by Leandro Camilo and Tuneet Randhawa
We want to take you on a journey. As you read this introduction, imagine yourself in each situation—and feel what is being experienced. This may feel overwhelming—but the good news is that we can create a digital world that includes everyone.
You start your day in the office as normal and turn on your laptop. You’ve just received an email from your manager, with a list of outstanding project tasks. She’s asked you to action the items highlighted in red. But when you open the document, you don’t see any red, everything looks the same. You email your manager asking for clarity. Next, you’ve just received a notification: about a mandatory training course. It opens with a video. You press play - you can see someone speaking but hear nothing. You try the CC button to play captions. Nothing. No matter what you click you can’t consume the content. A knot in your stomach starts to grow. You shift your focus to something else. A team member has asked you to review a project report, but it's hard to read: cluttered layout, unreadable font, no clear headings and complex language. You struggle to make sense of it. How am I supposed to review and summarise this? Your hands begin to sweat and it feels like your screen is turning blurry. You receive a notification pop-up—you know that means it's time for you to join your 1pm meeting. Maybe this is the opportunity you need to win back the day. It’s a virtual meeting that is discussing a presentation. As you follow along on your screen, your colleague refers to the graph on slide three. You go to slide three but it’s just a blank box, you go to the next slide and it’s the same thing—no graphs, simply blank spaces. You’ve lost focus and can’t follow the discussion. You zone out and decide to check your inbox. Your manager still hasn’t replied to your email from this morning. The knot in your stomach returns—and now it's bigger.
What if this was your reality?
These scenarios can be a daily reality for people with certain types of disabilities or neurodivergence—navigating content in a digital world.
If you have red-green colour deficiency (also known as colour blindness), you wouldn’t be able to determine which tasks in the email were outstanding—given they were colour coded.
If you have a hearing impairment and encounter videos that have no closed captions or transcripts, you’d struggle to complete the mandatory training course.
If you are neurodivergent, your brain may become overstimulated by the cluttered and unstructured content in the project report.
And if you have a vision impairment, the lack of alternative text descriptions (Alt Text) or summarisation in a presentation would mean that your screen reader couldn’t detect the graphs in the presentation.
How would you feel if these obstacles limited your ability to do your job? How would you feel if, as a leader, you created those obstacles for your team? Not all disabilities are visible or permanent—and their impact can vary from person to person.
Today, Global Accessibility Awareness Day (GAAD) is marked across the world, and we want to raise awareness of the importance of digital accessibility for all. Read on to explore more context and find out what you can do to help.
Small changes. Big impact.
More than 300 million people worldwide experience some form of red-green colour vision deficiency— also known as colour blindness.1 How can you help? Avoid using colour alone to convey meaning to your colleagues, incorporate alternative visual cues like shapes, patterns, icons or text labels alongside colour.
Over 5% of the world's population have hearing impairments.2 How can you assist? Always provide closed captions and transcripts for video content and use platforms that support accessible video features.
It’s estimated that around 20% of the population globally are neurodivergent, experiencing autism, ADHD, dyslexia, dyspraxia or other neurological differences.3 What can you do? Use clear headings, consistent navigation and plain language. Avoid cluttered, text-heavy pages and unreadable fonts.
Globally, around 295 million people have moderate to severe visual impairment. Some may require a screen reader to interact with digital content.4 To be supportive, always add descriptive alt text to images, charts, tables, banners and logos—whether they appear in websites, apps, documents or social media. Make sure the alt text you include is meaningful and accurately describes the content you’re using.
These small actions can make a big difference. This GAAD, let's remember the human side of digital accessibility in the workplace. Together, we can build a more accessible and inclusive digital world for everyone.
Looking for more? Explore our tips on how you can promote digital accessibility and inclusion every day, in our Making the world of work more accessible article.
At PwC, we believe that inclusion of all talents and abilities is essential to create a thriving, innovative and inclusive workplace. Through our Global Disability Inclusion Strategy, we're building a culture where every individual—disabled, neurodivergent or otherwise—has the support and opportunity to thrive. So, you can grow here and go further. Learn more about PwC’s Global Disability Inclusion Strategy.
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