If the Head of Product shouldn't become the bottleneck, why should I as the expert?
I don't want a product team to need me forever and for every little thing. Being asked to review every design or settle every accessibility question can feel flattering. It proves I’m useful, but it can also make me the next bottleneck.
When every decision passes through the accessibility expert, work slows down. Designers wait for feedback, engineers hesitate over choices they could learn to make and, if I'm not around, the decision will either stall or move ahead without me.
That isn't the kind of support I want to provide.
My job is to help teams build their own judgement. I want them to understand why a keyboard interaction works, recognise when focus order is wrong and know which questions to ask before development starts.
That means I have to explain why something's important, my reasoning, and not only my answer. It means I have to help them create useful defaults and share examples they can return to later.
The one thing I haven't sorted out yet is when to step back.
There's a risk in stepping back too soon. Confidence takes practice and telling people "you own accessibility now" without guidance won't help them much. I need to somehow reduce my support gradually as the team's ability and confidence to judge things for themselves grow.
I'll know it's all working when fewer decisions need me and the quality of those decisions keeps improving.
My goal is to make accessibility feel normal when I won't be around anymore.