Accessibility Designer

Overview

Accessibility is a key part of this company’s mission to empower people and organizations to achieve more, and this BI team is continuing a journey to ensure this remains true as we work to make data more available, usable, and understandable in a wide range of experiences. We want to ensure the more than one billion people with disabilities across the planet can consume and create content using BI services and applications.
As a part of our efforts, we are looking for an accessibility designer with a demonstrated record of success to help sustain culture change and lead initiatives on data visualization, data consumption, and creation that go far beyond making this “technically possible” to industry-leading innovative approaches. The successful candidate will be a part of a team looking to go beyond alt text on graphics and converting charts to tabular data. We are looking for an individual who can extend their previous work and/or lived experiences with screen readers and other assistive technology, software accessibility, and user experience to serve as a subject matter expert to the design organization and grow the overall knowledge and awareness of the team, while defining the future in data visualization accessibility.
The successful candidate will be a strong self-starter who can work in a fast-paced software development environment and handle a wide spectrum of responsibilities. The role requires the ability to build relationships throughout the design team and provide accessibility guidance and expertise to the designers and other stakeholders.

Responsibilities:
• Work with designers throughout the software development cycle to ensure accessibility is incorporated at the initial stages of product development.
• Define accessible names, roles, states, properties, and expected keyboarding of product components.
• Review designs and specifications for accessibility accuracy and thoroughness.
• Identify, leverage, and evangelize opportunities to improve accessibility inclusive design practices and awareness across the program.
• Stay current and contribute to industry trends and developments in accessibility, assistive technology, and chart and graphic accessibility.
• Communicate with cross-disciplinary teams inside and across studio(s) through all stages of design and development. Owns communication for what one is doing in a proactive way. Identifies which mode of communication should be used. Manages tonality, being respectful, inclusive, etc. Communicates up and out to leaders.
• Provides guidance to the team of product designers. Ensures full understanding of the original design and vision, and links to established problem and/or goal. Begins to mentor designers in specific areas of expertise. Influences those outside of design.

Qualifications:
Required:
• 2-4 years of direct experience working in accessibility.
• The ability to understand and communicate concepts such as accessible name, roles and states, and expected keyboarding interactions to audiences new to accessibility and how those concepts impact user experiences.
• A proficient knowledge of accessibility standards and techniques including WCAG 2.1, ARIA, EN 301 549, and Section 508.
• Exceptional communication skills with an ability to adapt and tailor communications for different audiences.
• Previous experience communicating accessibility concepts to both technical and non-technical audiences.

Preferred:
• At least two years of work in Product Design or UI/UX design.
• Previous experience with data visualization and making charts and graphs accessible.
• Customer obsession and a real passion for both data and accessibility.
• Ability to contribute accessibility specifications illustrating best practices in accessible user experiences.
• A demonstrated track record of impacting change and influence without authority throughout an organization.
• Previous experience reviewing websites, applications, and design mocks for accessibility and communicating issues and findings to appropriate stakeholders.

The target hiring compensation range for this role is the equivalent of $44.94 – $49.93 an hour. Compensation is based on several factors including, but not limited to education, relevant work experience, relevant certifications, and location.
Additional benefits offered may include; medical health insurance and dental insurance, life insurance, and eligibility to participate in 401k plan with company match.