Episode 3 - Heather Perriam

It's time for Episode 3 (already!!!) and we have the fantastic Heather Perriam joining Mike Hartley for the regular round of questions - all answered from our guests personal perspective.

Heather is a big advocate for Accessibility and ensures that it is always built in from the beginning of projects. She is also adult-diagnosed ADHD and has some really good takes on the impact and potential of AI.

Transcript

Mike Hartley (00:00)
Hello everyone and welcome once again to another episode of 365 ally the podcast. My name is Mike Hartley and Tonight I am absolutely delighted to be joined by Heather Perriam Welcome Heather

Heather P (00:17)
Hello, hello.

Mike Hartley (00:18)
Hello. And I will be honest, this is the first time outside of sort of chatting in group chats and what have you, that I have actually met or spoken to Heather. So I'm looking forward to learning from you and about you as much as I'm sure everybody listening and watching us as well. Heather, tell us bit about yourself.

Heather P (00:39)
Yeah, yeah, so my name is Heather Perriam. So that was a great start. That all worked out good. We all know who I am. I am a practice lead. I run a business applications practice here in the UK for a company called Trustmaque And I don't sound like I'm from the UK because I'm not. I moved here about four years ago. And when I moved here, I made this complete career shift.

So in the US, I worked in telecom for 15 years and I moved to the UK and was like, I wonder if somebody would really give me a job building these tower apps that I like to build. And it turns out that somebody did, right? And so I've been on the journey for the past few years from consultant to solution architect and now obviously running a practice and having a fantastic team around me. I am also an adult with ADHD who did not know

formally that she had ADHD until ⁓ a few years ago. And so apparently everybody else knew, but I didn't know. then like, kind of, one of my friends started talking about like RSD and all of this. And I was like, this is resonating. And it was like, like, could that be why I cry every time I think I'm in trouble? And he was like, it could be Heather. And so, so, so then we ended up in this place, right?

And so I spent a lot of time now really talking about ADHD, how we can work with the good parts and the bad parts about that. And then obviously from a solution perspective, my team is accessibility first. And so we're always thinking about how we can make solutions accessible to the most people. And that includes neurodivergence and making things

easier for people like me to use.

Mike Hartley (02:21)
love it. Love it. Brilliant. Yeah, it's a really, really funny one with, I mean, I'll be honest, I've never had a formal diagnosis. I can get through my work, Capgemini, I can go through a private assessment. The irony being is that I always forget about it and think about it at three o'clock in the morning or random other times.

Heather P (02:31)
right, yeah.

Mike Hartley (02:48)
I even have it pinned to the top of my outlook at work and I forget about it during the day or I get distracted. I mean, tell me your ADHD without telling me you're ADHD. But I've had a number of friends who have gone, do you really need it confirming? I'm like, well, yeah. Yeah, what are you saying guys? Yeah, yeah, it's a no brainer.

Heather P (02:56)
Absolutely.

Mike Hartley (03:12)
It really is a no-brainer. So, but yeah, it is a funny one how people sort of recognize it all in you before you necessarily kind of, although I do find with some people and it kind of became a bit more socially acceptable and it's now becoming a little less socially acceptable in people.

Heather P (03:21)
Yeah!

Mike Hartley (03:33)
didn't want the label of being ADHD, then a lot of people got diagnosed with it later life diagnosis, because I mean, certainly when I was a child, nobody diagnosed ADHD when I was a kid.

Heather P (03:48)
No, no.

I usually say too, like in my case, especially women, like girls. Girls didn't get ADHD when I was younger. Like we just talked too much and we were social butterflies, right? But we never, never, ever, ever got an ADHD diagnosis. It just wasn't a thing.

Mike Hartley (04:05)
Yeah, I was I was lazy. I was distracted. I was troublemaker. All those wonderful labels. It's frustrating me a bit now because there has been a lot of later life diagnosis, which is great. And it's quite right because it was under. Well, it wasn't diagnosed.

Heather P (04:15)
Yeah!

Yeah.

