HXD 2018

Building an inclusive design practice 
We all go into projects with good intentions—we want to make things welcoming, seamless, and maybe even fun to use. But without a process for ensuring our design decisions are also inclusive, equitable, and fair, our products can end up with all sorts of biases embedded in them. At best, these biases leave people out or let them down—and at worst, they can do real harm. From “smart scales” that assume everyone wants to lose weight to form fields that fail for queer people to exercise trackers that trigger disordered eating, we’ll look at the ways narrow thinking and unchecked biases can wreak havoc. Then, we’ll talk about what we as designers and user advocates can do about it: how we can uncover assumptions in our work, have difficult conversations with our teams and companies, and use design as a wedge to open the door for a more ethical and inclusive way forward.