Episode 16 – Event Accessibility, ROI, and the Cost of Backsliding

Episode Summary

Mark Miller, Justin Stockton, and Stephen Cutchins from Cvent discuss three accessibility stories that all point to the same lesson: accessibility is not just a compliance issue; it is a trust, revenue, and experience issue. Stephen brings deep event-industry perspective from Cvent, while Justin adds practical examples from meetup and concert access, and Mark ties it together with the larger business and culture impact.

This week’s guest: Stephen Cutchins

Festivals made more accessible for disabled people after agreement with equality watchdog 

Equality and Human Right Commission

Industry missing out on £66m a year through inaccessible ticketing

Caroline Clift

The vanishing art of disability reporting

Grant Stoner

Main Topics:

• Stephen Cutchins shares how he came to serve as Director of Accessibility at Cvent after more than 20 years in the field
• The group breaks down a Live Nation enforcement action in the UK tied to inaccessible festivals, missing toilets, weak captions, and lost attendance
• They discuss the 66 million pounds in annual ticket revenue the UK music industry is estimated to miss through inaccessible ticketing
• Justin describes real-world access barriers like keycard-only elevators and why small details can block entry
• The conversation emphasizes that accessible registration, marketing, physical space, and wayfinding all need to work together
• They explore how trust grows when events ask the right registration questions and visibly include disabled attendees in their imagery and outreach
• Stephen explains how a prior Reading Festival success story once drove a 286 percent increase in revenue from disabled attendees, then later backslid when accessibility stopped being maintained
• Mark and Justin stress that accessibility has to be baked into policy and process, not left to one passionate champion
• The final article shifts to gaming and the burnout behind disability reporting, with the group reflecting on how accessibility coverage itself can fade when the industry stops prioritizing it
• The episode closes with a reminder that accessibility improvements often benefit everyone, not just disabled attendees

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Transcript

Mark Miller (00:06)
Hey, welcome to the Accessibility Breakdown. I am Mark, and this is

Justin Stockton (00:10)
Justin?

Mark Miller (00:11)
And

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (00:12)
Stephen.

Mark Miller (00:13)
Nice. Every week we play pay tribute to those who stand out to us as leading by accessibility by picking three topics that strike us in some way. This week, we’re gonna talk about Festivals made more accessible for

Disabled people after agreement with equality watchdog. This is not necessarily an article. This is really an enforcement that was done against Live Nation. So we’ll talk about that a little bit more, but this is super interesting and it really ties in with what what Steven is gonna bring to this today. so we’ll get we’ll get more into that. The next article is industry missing out on sixty-six

mil million thousand pounds a year through inaccessible ticketing and this is by a woman named Caroline Cliff. And then we’re gonna talk about something a little bit different than those two called the vanishing art of disability reporting and that is by a a a really successful reporter named Grant Stoner. So as you all can see we have a guest with us today Stephen

is a long time friend of mine. we’ve been in the industry together, hanging out at all sorts of conferences like CSUN and Steve. And you know, I’ve got to thank you for inviting me twice to s twice twice to CVENT Connect, which is the big conference that your you you guys do. Steven is from from CVENT. every year. This year it was in Nashville, which was amazing and fantastic. and

Steven invites me there to speak with him and a bunch of other great folks on a panel about event accessibility. So that’s why these two event related topics are so germane here is because that’s Steven’s world. So Steven, you wanna tell people a little bit about yourself? A little

a little

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (02:19)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (02:19)
more than I just covered?

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (02:20)
Yeah, thanks, Mark. Steven Cutchins. So yeah, I’m director of accessibility at CVENT. about five years ago I well, I I’ll back up a little bit. I was doing events industry hey is my I gotta ask, is my video all screwy again? Am I? A little choppy. I don’t know what’s going on.

Mark Miller (02:37)
I think you’re good. Mm, it’s a little it looks a little funky from this end, but we’ll live with it. We’ll

live with it. Steve’s got a new w we’ll we’ll let the audience in on the behind the curtain here a little bit. Steven just stuck started using a new laptop. So as

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (02:55)
Yeah, it’s not happy.

