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Empowering every user: making McAfee Support accessible

Empowering every user: making McAfee Support accessible

Achieving WCAG 2.0 AA Compliance to make an inclusive website for all users.

Achieving WCAG 2.0 AA Compliance to make an inclusive website for all users.

McAfee

2022

McAfee a11y

Accessibility Audit

Screen-reader testing

ADA standards

1 year

Quarterly sprints

1 Designer

16 Dev engineers

1 PM

UX Research lead

Accessibility Engineer

Background

Background

Built on an Oracle tech stack over several years by different teams, the Support website posed a series of challenges that prevented the company from complying with accessibility legal requirements.

Built on an Oracle tech stack over several years by different teams, the Support website posed a series of challenges that prevented the company from complying with accessibility legal requirements.

Problem Statement

Problem Statement

How can make the Customer Support website's design inclusive?

How can make the Customer Support website's design inclusive?

Solution

Solution

Achieve WCAG 2.0 AA standard across the experience.

Achieve WCAG 2.0 AA standard across the experience.

Method

Method

Quarterly targets to improve ADA standards by working with the UXR team to identify, prioritize and fix issues with routine usability testing to keep us on the right track.

Quarterly targets to improve ADA standards by working with the UXR team to identify, prioritize and fix issues with routine usability testing to keep us on the right track.

Understanding the scope of the problem + timeline

Understanding the scope of the problem + timeline

Over the course of a year we assessed and addressed ADA fixes with a lot of guidance from an accessibility engineer for particularly tricky problems.

Over the course of a year we assessed and addressed ADA fixes with a lot of guidance from an accessibility engineer for particularly tricky problems.

Method

Method

I acted as the bridge between the User Research for Accessibility Lead + the Accessibility engineer and the developers on my team.

I acted as the bridge between the User Research for Accessibility Lead + the Accessibility engineer and the developers on my team.

Process

23+ JIRA Stories (ADA epic)

The legacy tech stack and years of design debt meant there were a plethora of issues to address. I would write up tickets and follow up with the engineering sprints.

4 check-ins through the year

Our method was to have a quarterly review and test fixes with visually impaired users. Some issues would go back into JIRA.

8+ Fable user testing sessions

23+ JIRA Stories (ADA epic)

The UXR team helped us set up sessions with screen-reader users to test updates to the Support website.

The legacy tech stack and years of design debt meant there were a plethora of issues to address. I would write up tickets and follow up with the engineering sprints.

Design Tradeoffs

4 check-ins through the year

For some issues I had to take a call on whether to retain them, reduce aesthetic value to a degree for functionality or remove/update whole elements.

Our method was to have a quarterly review and test fixes with visually impaired users. Some issues would go back into JIRA.

8+ Fable user testing sessions

The UXR team helped us set up sessions with screen-reader users to test updates to the Support website.

Design Tradeoffs

For some issues I had to take a call on whether to retain them, reduce aesthetic value to a degree for functionality or remove/update whole elements.

Margaret Kuo (UXR Lead) walking us through observed behavior.

Margaret Kuo (UXR Lead) walking us through.

Easy, Medium, Wildly complex fixes

Easy, Medium, Wildly complex fixes

Some issues kept cycling through JIRA because of how the original components were coded. Deeply nested FAQs, modals with interactive elements, chatbots etc.

  • Some fixes like changing the font size from 12px to 16px were relatively simple.

  • Others like DOM order and navigating the website were more difficult.

  • And ones, like nested accordion structures and nested cards, required multiple sprints.

The Easy fixes

The Easy fixes

Some fixes like changing the font size from 12px to 16px were relatively simple.

Some fixes like changing the font size from 12px to 16px were relatively simple.

Adding aria tags and button labels

Tradeoffs

Tradeoffs

I challenged the need of some elements inherited from the enterprise side. This eventually led to re-evaluating 47 search filter options and removing it entirely after looking at usage patterns.

I challenged the need of some elements inherited from the enterprise side. This eventually led to re-evaluating 47 search filter options and removing it entirely after looking at usage patterns.


There was no point in trying to fix an element that no one used.


There was no point in trying to fix an element that no one used.

What I learned

What I learned

It was great collaborating with JAWs users and a revelatory experience as a designer.

It was great collaborating with JAWs users and a revelatory experience as a designer.

What I'd do differently

What I'd do differently

Additional review with UXR

Additional review with UXR

We missed a crucial step where I hadn't observed that screen-reader users really more on the arrow keys than the tab keys when navigating a website. We had to go through another cycle of fixes to rectify this oversight.

Sunk cost fallacy

Sunk cost fallacy

It would have been quicker and less resource intensive to completely overhaul the contact support modal, than the time and effort we spent trying to add fixes to a complex nested element.

Holla at Me

Feel free to contact me. I'm actively looking for a new challenge!

Neha Ashok

LinkedIn

Holla at Me

Feel free to contact me. I'm actively looking for a new challenge!

Neha Ashok

LinkedIn