USA 
United Kingdom
There’s a lot to get excited about in the world of learning technology.
From learning in the flow of work to badge-based, choose-your-own-adventure-style gamified courses, and centralized, friction-free learning management systems (LMS) to groundbreaking VR factory floor training simulators, the learning experience employers can create has truly accelerated in sophistication.
As a result, the e-learning industry has seen an astonishing boom. L&D and e-learning are now often used interchangeably, and the e-learning market sat a value of $399.3billion as of 2022, with the prospect of becoming a trillion-dollar industry by 2032, per analysis from Global Marketing Insights (GMI).
Unfortunately, for all this innovation and excitement, many organizations still neglect e-learning accessibility. By doing so, they exclude a huge proportion of the workforce from benefiting from this otherwise brilliant technology, undoing much of the progress of the past several years.
As a Head of Learning & Development at a world-leading television corporation, who is also blind, recently told me, “People are not disabled by their condition; they are disabled by badly designed technology.”
It’s time L&D and HR professionals to get serious about e-learning accessibility.
What are the barriers to e-learning accessibility?
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2023 saw the highest percentage (22.5%) of people with a disability in the US workforce since at least 2008. Given well over one in five workers have a disability, inaccessible e-learning content is not only illegal under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, but also puts a huge proportion of the workforce at a disadvantage.
And yet, many employees with disabilities continue to report accessibility problems with e-learning at work.
Karen Burke, Talent Manager at London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG), states the two most prominent barriers to building an accessible e-learning experience are “inaccessible authoring tools” and “a gap in understanding of digital accessibility guidelines and requirements from learning professionals.”
Other barriers may include a lack of inclusivity in those who orchestrate and design e-learning programs, and opposition from those who feel investment in e-learning accessibility is not worth the time or cost. These are all barriers that HR and learning leaders must surmount.
Following accessibility guidelines
Firstly, there are detailed guidelines available such as the WCAG2 that offer a thorough checklist to ensure all e-learning content is accessible. Whilst critics of the guidelines have said, ironically, they aren’t the easiest to understand, they do offer a minimum standard for compliance.
“For employers that build courses in-house, ensuring the team responsible has had adequate training on the subject is a good first step,” explains Burke. “All designs should begin with accessibility in mind and shouldn’t require retrofitting once complete. Taking the time to build accessible templates that can be used by anyone in the team and including an accessibility section in the QA checklist will help to ensure that’s the case.”
Scrutinize vendors during the procurement process
Secondly, for most organizations, e-learning often involves partnerships with vendors or third-party providers. Whilst evaluating current or future partners, L&D professionals should scrutinize platforms and any content being provided by the company to determine whether they meet e-learning accessibility benchmarks.
Burke agrees that managing the procurement process is fundamental to e-learning accessibility. “For employers that use third-party suppliers for their course creation, it’s important to understand whether the tools those suppliers use can build accessible solutions or if there are any gaps in the technology,” she advises.
Most platforms worth their salt should be able to give clear evidence their products are compliant, but they may also offer you guidance and support for your wider e-learning offering.
“Setting the standard from the start and baking accessibility requirements into the agreement will help to ensure that all future projects begin with accessibility in mind,” Burke adds.
Continuously audit accessibility with input from people with disabilities
A further caveat is that focusing on e-learning accessibility isn’t a one-off exercise or checklist. New programs, courses, and platforms are in constant development - as are guidelines. It should therefore be a continuous focus for L&D professionals, particularly for those who oversee or execute e-learning content design.
As well as referring to industry-recognized guidelines and benchmarks, regular audits and surveys with employees can uncover barriers to accessibility. It is often able-bodied people who design e-learning content and platforms, whilst those with disabilities are overlooked.
Why does e-learning accessibility matter?
Many organizations and leaders may neglect e-learning accessibility because of an incorrect assumption that it is too timely, too costly, and only benefits a small proportion of the workforce.
However, these excuses do not stack up. By limiting the ability of those with disabilities to successfully access, process, or complete training, it undermines the impact of these programs for a huge share of the workforce. Whether it is incomplete compliance training that increases the risk to a financial institution; unreadable content that means a sales team member lacks strategies for closing deals; or even the demotivation, alienation, and disengagement to any employee who experiences an easily preventable barrier to their skills development journey, neglecting accessibility comes at a huge cost.
“With approximately 16% of the global population experiencing temporary or permanent disability, it’s vital that we build accessible e-learning experiences,” says Burke, adding that focusing on accessibility does not just benefit those with disabilities but all workers. “By building with accessibility in mind from the start, we’re not taking anything away from the learning; we’re ensuring that everyone has equitable access!”
As such, while L&D leaders should have a solid understanding of accessibility guidelines themselves and how those guidelines translate across different types of digital experiences, they must also be prepared to educate critics and demonstrate the value of e-learning accessibility to any who do not feel the juice is worth the squeeze.
“They’re also responsible for holding others accountable and ensuring that good, accessible design isn’t being sacrificed for the sake of time and budget,” Burke concludes. “There’s always a way!”
