Inclusion isn't "nice"
Mismatch reminded me that inclusion isn’t about charity or feel-good gestures. It’s about confronting the status quo—asking tough questions, surfacing mismatches, and changing the defaults that leave people out. The hardest part isn’t the methods; it’s staying with the discomfort long enough to make real change.
Fear is normal.
I often worry about saying the wrong thing or making mistakes, and Mismatch makes it clear that this fear is universal. Mistakes will happen. What matters is how we respond: correcting, redesigning, apologizing. Progress is measured by how we recover, not by striving for perfection.
Bias is unavoidable
I’ve realized how much my design instincts are shaped by ability bias—using myself as the baseline. Holmes reminds us that bias is systemic: products reflect the defaults of their creators. The work is to name those defaults and design beyond them.
Inclusion has no finish line
Holmes uses the metaphor of brushing your teeth, which stuck with me. Inclusion isn’t a one-time project—it’s an ongoing practice of care and maintenance. Each new feature or flow is a chance to ask: who’s being left out?
Design with, not for
“Nothing about us, without us.” This principle has reframed how I think about collaboration. It’s not enough to invite excluded communities for usability testing at the end. Inclusion means co-creating with them and shifting power so they help shape the design from the start.
Design for future relevance
One of my biggest takeaways is that inclusive design is also resilience design. It prepares for our future selves—as our abilities and identities change. It builds systems flexible enough to adapt to futures we can’t yet predict.
👉 Watch Kat Holmes talk about Mismatch (opens in a new tab)
Examples that inspired me this week
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HearingAI by Microsoft (opens in a new tab) Developed by a programmer with hearing loss who needed a better way to detect alerts. The team created an app that visualizes sounds in real time, showing intensity and direction—a clear case of lived experience driving innovation.
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The Internet Is for Everyone by Vint Cerf (opens in a new tab) Cerf, who is hard of hearing, helped pioneer email partly to communicate with his deaf wife. Many “universal” technologies began as accessibility solutions.
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John R. Porter’s portfolio (opens in a new tab) Porter is a UX designer and PhD candidate whose work blends practice, research, and teaching. I find this mix a useful model for balancing craft with impact.
Why this matters for my work
Inclusive design isn’t charity—it’s essential infrastructure. Every design system, flow, or micro-decision expands or limits participation. For me, building Pax means creating not just a design system, but a resilience system: embedding accessibility into every future product by default.
My takeaway this week
A product designer’s role isn’t to chase universality, but to keep shifting defaults toward inclusion—whether it’s a merchant onboarding form, a compliance flow, or a color token. Every decision adds up.
Video of the week
Andy Mineo: Hear my heart (opens in a new tab)
First published in my Inclusive Design Journals for the Paystack Design team. Adapted here for this collection.