Mike Hartley (04:28)
But now people are going, well, everybody's saying they've got it. And it's like, people are now hiding it more because, well, I don't want to just be another one on the bandwagon. And it's like, no, please, if you've got it, get diagnosed and get, get the support you need. It's nothing to be ashamed of.

Heather P (04:45)
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

And for me, I think it was so important because once I got that diagnosis, because I have ADHD, what did I hyper-focus on? Everything I could find about ADHD, like every single thing, because now I have this diagnosis, so it's for real, right? And then, like, more and more I was researching and talking to specialists in the field, and I was like,

My whole life makes so much sense. Like I always just have lived in this space where I didn't understand why people thought I was weird. I didn't understand when they thought I was annoying, you know, or my energy. it's like, Heather, that's not appropriate. Wait, you guys love it when I'm outgoing, right? But it's not appropriate right now because I didn't understand. And I always felt like almost foreign, right? Which is hilarious now that I'm an immigrant, by the way. But anyway, you know, even in my own country, I felt like...

I'm not from here and I don't fit in the way I'm supposed to and I'm likable, but I think I'm likable in small doses and like what is wrong with me? How am I, you and ADHD let me step back and say, but there's nothing wrong with you. You're Heather and your brain functions in a very specific way. And I think that's what it's all about, right? And some people don't need the diagnosis to do that. I have a very literal.

I probably cross over into the odd-EHD territory, right, where I have a lot of black and whiteness that goes on. And so until, like, somebody officially told me, I was just like, I don't, you know, it doesn't apply. doesn't apply. Nobody's told me. Surely somebody would have pointed it out.

Mike Hartley (06:21)
Yeah, yeah, it really, really is a it's a fascinating one. It's really kind of interesting just seeing seeing people finding these things out or discovering it and the amount of people as well who are just like, thank you. That just it explains so much.

Heather P (06:33)
Yeah.

CHOP!

We just get it, right? All of a sudden, things start making sense where you're like, you know, I used to get, so in America, we'd get these report cards and they'd have like your proper grades. And I was always a very good student, ⁓ mainly because I hyper-focused and was really good at tests. And I only ran into trouble when we got into the homework students, right? ⁓ But then they had these little boxes where they would evaluate your behavior. And if you got a check mark in there, that meant you weren't good at the behavior. So you would get in trouble.

and they had this box, I'll never forget it, is quiet at appropriate times. And I had a teacher who not just gave me a check, she put two checks in there. And I remember my friends being like, I've never seen someone get two checks. I felt like, what do you mean? I'm done with my exam, so of course I'm gonna talk to everybody else. I was really little, that was a really little Heather. She must have been like seven years old, no idea.

It's funny how you can tie it back, right? Then you get the diagnosis and you're like, my whole life, it makes sense now. Like my whole life. And this isn't me being broken or anything like that. This is how my brain functions. And it's functioned that way since I was a tiny, tiny Heather, you know? And it's really important. It's really important, I think, for me to have that understanding to shift from, I'm not doing it right. I'm not being like everybody wants me to be. I'm not doing anything. You know, I can't get it. I can't get it to...

Actually, I'm just going be Heather because that's a lot easier and then that opens up spaces, right?

Mike Hartley (08:04)
Yeah, yeah, definitely. I mean, at the end of the day, it's, I mean, again, kind of an adult diagnosis, you you've already proven you're not broken, because I mean, you're a practice lead. So you've clearly managed to get stuff right. I'm a senior solution architect, I've clearly managed to get stuff right. And, you kind of think, well, I can't be that broken. But

Heather P (08:22)
Like, yeah.

Mike Hartley (08:27)
I can now understand and play to my strengths a bit more and know how to manage it a bit better or know when to focus or how to deal with it all.

Heather P (08:32)
Yes.

Yeah,

yeah, I think it's interesting that you say that because I've always been a leader. It's been a natural thing for me. I love leading teams. I'm really impassionate about helping people develop and reach their goals and doing that coaching and mentoring, right? And then, and so of course I'm really lucky because I'm also a tech geek. And so I found a way that I could do like these things I love altogether. And

And it's fantastic. What the diagnosis has allowed me to do is to stop trying to be good at everything and to understand the things that are probably not in my wheelhouse and be okay with that, right? And that's what I think I always struggled with. I promise you most of my adult life I've been told off for not doing my time sheets on time. And I don't know what it is. I don't know why. I just can't.

