19 June 2020
A straight-forward website
Sometimes I feel the time has really come for straight-forward, clean and simple websites that are easy
to
use and navigate. Built with ethical design
principles in mind.
Simple ~ Accessible ~ Ethical
Be gone constant popups and ad bombardments every scroll, and
lets not
employ dark patterns (eg being tricked to click on an ad). It's also good practice to be wary of
the over collection of every bit of data about our users and show responsible custodianship and careful
good
purposeful use of what data we do have access
to.
Another aspect of a website I believe is really important is accessibility, that is everybody
should
have access to
your content on line,
even those differently abled. We need to think about those who use screen readers (ie those with
visual impairment) and those who may have other hearing or sensory difficulties (think autism or
hearing loss)
where captioning of
video content is vital.
It doesn't take a momumental change to make our websites straight-forward, ethical
and
accessible, just keeping these
principles at the core of what we do can make all the difference and that's my aim in this
realm.
Liz
18 May 2020
A distributed workforce
The future of the way we work, learn
and live may well change significantly as we more readily utilise technology and the online
world to suit our
needs.
For the first time this year, we had a great number of people working from different locations.
Plentiful
communicating and co-ordinating occurred
via many different and often new methods, think Zoom or Webex meetings, online consultations,
Slack or other messaging
channels and the utilisiation of team workflow products. This was an
amazing
experiment
in remote teams, collaboration and
new ways to work and deliver a service on line.
What a great demonstration of the resiliency and
innovation out
there. We have I believe, discovered that even when distributed, so
much can be
done (and done well I might add!). There are many instances where online is way more efficient
or accessible
for certain portions of the population. We even see other useful societal benefits, notably the
flexibility to give time to the other parts of our lives outside of the traditional work
paradigm. Local communities also stand to benefit from this broadening of work
spaces whilst also satisfying the need for in person
connections
and collaborations. Local, suburban co-working spaces could really come into play here.
Always looking
toward a better present and future - for all.
Liz