Provide Accessible Online Events and Meetings

Here are some best practices on how to provide accessible online meetings. Remember that even though you may not know of any colleagues with disabilities, many people with non-apparent disabilities do not disclose their disability for a variety of reasons. Creating an accessible experience from the beginning ensures everyone is provided with an inclusive experience without having to disclose their disability. 

1. Share the agenda and any meeting documents ahead of time. An agenda sets expectations for neurodivergent employees and sharing meeting documents ahead of time can help a wide variety of disabled people. Just make sure your documents are accessible before sharing them. 
2. Ask if anyone needs accommodations. Just asking this question can give disabled employees a sense of belonging, even if they do not need a specific accommodation for your meeting. It also helps people voice needed accommodations, such as human-transcribed captions and large print format for meeting materials. 
3. Turn on auto-captions for any meetings where human-transcribed captions are not requested. Auto-captions and the associated transcript help many people follow along, including hard of hearing employees and any neurodivergent employees that have an audio processing disorder, as well as anyone experiencing audio issues.
   1. Turn on auto-captions in Zoom
   2. Turn on auto-captions in Microsoft Teams
4. Describe any visuals you display during a meeting. Do not assume that everyone in a meeting can see the visuals. Whether someone is dealing with migraines that day or is blind, they may not be able to see what you are showing. Provide a basic description of each visual to ensure everyone can follow along.  
5. Spotlight sign language interpreters when an ASL interpreter is needed. Spotlighting the interpreter ensures the sign language interpreter is prominent during the meeting and appears on screen for a recorded meeting. 
6. Ensure there are multiple ways for attendees to communicate during an online meeting rather than relying on one communication method alone. Not everyone feels comfortable speaking their questions so providing both the ability to speak and type questions is best. 
7. Turn video off by default and let attendees determine if they want to enable video. Video is optional and can be beneficial to some, such as attendees that rely on lip reading, but not beneficial to others, including blind and deaf-blind employees as well as chronically ill employees.