Right. And then every time I'm sitting with like a manager who's probably neurotypical going, Heather, it's not that hard. Set yourself a reminder into your time sheet. And I'm like, I have a reminder. Actually, I have a post-it note and a reminder in my calendar. And I actually like, like I've done all these things and I still keep forgetting. And I forget because it's not important to me and it doesn't have a lot of value in its administrative tasks. And it's not nearly as much fun as like talking to a client or building something cool. Right. You know, ⁓

Mike Hartley (09:58)
Yeah.

Heather P (09:58)
And so, so getting the diagnosis helped me embrace that and say, okay, so now when I choose people to be on the team, I look to fill in those gaps. Like, so, so I've got, I've got a solution architect who is so process in detail driven. And he's also like, not afraid to tell me like, no way, Heather, you've got to go back and do this or, you know, stay on me, but also.

to lift some of this stuff up for me. Like, don't you worry about that. You go do the things you're good at, I'll do the things I'm good at, and then we're together. And that's what the power of understanding where your limitations are can be, be just so beneficial because now you can say to people, I need help, right? I need some help, I'm not good at this, I need some help with it.

Mike Hartley (10:44)
Yeah.

Oh yeah, yeah, no, no, I love that. Um, so, so

Coming onto the topic of accessibility, for you, what does accessibility mean to you and what does that look like in your daily life?

Heather P (10:56)
Yeah.

I think for me accessibility is a couple of things. you know, I had when I moved to the UK, my very first holiday went up to Scotland and I live in South Devon and I made my husband drive up as far north in Scotland as we could go, which to a British person is not normal.

So if any Americans are listening, they don't like to jive more than like 45 minutes. It's like a distance if it's past that. So, you know, which I didn't get. So I was like, why are we staying overnight when it's only a 12 hour jive? And my husband was like, you're insane. But anyway, we get up there and I didn't make it to the cabin. I fell and I had a very nasty serious break of my ankle. I broke two bones. It was an open fracture. I won't go into gory details, but it was just really horrendous.

⁓ in any way, the reason I share that is because I actually, it wasn't, it wasn't for two and a half years before I could walk without mobility aids. And it was the first time I really got this glimpse of things that weren't accessible to me. Right. I was in a wheelchair initially before I have a second surgery and we'd go to coffee and I would look and I realized I can't, I can't get in there. I can't get in there because it's not accessible.

so I can't even go to the coffee place. And it was hard mentally for that too, because I've lived my whole life with these things in front of me, but because I didn't have the lens, I don't realize what a challenge it was for people. So I've got that bit. So accessibility, yeah, there's going to different places. And now I can't walk up like a flight of stairs without wondering how would somebody in a wheelchair get up here? Is there a lift? Would somebody help them? You know, when I think about this all the time, and it's really important.

But then there's this other side of accessibility that's really, it's different because that's for those of us, you know, I said earlier about asking for help. When I was on crutches and I had a big bag, do you know, nobody said, no, I'm not going to open the door. In fact, most people had opened the door for me and I didn't even have to ask them to help because it was so obvious that I needed this assistance. When we have,

a disability that impacts us neurologically, people don't always see that, And so then, then we have to ask for help and we have to get the courage to ask for help. And so if you have ADHD and RSD or PTSD or any of these conditions that make asking things so stressful, you've got general anxiety disorder, all of this stuff that's like, I think I would rather die than ask somebody to help me.

because that is scarier. It is scarier to ask somebody to help me than to struggle through this, right? So then now when I think about accessibility, my thought is, how can I make it? How can I do something so that somebody doesn't even have to ask for help because it's there and it's ready for them and they don't have to go through that battle? And so even if I don't know they need assistance, it actually wouldn't matter because I built that in, right? I've considered that when

I've made the design or when I've hosted, I host a lot of events and I think about, what can make this most accessible so that somebody doesn't have to find the courage to write me an email and say, can I please have those PowerPoint slides ahead of time or could you please not call on me specifically if you're doing a Q &A? You know, like, I don't want them to ever have to think that they need to do that.

