As designers and researchers, we aspire to equitably address underrepresented populations in our work. But, equitable choices are often hard to prioritize with competing organizational interests and incentives. In this talk, Google researcher Nithya Sambasivan and designer Jen Devins will present their lessons learnt from building equitable technologies with social inclusion and technology ethics as guiding foci. Drawing from their experiences with advancing gender equity and accessibility in technologies, they will present a practical framework to apply equitable design and research in the product development process. The talk will discuss how to make the case for equitable design and gain support, how to create a foundation of core insights to guide decisions, and how to have applied impact on products.
Jen Devins leads the Accessibility UX Team and works to make Google products universally accessible by developing new standards and consulting with teams on accessibility design practices and guidelines. She has also worked as a user experience design manager on products such as Google Search and Google Analytics. Prior to Google, Jen was an interaction designer at eBay and worked on finding and buying experiences. Jen earned an M.A. in education with an instructional technology emphasis from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
