accessibility, do you see any patterns of things that,

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you know, you're looking forward to in the future?

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Do you see certain areas that need more work

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from the accessibility profession than others?

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Or are there certain things that you're excited

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to be working on in the future

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that you're just starting to get involved with?

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- Personally, I think that the area

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of e-commerce is a bit lacking when it comes

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to accessibility, because there are,

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that's the area where I think we can do way more,

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and not just like, in public space, but like,

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any e-commerce sector, because there's just not a lot of,

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it's mostly prefixed templates,

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but there is like, issues in templates already,

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so there would be change needed there.

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And I'm looking forward to getting

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into the current movement where accessibility is

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with the change of the European directive,

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there's like a new movement right now

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with people being even more aware of the necessity,

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and I'm kind of happy about joining this movement

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and being there to support other companies here.

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- And so as you do that, are there other groups

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or communities in your area

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that it's possible to get involved with?

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Or are you gonna be going to conferences

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and things now that the pandemic is over?

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- Yes, I would love to, and I already signed up for a few.

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Right now I'm networking in Vienna here.

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That's both with creatives but also developers,

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so I'm joining the network here and see what can be done,

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or if just anything I can do to help,

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and I hope I can join more conferences soon,

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so hopefully in person.

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But the best accessibility conferences are normally abroad,

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(chuckles) so I might have to travel for that.

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- Well, I went to my first conference

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since the pandemic started with CSUN back in March,

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and it was fun to be out among people again.

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So maybe we'll meet up at a future event,

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but I appreciate you taking the time to chat with me today.

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It was really interesting to hear how you've started out

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on your own individual business exploration

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of accessibility, and so, you know,

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good luck with everything that you're working on.

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- Thank you very much.