Mark Miller (02:56)
as is required with new laptops it has little issues he’s trying to work through. So one of them is the video shimmering. But you sound great. We are not gonna let that stop us.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (03:00)
Yeah. Hopefully it’ll it’ll yeah. All right. You know, I

I have Tourette Cinnamon and I’m twitchy, but I’m not that twitchy. So So yeah. So ten percent less twitchy. So

Mark Miller (03:10)
Yeah. So it’s only half as twitchy as is what we see. Got it, got it. Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (03:19)
yeah, so I twenty two twenty-three years in the events in I’m sorry, in the accessibility industry, as very typical, started in quality.

Somebody’s like, there’s this accessibility ADA

Mark Miller (03:31)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (03:32)
Section 508 thing, you know, we need to figure it out. And I it

Mark Miller (03:34)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (03:35)
I was voluntold, kind of stuck. fast forward 20. Well, I guess after that, it was probably within a couple of years, it was all I did. I got lucky and

Mark Miller (03:45)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (03:46)
said this is I want this to be my career. So now about 22 years, it’s all I’ve done. now

Mark Miller (03:53)
Great.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (03:53)
it’s director of accessibility at CVENT. We’re an event software company.

largest event software company in the world. So conferences like C Sun, the assisted technology conference, when you register, pick a hotel room, submit your papers if you’re a speaker, that kind of thing, that that’s all our software. so

Mark Miller (04:09)
Mm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (04:10)
clearly, you know disability and accessibility related events use our software. So we have to be hyper hypercritical, which is why they brought me on about, you know, about five years, four and a half, five years ago now.

Mark Miller (04:22)
Excellent. Yeah, and and so we’ve got a couple of articles that really talk about event accessibility and I’m excited to do that because we’ve had some great conversations at the panel that you do every year at Cvent Connect. And Cvent Connect is C Vents, as I said before, the Cvents Conference, which you can imagine if you’re a c company making software for conferences, when you have a conference

You better do something. And believe me, they do something. so they they

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (04:50)
Yeah, they’re pretty epic conference. Yeah. Yeah, it’s an epic one.

Mark Miller (04:55)
took over what seemed like half of Nashville to keep us all happy. What what was the number of people that were five five thousand five hundred a person?

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (05:01)
F 5,500 in person and all events industry.

So some hospitality, some

Mark Miller (05:08)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (05:08)
you know, i event planners, most of them are event planners. And yeah, you have to do it right because they throw

Mark Miller (05:15)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (05:15)
fantastic events. I’ve been to some events that are just incredible. So ours has to be as good or better. So it’s it’s pretty epic. Yeah.

Mark Miller (05:20)
A little bit a little bit better. Yeah, because they’re

looking for examples and ideas and all that. So you know, it would be like driving a Porsche and then you know, getting in a Prius and being like, Wait, wait, you want me to tell you what about

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (05:32)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (05:33)
this car? So so yeah, you better you better have a you better show up in a Ferrari, right? Let them drive a Ferrari. so we had I I gotta think you that’s just I I love the event and I meet so many great people there. The panel you put together is always fantastic. so I’m glad that y

That we’ve you brought us a couple of articles, Steve, ’cause I asked him to to do stuff that was in the events industry. Or our rule is if if you haven’t figured it out, folks who are listening, none of the articles that we talk about on this show are are we all put out content, all of us do, and none of them is our content. We’re always talking about other people’s content. So it’s a really great opportunity to to find some super cool stuff out there.

So let’s dive in with this enforcement against Live Nation. Am I saying that right, Steve? Is that a is that the way to kind of to to present this? And I’ll read it again. This is Festivals made more accessible for disabled people after argument with equity watchdog. why don’t you do us a favor and just set this

enforcement off. Tell us what this is about a little bit, Stephen, and then we’ll get into to chatting about it.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (06:48)
Yeah, so th this was an interesting one because and we’re I like what you’re doing is starting with the second article first. Is it yes, essentially no, I kinda like this because essentially Live

Mark Miller (06:57)
I didn’t know I didn’t know there was a first and a second. Okay.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (07:01)
Nation, there’s this what are they called? Let me hold on, write it down. It’s where’s my link? Equity and Human Rights Commission. This is out of the UK. there were a lot of complaints about

Festivals not being like the Reading Festival, Live Nation Festivals

Mark Miller (07:19)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (07:20)
not being accessible. A lot of complaints by people with disabilities. So they worked with them to get a a a

I don’t know if judgment is the right term, but essentially you have to make your your v your venues, your events more accessible. There weren’t enough toilets

Mark Miller (07:37)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (07:38)
for people with disabilities, wheelchairs, mobility issues and things. there weren’t enough captions. They and they were losing a lot of business. And it that article quoted what was it? It was it was millions by the way. You see it was sixty sixty-six million, they’re losing out on sixty-six million annually in tickets.

