Yacoob Woozeer

Accessibility Consultant

Yacoob has over 15 year’s experience of improving inclusion in government and corporate environments. Backed with his Master’s degree in Digital Inclusion he is passionate about all things inclusive and accessible, with a particular interest in education and customer journeys. He loves bringing people together to collaborate on balancing business and customer needs to ensure a practical, impactful and efficient way forwards, especially through Live and Snapshot audits and PDF training.

How did you get into accessibility?

Working in a public-facing role gave me first-hand experience of the difficulties people have accessing, not only digital, but non-digital systems as well.  As a systems administrator I was the first point of contact on a wide range of problems - these included users who needed reasonable adjustments to be made and those with disabilities.  In both cases I saw instances of people prevented from completing tasks by inaccessible systems, which was unfair.  Seeking to be able to resolve such issues, I developed expertise across the inclusion area with the aim of equalising opportunities for all.

What’s the one thing you’ve done in accessibility you’re most proud of?

I am proud of the results of bringing people together to achieve better solutions through combined efforts, and helping them to overcome a silo mentality so they are thinking about what the end user wants from the beginning of the process.  Asking questions such as “If I order from an accessible website, will the packaging be accessible, and if not, can I ask the delivery driver to unpack it?” increases awareness and challenges people to be more innovative. Breaking down barriers to digital and non-digital systems is not a dark-art – and it is useful to all.