Inclusive Design Fundamentals

Format:
Teams Course Online or in-house.

Group Size:
4–10 participants
(Larger groups available on request)

Duration:
Flexible delivery options:

  • 2-hour weekly sessions

  • Half-day workshops

  • Full-day workshops

Delivered online or in-house.

Approach:

Each session combines:

  • Practical theory

  • Live demonstrations

  • Hands-on exercises

  • Reflection activities

  • Short post-session quizzes

Participants leave each session with tools they can immediately apply to their work.

Price:
Subject to group size

Design products, services and experiences that work for more people from the start.

Inclusive Design Fundamentals introduces teams and individuals to practical tools and mindsets for designing services that work for diverse users across abilities, backgrounds and contexts. Learn how to identify exclusion, embed accessibility, and create experiences that are usable, equitable and valuable for everyone.

Inclusive design recognises the full range of human diversity — including ability, age, language, culture and context — and seeks to remove barriers that prevent people from participating fully in products and services.

Problems This Course Solves

Many organisations want to create inclusive services but struggle to translate good intentions into practical design decisions.

This course helps teams overcome common challenges such as:

  • Designing services that unintentionally exclude users

  • Treating accessibility as compliance rather than design quality

  • Lack of diversity in research and testing participants

  • Digital services that fail for users with different abilities or contexts

  • Limited awareness of bias in design decisions

  • Difficulty embedding inclusive practices into everyday product or service development

Inclusive design aims to identify and remove barriers that create exclusion and ensure products and environments work for the widest possible range of users.

What you’ll Learn

Participants will gain a practical understanding of how to design for diversity and reduce exclusion.

Key learning outcomes include:

  • Understanding inclusive design principles and why they matter

  • Recognising bias and exclusion in products, services and systems

  • Differentiating inclusive design from accessibility compliance

  • Conducting inclusive user research

  • Designing with diverse capabilities, contexts and needs in mind

  • Applying inclusive design heuristics to digital and service experiences

  • Integrating accessibility and usability into design workflows

  • Using inclusive design to unlock innovation opportunities

Typical Outcomes

After completing the course, participants typically:

  • Identify exclusion points in existing services

  • Improve accessibility and usability across digital and physical touchpoints

  • Expand design thinking beyond “average users”

  • Apply inclusive research and testing methods

  • Design more resilient, flexible and adaptable service experiences

  • Build greater empathy for diverse user needs

Organisational Benefits

Embedding inclusive design practices helps organisations create better services and reach more people.

Benefits include:

  • More usable and accessible products and services

  • Reduced risk of exclusion or compliance issues

  • Improved customer and employee experience

  • Stronger innovation through diverse perspectives

  • Increased market reach by serving broader audiences

  • More resilient service systems that work across different contexts

Inclusive design often leads to better solutions for everyone because features created for specific needs frequently benefit wider audiences.

Course Topics

Topics may include:

  • Introduction to Inclusive Design

  • Accessibility vs Inclusive Design

  • Understanding Human Diversity

  • Bias and Exclusion in Design

  • Inclusive User Research Methods

  • Designing for Different Abilities and Contexts

  • Accessibility Principles for Digital Products

  • Inclusive Content and Communication

  • Inclusive Design Heuristics and Frameworks

  • Evaluating and Improving Existing Services

Participants work through practical exercises and real-world case studies to apply the concepts immediately.

Ideal for…

This course is designed for individuals and teams involved in designing or delivering services.

Ideal participants include:

  • UX and service designers

  • Product managers

  • Digital teams

  • Policy and government teams

  • HR and employee experience teams

  • Strategy and innovation teams

  • Customer experience professionals

  • Organisations seeking to improve accessibility and inclusion

No prior design training is required.

About our instructors

This course is delivered by experienced practitioners in human-centred design, service design and innovation.

Our instructors have worked with government departments, corporate organisations and not-for-profits to design inclusive services that work for real people in real contexts. The training combines practical design tools, real case studies and hands-on exercises to help teams embed inclusive design into everyday work.

Participants leave with practical frameworks and techniques they can apply immediately within their organisation.

Bring This Course to Your Team

This course can be delivered online or in-house and tailored to the needs of your organisation.

To discuss delivery options or request a proposal  contact EXP Studio.