Mark Miller (07:54)
Sixty six million pounds.

Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (07:57)
Two and a half

million possible ticket sales in the UK music industry, sixty-six million annually. And they’re they’re missing out on that. And why I like these is I I’ve been doing, you know, events for you know four and a half years, for another five years before that.

Kind of related to the events industry, but doing accessibility for over 20. And for me,

Mark Miller (08:18)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (08:18)
it’s very personal, it’s very, I get the human aspect. And for me, that sells it. You know, we’re supporting humans like me, right? That’s enough. And that’s enough for a lot of people, but for some people, and it could be just they don’t see the benefit of it.

From a human perspective, I don’t know anybody with a disability. Let’s say an event planner. Nobody ever comes to my conferences. Why should I care? or it’s just

Mark Miller (08:41)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (08:42)
a simple, again, ROI thing. I would love to support attendees with disabilities at my events, but nobody comes with a disability, so I’m gonna say, I’m not gonna spend that money, right? So

Mark Miller (08:52)
Right.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (08:52)
so what I try to do is show that they’re it’s kind of cause and effect. Because we’re not supporting our attendees well enough with disabilities, they’re not coming.

Mark Miller (09:01)
Right.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (09:02)
And

There’s an ROI. You might spend a a dollar, or this is UK a UK article, you might spend a pound, but you’ll get back one point one, you know? And so there is a positive ROI. And I really, really like this one because

That’s one of the conversations I have when planners are like, Look, I’ve been running this conference for seven years and I’ve seen three people in wheelchairs. Ever. And then when you talk to people, well, yeah, I want to go. It’s a great conference. I’d love

Mark Miller (09:28)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (09:29)
to go to it. I’m in a wheelchair or I use a mobility scooter, you know, I have to use crutches or I I have a mobility issue. I won’t go

Mark Miller (09:36)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (09:37)
because I don’t see people with disabilities in marketing. They don’t ask me during registration what my mobility needs are or what my accommodation needs are. I don’t trust them, so I’m not and I’m

I’m gonna take my sixty-six million dollars in in this case ticket spend, I’m gonna go somewhere else, you know.

Mark Miller (09:53)
Yeah. Y so this is Justin, this

is really interesting because one of the questions that we got, and I fielded this question at the last C vent panel discussion was how do I how do I convince my leadership that we should be focused on accessibility in our events when we don’t have people walking through the door? So exactly what

Steve said, we don’t have people walking through the door with disabilities. We don’t have we don’t have attendees, people attending with disabilities. And it’s a chicken and I mean we answered it in the same, it’s a chicken and egg thing. It’s like I said to you know, ask them, do you not have attendees with disabilities because attendees with disabilities don’t want to show up to your event or because you’re not accessible? And the answer’s probably the latter. And then

Th these articles I agree are amazing because they start to wrap an ROI around it. And what I really liked about this, Steven, I don’t know if you picked up on this, but

so in the panel, right, there was me who was focused on digital accessibility and then the rest of the folks there really were more about physical accessibility. I had a guy in a wheelchair to the left of me named John who runs a fantastic business helping people with mobility impairments travel. You know, so obviously his perspective and my perspective were set it kind of in two different places. But I don’t know if you noticed in this article, it runs from beginning to end. It says you need audits on your websites, you

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (11:23)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Miller (11:24)
need

And you know, all all the physical spaces need to be accessible. And I was really like, yeah, it was bathrooms

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (11:29)
Mm bathrooms. They call out bathrooms and yeah.

Mark Miller (11:33)
exactly. And I was really pleased to see that because one of the things is is like you can have the most accessible conference in the world, but if people can’t put get past your online registration.

you’re putting out a huge signal and you’re blocking their ability to even just register. Right? So it it is it is a a whole has to be a holistic view. So I really appreciated the fact that this enforcement really thought through the whole breadth of what an accessible conference really means.

