Summary
Many organizations struggle with justifying and prioritizing accessibility. One of the primary reasons is because they’re thinking about accessibility all wrong. Instead of a checklist, a list of legal requirements, or a set of shackles holding designers and developers back, it’s time to start thinking of accessibility as what it is: an opportunity to innovate! In this presentation, Fable will draw from our expertise helping organizations like yours start the accessibility journey, to change the way you think about disability, assistive technology, and accessibility. We will demonstrate that accessible products are more flexible, customizable, and useful for all users. We’ll also show you how accessibility is directly tied to the creation of many of the most exciting and innovative technologies of the last 50 years, and how it’s changed the entire world for everyone. This presentation will inspire you with the information and ideas you need to accelerate your accessibility journey.
Key Insights
-
•
Many accessibility features like dark mode and voice assistants began as disability aids and are now mainstream because they improve experiences for all users.
-
•
One in five people live with long-term disability, and everyone can experience situational or temporary disabilities throughout life.
-
•
Accessible design is about creating flexible, customizable products rather than oversimplified or lowest-common-denominator solutions.
-
•
Diverse teams lead to innovative, inclusive products by uncovering use cases and solutions that homogeneous teams might miss.
-
•
Accessibility is a journey, not a one-time checklist fix, and must be integrated continuously into research, design, and development.
-
•
Disability is a universal and changing identity, highlighting that accessible products design for our future selves.
-
•
Humanizing accessibility by involving people with disabilities in training and product testing builds empathy and better buy-in.
-
•
Major companies like Facebook, Apple, and Microsoft embed accessibility as part of their core product experiences, showing its feasibility.
-
•
Innovations originally designed for accessibility, such as GPS and electric toothbrushes, often become more widely adopted because they offer superior usability.
-
•
Data sonification and advanced APIs allow vision-challenged users to access complex visual data like graphs in new ways, signaling ongoing innovation.
Notable Quotes
"Dark mode started off as an accessibility feature for visual challenges and eventually became mainstream because it’s so valuable for everyone."
"Everyone uses voice assistance now, whether controlling a smart home or sending a quick text; it gives independence to people with disabilities and convenience to all."
"Disability is the only identity that all of us will probably adopt at some point during our lives."
"If we are designing experiences that don’t work for everyone today, we’re designing experiences that in a couple of years will exclude ourselves."
"Accessible design is not about shackles or lowest-common-denominator; it’s about building great, flexible experiences for everyone."
"The Last of Us 2 was the first console game a completely blind person could play from start to finish by adding innovative, customizable accessibility features."
"Separate accessible designs are never equal, so we must design inclusively from the start to unlock all the benefits of accessibility."
"It is cheaper and better to do accessibility right the first time than to retrofit and fix later."
"Bringing people with disabilities into ideation and prototyping helps build accessibility by design and eliminates costly retrofits."
"Disability is normal, not shameful or rare, and everyone can benefit from accessibility innovations."
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"If you have problems with Slack or the conference experience, please contact the help desk customer service."
Bria AlexanderOpening Remarks
November 18, 2022
"We are moving from direct work to mediated work, from wanting things perfect to good enough for now, and from complete to adaptive and growing systems."
Hugh DubberlyProblems with Problems: Reconsidering the Frame of Designing as Problem-Solving
June 19, 2019
"We need honest, transparent conversations about futures because the impacts can be huge and wide-ranging."
April ReaganLook, Think, Act: The Futures-Smart Design Organization
October 1, 2021
"Conjoint analysis reveals how consumers make choices by examining trade-offs they are willing to make."
Ricardo MartinsUnlocking the power of advanced quantitative methods
March 12, 2025
"Giving the whole team access to feedback made them feel responsible and inspired to solve user needs."
Maria SkaadenContinuous Design: One eye on the horizon and the other on the next wave
November 8, 2018
"Feedback is more like an investment and a contribution into not just the person's work, but also to their growth."
Vanessa VarinFeedback: The Other F-Word
September 10, 2025
"We have maintained that freshness and acceptance of new ideas while growing rapidly."
Jen Crim Jess Quittner Saritha Kattekola Alex Karr Gurbani PahwaCulture, DIBS & Recruiting
June 11, 2021
"We’re moving from theory of change to theory of service: starting with what people actually need before creating anything."
Patrick BoehlerFishing for Real Needs: Reimagining Journalism Needs with AI
June 10, 2025
"We calculated nearly 10,000 hours saved in one year from redesigning compliance training, equating to three million dollars in opportunity cost."
Julie BaherCulture Change—My Journey
May 14, 2015
Latest Books All books
Dig deeper with the Rosenbot
How can visualization techniques be used during workshops to manage complexity without too much polish?
What career and life factors influence women’s early exit from tech versus longevity in law?
How does the second edition of the service design book address the relationship between service design and digital products?