“If you think an inclusive approach to communication is cost prohibitive, then you should look at what it costs your business to systematically exclude partsRead more about Food For Thought #013
The Accessible Canada Act (ACA) builds on the Canadian Human Rights Act and focuses on the prohibition of discrimination based on disability. Adopted in theRead more about Did You Know… #012
“Challenges for inclusion may be our responsibility to solve as professional communicators, but the weight of exclusion is ultimately borne by audience members alone.”Read more about Food For Thought #012
Research shows that people with disabilities have friends and loved ones who can be influenced when deciding which businesses to solicit, based on how inclusiveRead more about Did You Know… #011
“Inclusion is like driving a car… as long as everything runs smoothly, no one notices or cares. But when something breaks down, the entire experienceRead more about Food For Thought #011
According to Statistics Canada, one in seven Ontarians self-report as having one disability. Collectively, they represent about 1.8 million people in the province. As theRead more about Did You Know… #010
“If your definition of diversity and inclusion doesn’t include catering to the needs and expectations of people with disabilities and the elderly, then you’re doingRead more about Food For Thought #010
According to Statistics Canada, about 48% of Canadian adults have literacy skills that fall below high school level, which regularly affects their ability to optimallyRead more about Did You Know… #009
“The first step to becoming a truly inclusive communicator is to acknowledge diversity. Every single person needs some differentiation in some way, at some point,Read more about Food For Thought #009
When our inclusion strategy doesn’t consider disabilities, aging, marginalization caused by our use of technology, and cultural differences in our digital communication or during live,Read more about Did You Know… #008
“If you’re not explicitly leveraging strategies to include everyone in your audience, then you are implicitly excluding a large segment of that same audience.”Read more about Food For Thought #008
Disabilities come in many shapes and forms, but not all of them are always obvious to the onlooker! According to the Invisible Disabilities Association, 74%Read more about Did You Know… #007
“As professional speakers, trainers and communicators, we oftentimes have a misleading tendency to see our audience as nothing more than an extension of ourselves.”Read more about Food For Thought #007
Combined, working-age adults with disabilities and those over the age of 65 make up for about 40% of the entire population, meaning that more thanRead more about Did You Know… #006
“When we craft our message to meet the needs and expectations of audience members living on the extremes of the bell curve, then those inRead more about Food For Thought #006
The cost of a relatively simple accessibility-related lawsuit that gets settled quickly in the United States still averages around $350,000 USD or more… which isRead more about Did You Know… #005
“Discarding some audience members’ experiences as edge cases implicitly defines the boundaries of who in your audience you actually care about.”Read more about Food For Thought #005
In 2021, many companies have received multiple ADA-based lawsuits. Often, the first lawsuit is for the website and the second for a mobile app. AdditionalRead more about Did You Know… #004
“A one-size-fits-all delivery of your message will always end up denying part of your audience with fair and equal opportunities to truly learn, share, grow,Read more about Food For Thought #004
According to 2021 data from the American Institutes for Research (AIR), the total after-tax disposable income of working-age Americans with disabilities is about $504 billionRead more about Did You Know… #003