Any anything Justin’s go ahead, Steven.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:05)
Yeah. Yeah. At that well as

Justin Stockton (12:05)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:08)
to say at that on that panel is a lady named Paige Marge Marg, if you’re watching, shout out. She’s with Wounded Warriors. So they

Mark Miller (12:12)
Mm-hmm. Hey Paige. Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:16)
they get it right. And she

Mark Miller (12:18)
Yep.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:18)
actually sent us the questions that they include. C Sun, it’s the same thing. The California State University,

Mark Miller (12:22)
Yep.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:22)
they do it really well. National Federation Blind, you know. they

Mark Miller (12:26)
Of course, yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:27)
they do it right. They ask lots of questions. And

It just it’s trust. It makes people trust them.

Mark Miller (12:33)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:33)
I am comfortable enough as a user in a wheelchair with a s service animal and a personal care assistant. I’m comfortable enough trusting them to at least that first year try

Mark Miller (12:43)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:44)
it. And then if they try to get it right and it’s not perfect, I can talk to them and the next year I bet they’re gonna get it better.

Mark Miller (12:52)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (12:52)
And and then

I’m gonna spread the word throughout my community and next thing you know it’s not just me, it’s me and twenty friends, and then it’s me and two hundred friends, and then yeah, that’s that’s my ultimate goal is I want I would love it to be event planners, let’s say, knowing

Mark Miller (13:06)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (13:07)
that they can that they can get attendees with disabilities, period.

You know, if it’s twenty-five percent of the people

Mark Miller (13:14)
Well and also understanding

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (13:16)
in the US, they should see twenty-five with a disability, they should see twenty-five percent of their attendees with a a disability. I would love to see that.

Mark Miller (13:23)
Well and also understanding that they’ve spent years and years

not being accepted to people with disabilities. So just because you all of a sudden become accessible, it doesn’t mean that they’re gonna you know break the door down and be be there. It’s

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (13:34)
Mm.

Mark Miller (13:34)
gonna then take some time for folks to realize you’re now doing sin and quite frankly you should you know include

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (13:39)
yeah.

Mark Miller (13:41)
people with disabilities. You you don’t you don’t ever want to be exploitative, but if you’re putting pictures of attendees out there and you have attendees with disabilities, they should be equally included in that in in those in those pictures and the content.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (13:54)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (13:54)
You know what

In

in other folks with disabilities like that because when they see somebody if they’re in a wheelchair and they see somebody in a wheelchair attending the event, it gives them confidence, you know, it gives them a a reason to explore further. Justin.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (14:07)
We we got feed

we got feedback about I’m cutting you off again, but not sorry, the exact same thing.

Justin Stockton (14:11)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (14:11)
It’s okay.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (14:12)
We got feedback from an attend a person in a wheelchair saying, This is a quote, I wanna see people who look like me.

Mark Miller (14:19)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (14:19)
And I would think like you said, it’s a little exploitive, you know, I would feel like, let’s make sure we get a picture of the person in the wheelchair if they’re there,

Mark Miller (14:26)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (14:27)
if they’re not a paid actor, if they’re actually there and happy and it’s an accessible conference, you better take a picture of because the next time there might be ten of them. Yeah. Yeah.

Mark Miller (14:32)
Yeah. Yeah, and you don’t need a photo shoot. You just need to make

sure they’re in the picture, right? Or in or in one of the pictures. Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (14:37)
Just like you would any other attendee, yeah. Yeah.

Mark Miller (14:40)
I agree with you. Justin, I just wanted to get your your take on this article. But fr from a

Justin Stockton (14:44)
No. I it

Mark Miller (14:46)
from a non focused on t on event accessibility person.

Justin Stockton (14:49)
Well, I mean I

I mean, much smaller event, but I used to run the the Denver and Boulder accessibility meetups. And

Mark Miller (14:55)
there you go.

Justin Stockton (14:56)
whenever we would have you know, I would be approached by an organization that was like, yeah, you know, we’d love to come and you know, we’d love to host y’all and you know, you know, they would they would they’d like come out and see the space, so I’d come and see the space and it would be like there would be an elevator and the elevator would be great, but it has to be keycard.

And so someone who’s arriving late, someone like we talked about this last

Mark Miller (15:22)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (15:24)
couple of episodes ago, Mark, about like what happens if your Uber doesn’t work out or you have issues trying to get to a venue, is someone going to still be there to key card you up? you know, are you going to be late? And so those physical aspects of event space, of event planning, is it’s something

Mark Miller (15:43)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (15:44)
it’s something that you really have to take into account no matter

what size an event you’re you know, you’re hosting.