Mike Hartley (14:10)
Yeah.

⁓ that's brilliant. No, I love that. I love that. Yeah.

Heather P (14:15)
I get a little

passionate about this topic, Mike, because it's so important.

Mike Hartley (14:20)
Yeah, you're preaching to the converted. Honestly, I can go to events and there'll be like, right, any questions now, stick my hand up and it'll be like, Mike, go on accessibility, I guess. Yeah, go on, here we go.

Heather P (14:36)
Hahaha!

Mike Hartley (14:37)
Or I'll be working and somebody will give a demo and I'll go, yeah, can I just say something when accessibility? Yeah. Straight away.

Heather P (14:46)
Yep. And guess

what? Not going to stop, are we? We're not going to stop because I think, and my partner who has absolutely given me permission to disclose this by the way, because I am also a strong believer in don't disclose people's disabilities without their knowledge. But my partner is more on the, he's autistic, he's on that autism spectrum, like way. so, and,

Mike Hartley (14:49)
hell no!

Heather P (15:10)
his needs are different than mine. And so sometimes I'll see this like tip for neurodivergent people and I'm like, that would do nothing for me. What are they talking about? But then I'll ask him and he'll be like, no, no, no, that's really important. That's really useful. Do you know what he said once, because I was like, why is it in meetings? Like what makes you so uncomfortable? And he goes, honestly, Heather, I just sit there and I count on there being a loud mouth like you to ask all the questions so I don't have to. And I just started busting up because I was like.

Okay, so I serve a purpose.

Mike Hartley (15:38)
⁓ brilliant. Yeah, yeah. mean, that's it. I mean, you get that whole wonderful spectrum of people that all unique and different and you get us all together. And when we played those strengths, you just end up with amazing results. It's brilliant to watch.

Heather P (15:39)
They need us, Mike! They need us!

Yes!

Mike Hartley (16:03)
It's brilliant to be a part of when it works.

Heather P (16:03)
Thousand percent.

Yeah, thousand percent. Thousand percent.

Mike Hartley (16:06)
So yeah,

yeah. No, that is awesome. So moving on from sort of your personal daily life and what have you, we've got to talk about AI because everybody has to talk about AI now. mean, you... Exactly.

Heather P (16:19)
Yes. And we're in the community, so we can't avoid it, can we?

Mike Hartley (16:24)
Exactly. We have to talk about AI. I've seen some very interesting things, positive and negative, regarding AI and its impact on accessibility. I mean, what have you seen? What would you say the impact of AI has been so far?

Heather P (16:27)
Yeah.

I mean, I, this might be a hot take. I don't know. This could be controversial. So they could be like, my gosh, can't believe no. I absolutely love it. AI is a, as an accessibility tool. It's so much for me. Right. And, ⁓ I use it differently than other people who use AI for accessibility because that's the beautiful part about AI is it can be used in many different ways to, to assist people. I think a lot of people who may be.

don't have the technical side of the job. They think it's about putting cute prompts in the chat GPT and making silly pictures. And it's like, actually there's so much more beyond that that we can do. So a couple of ways that I use it. So all the energy that people love, they're like, you always want to get Heather to talk because she's so energetic. But what they don't understand is when I'm sad or I'm upset or I'm scared or I'm anxious.

I have that same intensity, right? And sometimes people get surprised by that because I react when they tell me something that doesn't hit me the right way. AI has allowed me to now go push a button into my AI tool, into my agent, and just get it all out. I'm so upset, blah, blah, blah, blah. I don't know how to handle this. This is unfair.

I have the neurodivergent sense of justice. So if I perceive something to be unfair, it makes me really upset, right? Put it all in there. And I could say, I just don't know what to do about it. And I can get a crafted formalized, like, these are the steps that you can take, right? I can get a statement now that I'm comfortable sharing that expresses my concerns without the like intense emotion that freaks people out and makes them think that I'm...

Mike Hartley (18:03)
Yeah.

