Web Accessibility Project Implementation Outline

Below you will find a list of the major milestones for implementation (rollout) of accessibility standards in any given company.
  1. Secure a company’s high-level management commitment and sponsorship
    Before developing a web-accessibility project implementation plan, it is imperative to secure a company’s high-level management commitment and sponsorship. Need  to identify the accessibility champion or sponsor from a high-level management who would provide continuous support for the accessibility project
  2. Appoint overall accessibility project manager (coordinator),
  3. Formalize a company-wide accessibility policy 
    Company needs to develop a policy that is based either on the government requirements or on the w3c guidelines with reference to the w3c guidelines.
  4. Evaluate a current status of the web from accessibility point of view. A quick preliminary assessment with one of the existing evaluation tools should be conducted in order to understand the scope of the project and required resources (can be done on a random basis, taking a sample). At this stage full-fledged assessment of all web pages is not required. 
  5. Identify the scope of the project 
  6. Develop a company-wide implementation (rollout) plan with the milestones and allocated resources
  7. Develop communication plan. Communication is an important part of the plan. It is important to communicate an implementation plan to all stakeholders. It should be either precluded or accompanied by an endorsement message from a high-level management (president or CEO) emphasizing their strong commitment to the cause and all benefits including business ones as well as requirement for all new pages to comply with accessibility standards. 
  8. Clarify approach towards such technical issues like pdf, flash, java etc 
  9. Research, select, recommend free software accessible for downloading or acquire commercial software that allows evaluation and retrofitting of the site (link to the list of existing software) 
  10. Retrofit company templates and stylesheets, test them on different browsers and platform, conduct usability test with participation of disabled people
  11. Specify all testing requirements for evaluation of the retrofitted pages (browsers, usability tests, platforms, etc.) 
  12. Develop or identify training materials, and organize training, 
  13. Set up help desk (only for medium and large companies/organizations)
  14. Establish compliance process 

Attachment:
Tracking tool sample (excel spreadsheet)