Mark Miller (15:50)
Yeah.

And it’s helpful for that to be people with disabilities. So, you know, when John is is shows up in his wheelchair at the event, his perspective is incredible. One, because it’s his his profession, but two, because he has that lived experience in a wheelchair, he really can think through some of the things that you just talked about, Justin, where w you know, those of us who who move around with two feet and you know, there may be things we don’t even think about and realize and I think the key cards are I wouldn’t have thought of that, you know.

well let’s move on.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (16:20)
Well remember the one the one John

mentioned, John Sage is his name by the way. He does accessible travel

Mark Miller (16:25)
Thanks.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (16:26)
solutions and sage travel sage traveling. he mentioned the the blinds in the hotel room. He said that can can I reach them or is there a giant dresser or something in the way? Because it remember ’cause if and I would have never thought of that. I’m thinking

Mark Miller (16:38)
that’s a good point. See, I wouldn’t have thought of that. Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (16:41)
about the room the door is

But it’s 36 in 30 or 36 wide. Can you get 42 to turn around? That kind of thing. Can you get in the bed?

Mark Miller (16:49)
Right. Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (16:50)
I would have never thought about the blinds. But he’s like, if I

Mark Miller (16:52)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (16:52)
go in the room and the blinds are wide open and I can’t close them, I have to ask somebody to come and close my blinds. And then in the morning, can somebody come

Mark Miller (16:57)
Come in and close That’s yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (17:00)
open? Like that’s you don’t think about that. So little

Mark Miller (17:03)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (17:03)
things like he needs to be able to reach the the stick, you know what I mean? And then move it

Mark Miller (17:07)
Yeah. Well in

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (17:09)
themselves. So it can’t be a huge desk. It can’t be a dresser. He has to be able to access those blinds.

Mark Miller (17:12)
And that’s why w you know,

b the regulations are great, but they should be looked at as a starting point. There’s more to be thought about, you know.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (17:20)
Way more, yeah.

Mark Miller (17:22)
so this gh

Justin Stockton (17:22)
Just curious. I don’t know, I gotta go

on the question. I am curious though. Like in so in the web space, we’re always focused on like, you know, everyone’s writing articles about like, this is the right way to mark up forms, and this is the way the right way to like, Steven, from like your perspective in events and physical accessibility, are people writing similar articles? Like, hey, if you’re planning for the like, here’s a list of seven questions to ask your event site,

I guess

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (17:50)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (17:51)
is maybe the right word.

Like, do they have like here’s a checklist of things that you should be asking? Like, do y’all have something like that? Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (17:59)
B we do. It

it’s not to the level of like that John Sage has with accessible travel solutions. They actually go and we’ll rate

Mark Miller (18:06)
In p in page.

Justin Stockton (18:06)
Okay.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (18:08)
you know, they have like certain criteria, hundreds of We have a c a lot of different resources. we try, I know a lot of do. Microsoft has some, we have some. I don’t know who else, but they’re out there, but I but I

Mark Miller (18:23)
Mm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (18:24)
think getting them in a one big giant place might be a nice thing. Yeah.

Mark Miller (18:27)
I think y you know

Justin Stockton (18:28)
look for those ’cause I feel I

feel like that would be a a good thing to have access to.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (18:33)
Yeah, CVENT has

Mark Miller (18:34)
We

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (18:34)
it, Microsoft had one. And there’s another it’s a non profit, I don’t remember who it is, but they had one too.

Mark Miller (18:40)
Yeah. Having my foot sort of in both worlds here, Justin, I would say that I would echo what Steve’s saying in terms of it’s out there. It’s not quite you don’t get the like for some reason in the digital accessibility industry, we just have a lot of minds that that are blogging, that are creating content. It’s probably not to the same level, and I don’t that’s that’s anecdotal, like I don’t have numbers, but Steve and I have talked quite a bit about

change trying to change that, you know.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (19:10)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (19:11)
So all right, well let’s jump to this to this next article. Do you have something else, Justin?

Justin Stockton (19:16)
Nope, sorry.

