Accessibility Specialist

Job description

Background

Scope’s Partnerships team are focusing on getting everyday equality for disabled people. Our work focuses on:

• reaching as many organisations and individuals as possible to educate and empower them to be accessible and inclusive
• having the biggest impact for disabled people in those organisations and for disabled customers
• creating income for Scope

As part of building new partnerships, we have developed our consultancy offer. This supports businesses and partners with accessibility and disability inclusion.

Our current offering will be promoted on a new Scope website for businesses. This will be the online hub for businesses to learn about the different services Scope offers. This product offering will grow and develop with the new site and demand from partners.

Role purpose

We’re looking for someone to join the partnerships team under our Lead Accessibility Specialist.

The Accessibility Specialist will support the delivery and creation of Scope’s accessibility training products for businesses. This will include accessibility reviews as part of training packages and potentially audits. The role will be split between content and technical web accessibility.

We also create bespoke corporate packages for our partners depending on their needs. This can include creating a new training programme from scratch. Or it can include co-producing the training with the organisation to tailor it to them.

Our offering also includes quarterly 1-day content accessibility training sessions. Professionals from different organisations can sign up to these.

Duties may also include supporting other Scope and partner projects with accessibility. The role will involve working with the Programme Lead for our inclusive employment products. And Digital Inclusion Lead on web accessibility audits. These are all part of Scope’s consultancy offer.

As Scope’s business services expand, new product opportunities will come up. The role will require creating new training products in different formats. For example, face to face, video and e-learning. They will also be able to support with making sure all new products are accessible and meet web standards.

The Accessibility Specialist must have experience with accessible content. They’ll be confident in training others best practices. They will also be able to review a website and other content types for accessibility issues.

This includes good understanding of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). But they must also be familiar with reviewing content, from plain English and readability to alt-text descriptions.

It’s essential they understand the variety of accessibility issues people have and their lived experiences. We want someone who wants to support professionals and businesses to build a culture of accessibility and inclusion. Not just meet the guidelines.

The team

The Accessibility Specialist is part of the ‘Create Demand’ team. This team is the creative part of Partnerships at Scope. We focus on developing, refining and delivering the Partnerships offer. This allows us to get the most impact, reach and income for Scope.

Main responsibilities

• Deliver quarterly 1-day accessibility training
• Deliver existing corporate accessibility training products
• Create and deliver bespoke training products
• Work closely with partners to tailor or co-create and deliver customised training programmes
• Create and deliver new training products on technical accessibility and WCAG 2.1
• Develop new training assets, like toolkits and videos
• Review content accessibility of websites, Office documents and other content types
• Conduct technical accessibility reviews against WCAG 2.1, this may expand to supporting with website auditing product
• Support the development of consultancy product offering for Scope’s business services
• Support colleagues with accessibility of their work. This includes the development of the new business website.
• Give talks at events on accessibility and promote consultancy offer 

Internal contacts

• Partnerships team
• Services team
• People team
• Marketing team

External contacts

• Accessibility community
• Partners and prospective partners
• Web agency for the business website

Person specification

Knowledge and experience

Essential

• A good knowledge of digital and web accessibility standards
• Experience reviewing content and websites using WCAG 2.1 and content accessibility best practices, such as plain English
• Experience using assistive technologies to test content
• Experience with accessibility testing and content tools, such as WAVE, Microsoft Insights, Hemingway App
• Experience delivering training and public speaking
• Experience using Office 365. And a good understanding of the accessibility features.
• Understanding of accessibility best practices for different programmes and content formats. For example, PowerPoint slides and presenting, social media posts, newsletters, websites, and so on.
• A good knowledge of the Equality Act 2010

Desirable

• Lived experience of disability
• Good knowledge and understanding of the social model of disability, and using social model language
• Experience creating accessible training. This includes pacing, exercises, different activities. It also includes understanding possible barriers and preparing inclusive alternatives.

Skills

Essential

• Passionate about accessibility and equality for disabled people
• Understanding of disability barriers, lived experiences, common adjustments
• Ability to review, test, analyse and communicate accessibility issues and explain these in plain English
• Ability to collaborate directly with partners to tailor and implement training
• Skills in creating professional looking presentations for training, using our template
• Confident with teaching, answering difficult questions and speaking in front of audiences.
• Ability to take feedback and make changes. This includes from training participants, organisations, or colleagues
• Strong attention to detail, especially when reviewing content for accessibility issues
• Can work individually and collaboratively. We will support if you need to work in a specific way.
• Organisation and prioritisation skills. We can support applicants with tools and ways and working if needed.
• Ability to create engaging and accessible content in Word, PowerPoint, and on websites.
• Can communicate with team members, other teams and external contacts.
• A good match for Scope’s values: pioneering, courageous, connected, open and fair

Desirable

• Can bring their own style of delivery to training that keeps people engaged. Particularly for online classes.
• Feels comfortable saying ‘I don’t know’ to questions or requests. And will follow up rather than trying to respond without knowing the topic
• Ability to work well with businesses or colleagues. Knows when to be firm and when to be flexible to achieve what’s needed. We can support with finding ways to help you to this or work with you to develop this skill.