Last week, I talked about some common pitfalls to avoid when setting your team's accessibility KPIs.
I gave four examples:
- Adopting metrics because they're the industry standard
- Setting metrics as a goal
- Comparing your metrics to another organisation's or an industry average
- Making one person responsible
Here are some other examples I found online and a few I got from some of you.
Only measuring automated test results. Automated testing typically catches just 30-40% of accessibility issues. Organizations get a false sense of security when they rely solely on automated scores.
Not including disabled users in setting metrics. It's a common enough mistake to create accessibility metrics without actually involving people with disabilities in the process.
Setting vague targets you could never measure. Stuff like "improve accessibility" without specific, measurable criteria is pointless.
Focusing only on compliance, not usability. Perfect WCAG scores don't automatically mean good user experience.
Treating accessibility as a one-time achievement. Setting KPIs as if accessibility is something you "complete" rather than treating it as an ongoing process.
And one more that I should have probably included in the original list.
Not connecting metrics to business outcomes. Failing to link accessibility measurements to concrete business outcomes like increased user retention, conversion rates or customer satisfaction. This makes it harder to maintain support and resources for accessibility initiatives.
Thank you to everyone who wrote back!