Mark Miller (19:17)
Okay. and this is this is another article that addresses event accessibility but it it kind of approaches it from it’s not a regulatory thing. It it really talks about

that’s sixty six million pounds, right? The the ROI, what you could be leaving on the table. And this is by Caroline Cliff and what was really interesting about this article was that they talked about like a lot of people were being pushed to register for these events by phone if they had a disability. So that the you know the the disability registration

Formerly was on the phone, which I can’t even begin to tell tell you why. I think that that’s not a great idea. But and and this again mentioned and and pushed towards making your digital assets and everything accessible. But Steven, since you’re the expert, why don’t you set us up further on this article?

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (20:21)
Yeah, so I like this one. This one was so the one we first one we talked about is two thousand twenty six.

Mark Miller (20:26)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (20:26)
This one is two thousand fourteen. It’s still about the reading festival. And it so in the second one it’s well or I’m sorry, in time wise, the two thousand twenty six one, it’s Live Nation Reading Festival, they blew it. You know, they’re they’re bringing action

Mark Miller (20:42)
Right.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (20:43)
against them, they’re losing all this revenue. The first one was from two thousand fourteen and it was saying how

They made this effort over, I think it was five years. They saw a 286% growth in revenue by attendees with disabilities. It went from from 40,000 pounds to 115,000 pounds in revenue from 09 to 2013. They were, there’s a quote, reaping the rewards. So they did everything right. They were making all this egg, they were they would tripled their revenue from people with disabilities over four years, I guess five years and

2014. They had tripled their revenue. They were doing great. And then the next article, 12 years later, is Live Nation completely blew it. And it’s the

Mark Miller (21:29)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (21:30)
same company. And I absolutely love this because we did it right. We probably rested on our laurels. Probably the people who, and this is that third article, Justin, the people who were

They this was their passion. They were the ones that to make sure that these events, these you know, Festivals were accessible, they got burnt out, they left. And then nobody picked up the the, what do say, pick up the baton, and it just died. So you went from being the and

Mark Miller (21:58)
The yeah, or the ball. Yeah. Pass the baton, pick up the ball.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (22:01)
and and I hate it because this was a success story. I mean, I still use it because the fact that they blew it doesn’t mean that that they didn’t write it do it initially. I still tell planners

Mark Miller (22:09)
Right.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (22:10)
like they had 286% more revenue.

From f specific to people with disabilities. So that’s

Mark Miller (22:16)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (22:16)
and that’s like not just you know, I have limited hearing or you know, my my might have minor arthritis. These are like wheelchair users, right? They needed accommodations or they can’t go at all. So it’s huge. It’s we saw all this revenue, we made all this extra money, we were reaping the rewards, is the quote, and then fast forward twelve years and then there’s action and complaints and all this stuff. It’s such a great story that

You did everything right, you know? And think

Mark Miller (22:45)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (22:46)
of all

Justin Stockton (22:46)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (22:47)
those extra hundred thousand of pounds you would have made over those twelve years, right? You would have made over a you know a a million pounds or more over those twelve years. And

Mark Miller (22:55)
Right. What did you you Yeah, it’s not just about it’s not

Justin Stockton (22:57)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (22:58)
just about the the the enforcement that happens. It’s about the whole missed revenue for those years. It’s yeah, well it’s interesting to me that like

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (23:06)
Twelve years of revenue. Yeah.

Mark Miller (23:09)
it’s hard to you know, J Justin can tell you and and I’m sure you can too, Stephen, but just

You can make all these ROI arguments and it still doesn’t mean that and you would think, well that’s exactly what the C suite wants to hear about and they still still don’t do it. So it’s interesting to see that, but to see that fall off, you know. And I I think and we don’t know the details, right? We don’t know why it fell off, but I think s you probably were k knocking on the door of it, Steve, where you were saying like people left or whatever. That’s why it becomes then important

Like you get this right or and you’re doing it well.

You have to put it into a policy and procedure. You have to if you if you have somebody brilliant that’s helping you do all this, that is great. They’re gonna move on.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (24:02)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (24:02)
What you need to take that next organizational step. And this is this is what Justin and I are all about, right? With the accessibility maturity model that is done by the APA workgroup or the W3C and and we do a lot of this for our clients, but it is about getting those policies and procedures, about baking accessibility into the process, because when

these experts leave these people that are doing it leave they leave a big big you know gaping kind of yeah

Justin Stockton (24:30)
It’s now it’s a drain.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (24:31)
Yeah. Yeah.

