Organizational Accessibility Practices and Management
What this domain tests
Domain 5 tests how organizations operationalize accessibility: governance, procurement, testing, training, and continuous improvement.
Core rules
- Policy and ownership: an accessibility policy, an executive sponsor, and named roles across design, development, content, and procurement.
- Shift left: embed accessibility in requirements, design systems, and component libraries rather than remediating at launch.
- Testing: automated tools catch only part of the issues; combine manual checks (keyboard, screen reader, zoom, contrast) with testing by people with disabilities.
- Procurement: require an ACR/VPAT, test critical flows, and include contractual accessibility terms and remediation timelines.
- Feedback: a public accessibility statement with a contact route and a documented response process.
- Governance: accessibility in the SDLC, release gates, training, audits, and metrics; WCAG-EM for evaluation scope.
- Maturity: ad hoc → planned → managed → integrated; overlays are not a substitute for accessible code.
Worked example
A company buys a SaaS HR portal. Procurement asks for an ACR claiming WCAG 2.1 AA. In a demo, the candidate cannot tab to the “Apply” button and the date picker traps focus. Reasoning: the ACR claim is contradicted by observed behavior; automated scans may not catch the focus trap. The organization should require remediation before contract award, add accessibility warranties, and retest. A “we have an overlay” response is not sufficient.
Traps
Treating a one-time audit as the program; relying on automated testing alone; buying an overlay instead of fixing code; no feedback channel; accessibility owned only by IT, not content and procurement; measuring compliance without user outcomes.