10 minutes
Accessibility early in project governance Place accessibility requirements, testing and sign-off at the right stages of a project so retrofits become rare, and see what it costs when they are not.
What you’ll be able to do Place accessibility requirements and testing at the right stages of project governance and explain why early placement reduces cost and risk. Compare the responses to this question and explain your choice: As the executive at the gate, what do you decide? Document a next step for Accessibility early in project governance: Take your area’s project approval template and add one accessibility criterion at each gate: charter, design, build, acceptance and post-launch review. The cost curve and the stage gate Every project discipline knows the same curve: a requirement missed at the start costs little to add, more to add at design, much more at build and most after launch, when it means rework, parallel processes, complaints and sometimes a second procurement. Accessibility follows the curve exactly. A keyboard-operable date picker is a line in a requirements document; after launch it is a change request, a vendor negotiation, a retest and an interim process for everyone the defect blocked.
Project governance already has the mechanism to move accessibility to the cheap end of the curve: stage gates. Each gate is a moment when a sponsor’s signature is required and criteria are checked. An accessibility criterion at each gate exercises the sponsor’s authority automatically. At the charter gate, the criterion is that access is a named success criterion with a standard and an owner. At design, that the accessibility lead has reviewed the designs and that tasks have been walked with assistive technology in mind. At build, that both a checker and hands-on testing are running and defects are tracked with the same priority as any other. At acceptance, that disabled users have completed the key tasks on the real product and blocking defects are closed. After launch, that barrier reports are monitored and a retest is scheduled.
Testing with disabled users is the part most often left to the end, where there is no time to act on it. Move it earlier and budget time to respond. The W3C Web Accessibility Initiative’s evaluation guidance is clear that involving users with disabilities throughout finds problems that expert review alone misses, and finds them when they are still cheap.
An accessibility criterion at every gate Charter Access is a named success criterion with the standard, the acceptance test and the owner. The budget includes testing, remediation and disabled-user testing. The sponsor does not sign without it.
Design The accessibility lead has reviewed the designs, key tasks have been described for keyboard and screen-reader use, and content plans include captions, transcripts, plain language and accessible documents.
Build Accessibility checks run as the product is built, manual testing is scheduled, and accessibility defects are tracked and prioritized alongside every other defect, not in a separate list that ships last.
Acceptance Disabled users have completed the key tasks on the real product. Blocking defects are closed and retested. The vendor’s remediation dates for remaining items are in the contract. The go-live includes an interim access plan.
Post-launch Barrier reports have a route and an owner, a retest is scheduled, and the review point checks whether the remaining items were fixed on the dates promised.
Let the gate do the work What you can change You control the criteria at each gate you sign, and therefore whether accessibility is checked five times before launch or once after.
What to watch for Do not allow a project to reach acceptance with disabled-user testing scheduled for the first time that week. Do not approve a launch that relies on a separate system for disabled users.
Your next step Add the five gate criteria to your area’s project template and send it to the project management office this month.
Where a barrier costs what At requirements
One sentence in a document and a line in the budget. This is where a keyboard-operable control, captions and accessible documents cost almost nothing.
At design
A review and a revision. Still cheap, and the moment to walk the tasks with assistive technology in mind.
At build
Rework of code and content, retesting and schedule pressure. Manageable if defects are tracked with normal priority.
After launch
Change requests, vendor negotiation, interim processes, complaints, retrofit budgets and sometimes a second procurement. The most expensive place to learn.
A stage gate is the sponsor’s authority made routine. Put an accessibility criterion at every gate and the right question gets asked five times before launch, whether or not anyone remembers to ask it.
Carry this forward A barrier costs least to prevent at requirements, more at design, much more at build and most after launch; the order never changes.
Stage gates are where a sponsor’s authority lives; an accessibility criterion at each gate is how that authority is exercised without a meeting.
Testing with disabled users belongs before launch, on real tasks, with time in the schedule to act on what is found.
One knowledge check; a marked-up copy of your area’s project stage-gate checklist with accessibility criteria added.
Take your area’s project approval template and add one accessibility criterion at each gate: charter, design, build, acceptance and post-launch review.
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