Mark Miller (24:33)
and so to me this is probably I’m gonna be a little careful because we don’t know why it fell off but this is probably a really good argument for like yeah when once you start doing it now do the work of of baking it into the the organization

So Justin. Steven

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (24:54)
Yeah. Yeah. I’m

Mark Miller (24:56)
and I will walk all over you from a talking standpoint.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (24:58)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (25:01)
We we warn the panel, we’re like, if we just get going,

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (25:02)
We Yeah.

Mark Miller (25:04)
like tell us to be quiet.

Justin Stockton (25:05)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (25:05)
But what is but I I want you to jump in and and

Justin Stockton (25:09)
No, I

d it’s yeah, it’s really interesting. I mean, there could be a whole number of reasons why they fell off, but twelve years is a long time.

Like

Mark Miller (25:19)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (25:20)
I’m sure that l was to thinking about Live Nation themselves, probably a lot of in house developers, probably some contractors in there, but they never made it like it was a priority at one point. And

Mark Miller (25:32)
Yeah.

Justin Stockton (25:32)
if you read that twenty fourteen article, it came about shortly after new laws were passed in the UK.

So it was a reaction to that and then they kinda coast like Steve said, Stephen said, coasted for a little bit and then started losing people, people

Mark Miller (25:49)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (25:49)
floated away, whatever, and then it just fell off and it never made it back into the process. And twelve years later, they’re up a creek without a paddle.

Mark Miller (25:59)
But if somebody had said all of our contracts are gonna include language in there about accessibility. Every time we build a stage, our processes, that stage has a ramp. Every time you know, keep going and keep going and keep going. then maybe that never would have happened. And maybe

if they iterate, they optimize, they improve, they would be even, you know, sixty six million pounds would have been the beginning, not the end, you know.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (26:35)
Yeah.

And I I had a conversation with a a very high up leader at a at a company once and this person was saying how you know, how much is it to to make our site, I think it was a product, but let’s say our website, how much is it to make it accessible?

Mark Miller (26:52)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (26:53)
and then the next question is how much is the fine if I don’t do it? And

Mark Miller (26:57)
Right.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (26:58)
if you’re you know, b an owner of a company or the

CIO or C whatever it is of a company, th that’s how they think. You know?

Mark Miller (27:08)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (27:08)
And I wonder if this I’m not I don’t know if this is it with necessarily with Live Nation, but one minute, how much are we spending on accessible toilets and all this stuff? We’re spending

Mark Miller (27:17)
Mm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (27:18)
fifty thousand a year? Why? Let’s cancel it.

Mark Miller (27:20)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (27:21)
Not realizing that they’re making more than that, maybe. And the other person

Mark Miller (27:24)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (27:25)
could have said, Hey, you know, I I don’t have the data, so I mean, I don’t think there’s any wheelchair people. Okay, don’t do it.

Mark Miller (27:32)
Well, and you brought up a good

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (27:32)
Not knowing you know.

Mark Miller (27:34)
you brought up a good point too. Like we’re looking at sixty six million pounds is the ROI. The ROI is really sixty six million pounds plus whatever you don’t get fined, or whatever

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (27:46)
Yep.

Mark Miller (27:47)
that is. plus

Probably some savings because all of your systems work better, so you have less support queries, you have less you know, bugs being filed. It’s like ultimately these things lead to there’s a whole bunch of factors that lead to that RO ROI. So all right. Anything else about this one before we move on? go ahead, Justin.

Justin Stockton (28:11)
Yeah. I like to draw a lot of I like to draw

a lot of s similarities between accessibility and security and

Mark Miller (28:18)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (28:19)
from an ROI perspective, like it’s like that’s like that argument of well, we’ve never had a wheelchair user, why would we have a ramp? Like doesn’t

Mark Miller (28:27)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (28:27)
make s it doesn’t you would never say you would never say, Well, why are we paying for all these security consultants? We’ve never been hacked. We’ve never had a

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (28:35)
Yes.

Justin Stockton (28:35)
data

Mark Miller (28:36)
Yeah. Well the other thing too, like this is

Justin Stockton (28:38)
Like so

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (28:38)
That’s yeah, that’s perfect. That’s exactly

Justin Stockton (28:40)
you’ll have you

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (28:40)
it. Yeah.

Justin Stockton (28:40)
won’t have that conversation, but you’ll have you know, the conversation about accessibility is that people doesn’t exist. Yeah.

