Project Manager

Accessibility Responsibilities

• The Project Manager manages product development activities.
• The Project Manager ensures compliance with digital accessibility regulations and requirements by performing the following duties and responsibilities:
  • Create and maintain project procedures and documentation that are accessible to all members of the project team and project stakeholders, addressing accessibility and usability concerns as needed
  • Include accessibility-related activities in project timelines and milestones
  • Include accessibility evaluation in product testing (e.g., usability testing, use case tests)
  • Support design, development, and/or procurement teams in prioritizing accessibility in project planning and product development

Qualifications

Required

Applicants for the Project Manager role are required to have these qualifications:

• Knowledge of digital accessibility and disability inclusion
• Knowledge of regulations related to digital accessibility (e.g., Section 508, ADA)
• Knowledge of WCAG 2.2 A, AA, and AAA requirements
• Experience managing projects that require compliance with non-functional requirements (e.g., security, privacy) including accessibility
• Experience incorporating accessibility into project planning and product development methodologies

Preferred

Applicants with the following qualifications will be preferred:

• Experience engaging with people with disabilities who are authentic users of assistive technology in research and design activities
• Experience coordinating accessibility and usability testing with an ability to understand testing and prioritize testing results.
• Experience managing projects without resorting to an accessibility backlog

Recruitment Questions

Behavioral

• Knowledge of digital accessibility and disability inclusion
  • Who benefits from accessibility?
  • How would you define inclusive and/or universal design? Can you provide an example? (Does not need to be related to a digital product)
  • What resources would you recommend to someone who wants to keep informed of the latest updates on accessibility and inclusive design?
• Experience managing projects that require compliance with non-functional requirements (e.g., security, privacy) including accessibility
  • How do you see accessibility fitting into your role in the organization?
  • How do you incorporate accessibility into your day to day activities? (Email, document creation, when presenting content, etc.). Give an overview of the process you go through for (insert example).
  • Describe at least five disability etiquette tips every manager should know.
  • How would you convince leadership to allocate funds and resources to conduct accessibility audits?

Technical

• Knowledge of regulations related to digital accessibility (e.g., Section 508, ADA)

  • Provide a general overview of the laws related to digital accessibility and how they differ.
  • Describe the difference between Section 504 and Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act.
  • Describe the difference between Section 508 and the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.

• Knowledge of WCAG 2.2 AA requirements

  • What is WCAG? What are the differences between A, AA, and AAA compliance?
  • What are the Authoring Tools Accessibility Guidelines and what are some of the benefits of using these guidelines when creating an authoring tool?

• Experience incorporating accessibility into product development methodologies

  • When is the best time during a project to work on product accessibility?
  • What is the difference between automated and manual accessibility testing?
  • Who is responsible for ensuring the accessibility of products and services?
  • Describe the impact of product procurement on the overall project life cycle.
  • How have you incorporated accessibility into your project management activities? Note for interviewer: Project managers should be thinking not just about the project tasks but also about how key awareness and support deliverables are developed: project communications, user testing documentation, training materials, and other key deliverables.
  • How do you establish accessibility standards and best practices for the day-to-day operation of your team with team members and stakeholders?
  • How have you measured the overall accessibility health of a project?
  • Describe a project in which you built accessibility into the overall project life cycle. What were key milestones for accessibility? Which project roles were impacted?
  • Which communities or resources do you engage with when your team is struggling to find a fix to an accessibility issue?
  • What is the biggest challenge, cross functionally, to getting accessibility features launched? In your experience, how have you overcome this challenge?
  • Have you encountered a situation where an internal process was inaccessible or unusable by a member of your project team? If so, how did you address the issue? If not, what steps would you take to find an accessible solution?

• Experience engaging with people with disabilities in research and design activities

  • How have you engaged users with disabilities in providing feedback throughout the design, development, and user experience research processes?

• Experience coordinating accessibility and usability testing with an ability to understand and prioritize testing results

  • Describe your process for ensuring that project and testing documentation are accessible to all members of the project team, including user testers with disabilities.
  • What steps would you take to guide designers and developers on your team who are struggling to understand or act on an accessibility testing report?

• Experience managing projects without resorting to an accessibility backlog

  • Describe how you would prioritize accessibility issues that need to be addressed.

Translations

A list of translations will be provided here when received by language. Please submit through GitHub.

Disclaimer: Use this toolkit to incorporate accessibility-focused knowledge, skills, and sample pre-screening and interview questions into your job descriptions and hiring process.