Heather P (18:22)
crazy or whatever, you know, it's like, no, here's some actionable things now. So, my leaders, I can say, I have some actions that I need you to take based on this without having all of the other stuff and the other junk clouding it, right? And so it's really helpful for me that way. It's also really helpful for me to get the starter for 10 because sometimes I just sit there and that person who'll just sit there for hours, like, I know I need to do this, but I don't know where to begin. I just don't know how to start it. I just don't know what to do.

And if I can get AI to just get me something generated, right? Like just help me get this going. Are there negatives to that? A thousand percent. We've all seen them. People who like try to pass off AI generated content as their own. And you're like, if I wanted to fit a prompt into AI, I could have put a prompt into AI, right? And people don't use it in a way where they don't use it.

Mike Hartley (19:08)
Yep. Yep.

Heather P (19:11)
responsibly, guess, or ethically, maybe is what I would say is, you know, just say what you did. Say you used AI. Tell me, hey, I put this through AI. This is the response I got, you know? And I think that's where we're going to see a lot come into shape in the next few months around accessibility and how we use AI to keep things accessible, but to still allow people.

to use their expertise and to use AI to give you the foundation, but your expertise still needs to come in and contribute the value that you bring, right? So that's probably really long answer, Mike, but I'm just like, I don't know what I would do without it at this point. I don't know what I, I guess that sounds dangerous as well, but it's helped me so much to have that tool there and to have that kind of guide to get me going when I'm stuck.

Mike Hartley (19:47)
No, that was Britain.

Yeah, no, no, that is brilliant. I love that. I love that idea. And I mean, I don't I'll be honest, I don't see using AI in this kind of context as being sort of dangerous in that sense. The last guest on the podcast, Taylor Dawood, he said that for him,

the AI for him, you've got people who would be kind of normal or however you want to describe them. And for him, AI, whereas people would be up here and he would normally be here because of disabilities and what have you, AI's allowed the closing of that gap. And I think it's the same there.

Heather P (20:34)
Yeah.

Mike Hartley (20:49)
in in that whole I don't know how to express I don't want to explode at people I don't want to be super intense I don't want to to come across in the wrong way so help me kind of rationalise I don't see it's irrational but just help regulate I think regulate's probably a better word exactly yeah

Heather P (20:49)
Yes.

No.

No, but it's like.

regulate it, frame it for me, right? And to

be fair, I do it in reverse as well. So if you sent me an email and I saw it and I just perceived all of a sudden you must be angry with me or you were being impolite or you didn't believe in what I would say, I will use AI to say, can you tell me what this person means by this? What is the tone of this email and blah, blah. And then it'll come back.

And it's like you could frame it into this way that doesn't hurt anymore, where they're like, ⁓ it seems like they just want a little clarification on this point. And I'm like, okay, so Mike doesn't think I'm an idiot. All right, thank you, I needed that. I needed to just understand, right? And I think that's helpful for us sometimes, because we don't get toned in our emails, do we? We don't get toned, we don't get, you know, so yeah.

Mike Hartley (21:57)
No

their words on the screen. yeah, yeah. I mean, the amount of times I've misinterpreted or people have misinterpreted what I've said and it's led to all sorts of breakdowns of relationships, personal and professional, just because people read it in a way that it wasn't intended. So no, no, that's brilliant. And I guess really, I mean, that's kind of where we're at now. ⁓

Heather P (22:02)
Yeah!

Yes.

Yeah!

Yeah.

Mike Hartley (22:26)
What do you see as the future of accessibility with AI?

Heather P (22:31)
I really think, you know, and we're both in the same business, right? We both look at the architecture and we tell people how we can help them get the outcomes that they want with solutions. But AI is still, even though it's actually been around a lot longer than people think it has, AI as we know it right now, is still at its infancy, right? And it's growing very, very fast and it's changing very, very fast.

Mike Hartley (22:47)
Mmm, yeah.

Heather P (22:55)
I future state, we're going to see AI be able to break down a lot of the digital barriers that we've put up inadvertently over the years. I never ever, long forms, for example, are such a challenge for me. And I made this LinkedIn post earlier in the year that was last year that was really.

