Website Redesign-MIT Risk Management & Compliance Services

The client:

Opus Design of Boston, worked with MIT to redesign their Risk Management & Compliance website.  This department at MIT helps keep their community in compliance and manages risk.  Their vision is to advance the mission of the Institute through informed risk-taking.

The project:

Our design agency took on this website redesign and put into place the requests of the client.  We worked to make it modern and simple; to create character while being extremely intuitive from a user-perspective.

Design challenge and approach: 

Sr. Graphic Designer, Casey McGee took on this project.  She worked with Bara Blender from MIT.  Bara is the Communication Strategist, she keeps the style and brand of MIT consistent across all its communities.  For this website, we were pushed by her to make sure it was accessible to all.  To do this Casey spent a day using a screen reader, putting herself in the shoes of those who are visually impaired.  She created an accessibility document guide for Opus.

One of the challenges on the homepage was making sure the contrast in the colors, especially the blue, was high enough to be visually acceptable to all readers.  To be sure of this she used the website Juicy Studio to test the contrast between the background and foreground color.  After several revisions, the right blue was found.  In her accessibility document, she referenced several websites that have tools to ensure all readers can use the website.

Not only did the design have to meet accessibility standards, but the back end did as well.  Arranging hierarchy and tagging properly makes it possible for hearing impaired to work through the website.  Working together with the developer, Casey was able to create a website that is in compliance with their standards.  Now Opus is more intentional about making their websites accessible so everyone can access them.