I realise we’re already a week into the new year, but it’s my first day back at my desk, so now feels like a good time to reflect on the year just gone. Let’s call it my slightly late wrap-up of 2024.
All Change
Last year was a big one for me, leaving my job at NearForm to join GitHub’s accessibility design team.
I’ve worked in both agency and client-side roles, and they each have their pros and cons. Agencies are great for variety—you get to work on loads of different projects, industries, and clients. The downside? You’re usually handing things off just as you’re really getting into them. Client-side roles are the opposite: you focus on fewer projects for longer, which can be really rewarding. You don’t get the same variety but you do get to make lasting changes and see them come to fruition.
For me, NearForm was the best of both worlds. I worked on some amazing, meaningful projects—everything from COVID-response to mergers and acquisitions—and spent months embedded with clients, which gave me time to dig deeper.
Now at GitHub, I’m lucky enough to be working on projects that solve real problems and (hopefully!) make a lasting impact. Highlights from my first year were meeting the incredible design team in Bellevue and developing a framework to help track and describe GitHub’s features. I'm learning tons from the super talented and knowledgeable team, who are all passionate about making software development accessible to everyone.
Volunteering
Another big change last year was getting involved with AbilityNet. I’m one of over 450 Local Tech Volunteers across the UK, helping older people and disabled people with their tech—whether that’s remotely or through home visits.
One of my favourite experiences was working with Carol, who was struggling with her iPhone after several stays in hospital. Over a few visits, we got her email working, saved her passwords securely, explored the NHS app, and even practiced things like taking photos, using Google Maps, and shopping online with Tesco.
As a nice bonus, GitHub rewards volunteering with extra money to donate to charity. I sent mine to the National Association for Children of Alcoholics to support their Christmas helpline, which felt like the perfect way to round off the year.
Side projects
Just before Christmas, I finally completed the process of migrating Eventua11y to a completely new front end stack. Eleventy (which I still love, and which powers this website) has been replaced with Astro and Vue, to allow greater flexibility and potential for more interactive features. Content management is still provided by Sanity and the hosting is still with Netlify. Working with timezones is still a pain in the arse and Copilot continues to save the day.
A couple of other projects are still simmering on the back burner. I let some domains expire, renewed a few, and resisted buying any more.
2025
What's the plan for this year? I started studying for a Masters degree in 2023 but ended up dropping out after breaking my arm and falling behind. I’m ready to give it another go this year. I’ve signed up for a Systems Thinking course, and I’m feeling excited about jumping back in.
I need to get back into the habit of reading more regularly. I have set a very conservative goal of reading 12 books this year, but I'm hoping I can manage a few more. Perhaps the Accessibility Book Club reading list will help keep me on track?
Writing too. I'm starting as I mean to go on.