It was really impactful for people. And I always appreciate when I get feedback if something like impacts somebody, right? But I talked about how I got nominated for these four awards, national awards for a CRN and I couldn't do it. I couldn't respond because I could only get through one of the four, because each form was so long. It required this really lengthy response. And I was like,

my gosh, how am I nominated for diversity awards but they're not accessible to somebody like me because there's no way I can fill all this out. Like it will just never get done. And so I think as we approve AI, I'll be able, I think forums will change their shape where it's just like, Heather, push a button, speak into it, tell me what you want in here. I'll do it, you know.

Mike Hartley (23:42)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Heather P (24:00)
There's the dictation style, but where AI will come in is like, okay, now I can capture your tone, I can shape this for you. We've got that now. We can make that happen now. What I hope to see in the future is that it's standard. It's just built into everything we do. It's like, of course, this is an option. Just like we know there's gonna be parking for disabled people at a venue. We know there's gonna be parking spaces set aside for disabled people so that you have that option.

I just want to see that in the future. I really believe accessibility and if people like you and I in this influential space can push accessibility first when you're designing everything you do needs to have an accessibility. You got to put accessibility in from the business and from the beginning not we're going to add it in after we're done. After we do the cool thing we'll make it accessible. Nope, do it from the beginning.

Mike Hartley (24:44)
yeah.

Heather P (24:47)
And then we'll see this future where AI is just part of it. AI is there to help you out and to help you achieve things that might be really challenging without it.

Mike Hartley (24:56)
Yeah, yeah, agreed. Totally agreed. mean, yeah, you, you, you're never going to go back and add in accessibility because it's not worth the time, the money and, ⁓ and what have you people move on to the next project. So yeah, it's got to be at the beginning and yeah. I've got to say, I'm finding I'm, I'm telling people, yeah, if you're using AI, just add a simple line that says, make this accessible compliant.

Heather P (25:07)
No.

Yes.

Mike Hartley (25:22)
make WCAG 2.2 compliant and ARIA compliant. It won't be perfect, but it will do a lot more than you would do if you didn't ask it to put it in. And it's only going to get better. It is only going to learn and get more accurate. yeah.

Heather P (25:34)
Absolutely.

Mike Hartley (25:41)
Final question really, what would be your one personal hot tip for accessibility from your perspective? What's your number one tip?

Heather P (25:50)
Just talk to disabled people. If I give you my perspective on ADHD and the things that help me be successful, they could be very different than what you need as somebody else who fits in that ADHD category. whether we're building digital solutions or we're building houses, we've got to talk to the people who are going to be using

products that we're producing and we've got to talk to them and is there anything I can do to make this better? Is there anything I can do? Is this accessible to you? this difficult for you to use or is it easy? And then when you get that feedback, you need to own it. You can't sit there and say, I think that's stupid. That's not that big of a deal or they're just going to have to deal with it because that will remove the functionality over here or that will remove...

my cool graphic or whatever it is. have to actually take it and listen to it, even if you've never heard it before. Right? So I think that's what it is. It's rather than trying to make assumptions or reading a web page on this is what you can do to make it accessible. Just talk to the disabled people. That will be utilizing what you're putting out there.

Mike Hartley (26:54)
Yeah, yeah, agreed. Agreed, totally agreed. That is it, yeah. Well, Heather, thank you so much for this. It has been entertaining, educational and totally enjoyable. It's been brilliant meeting you and talking to you and getting to hear some of your story and your experiences and... ⁓

Heather P (27:08)
Yes!

Mike Hartley (27:18)
Yeah, I know I've learned a lot and I'm sure podcast listeners will learn a lot as well. So thank you so, so much.

Heather P (27:25)
Absolutely.

Thank you, Mike, and thank you for putting this together. The more of us that are talking about it, the better it's going to be for everyone. So I just appreciate you. I appreciate you creating this space and letting people like me come and share my side.

Mike Hartley (27:42)
All my pleasure, trust me, all my pleasure. And so folks, that's it for another episode of 365 Ally the podcast. Thank you for joining us and look forward to seeing you on the next episode. So we'll see you soon. Bye bye.