Mark Miller (28:45)
Right. But

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (28:48)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (28:48)
but but also and this is the thing that people don’t think of, right? Is that is the curb cutout effect, right? Which is that phenomenon of of of people who don’t have a disability using things put in place for people with disabilities. But just think about something simple, like we have a ramp that leads up to the stage so that wheelchair users can be speakers, musicians, like whatever the case is. Well, as soon as you put that stage together and you put a ramp on it, like

Maybe the person that’s putting the couch up there for that panel discussion, now they’re not calling over three people to help to heave it up onto it. They’re keeping it on the dolly and going up the ramp. Like

multiply that times a bunch of conveniences. Like you have made that environment more accessible for a lot of s scenarios. And you can even like how would you even gather the data on the, you know, now we’re, you know, now we’re now we’re set up a half a day quicker. You know, like how do you even start to figure out all those things? So it’s really sort of I think that in the next article

Justin Stockton (29:53)
Or the

Mark Miller (29:54)
we talk about I’ll lead into this. I think that the conversations need to continue in order for

more and more people who don’t face this every day like we do to realize all of these benefits because when you when doing it for people with disabilities falls down where

you can pick it up is when you start realizing the entire breadth of the benefits, the ROI, the improved usability for everyone, the you know, y you have attendees, we want to come back next year, you’ve got more of a retention, you know, all these things in increase. And if you have a hard time convincing people because of one thing, try and convince them because of all those things. But you you know, the three of us and and everybody else who we talk about on this show

in in in in the wider community of accessibility. If we keep talking, hopefully the message gets out. So let’s move

Justin Stockton (30:52)
I got

Mark Miller (30:53)
to did you have a point, Justin, you wanted to

Justin Stockton (30:56)
I was gonna make one more point.

Mark Miller (30:57)
go for it.

Justin Stockton (30:58)
And that was I got a chance to take my son to his first concert this year at Mission Ballroom here in Denver. And

Mark Miller (31:05)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (31:06)
we’re standing in line and everything. And the line next to us is the l is the line for if you have if you’ve registered for like a wheelchair access or you need you know exp hint

Mark Miller (31:17)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (31:17)
special seating or anything like that. And as we get up to the front of the line, there’s a woman there.

you know, kind of checking people’s tickets and stuff. She herself is in a wheelchair. And she’s the one responsible for making sure that if you need special access, that you get that special access. And then she hands you off to someone else who needs.

Mark Miller (31:36)
Big thumbs up.

Justin Stockton (31:37)
And while myself, my family does not need that, I now know that. And so if someone ever says to says

Mark Miller (31:43)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (31:44)
to me, Hey, I’m interested in going to see a concert, like where would you want to go? And and if I know that they have that they need special assistance, I’m gonna be like, go to Mission Ballroom.

Like they’re they they are walking the walk and so to speak. probably not the best pun. Yeah.

Mark Miller (31:57)
Yeah. Yeah, and it’s not a checkbox if there’s a person with a disability there. What’d you say?

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (32:02)
Yeah.

Justin Stockton (32:03)
I said they were walking the walk, but that’s probably not the best pun to use. So

Mark Miller (32:06)
The the f yeah. Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (32:07)
Hmm.

Mark Miller (32:10)
the yeah, I think that that’s well and and hats off to them and also you know, all things else being equal or maybe even not, like who who do you wanna support, right? You know, like direct question to you guys, who would you support? The people

Justin Stockton (32:21)
Exactly.

Mark Miller (32:22)
doing that or or somebody else not doing that.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (32:22)
Yeah. Yeah. And and r

really quickly, no place gets it perfect, at least it

Mark Miller (32:29)
Right.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (32:29)
maybe Wounded Warriors, they do, but nobody gets it perfect. And I had asked John Sage, I asked him this question

Mark Miller (32:32)
They come close. See C C Sun.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (32:36)
of he he had made a comment that he had never been to a fully accessible event ever.

Mark Miller (32:41)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (32:42)
And I said, open myself up, what about CVENT Connect? And before he could even answer, the the

Two people on the panel said the carpet in what we call the innovation pavilion. It’s where we talk about our products.

Mark Miller (32:55)
Mm-hmm, I remember that.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (32:57)
And they said the carpet was too thick. It was carpet, it was made to look like an outdoor recreational area, you know? And

Mark Miller (33:02)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (33:03)
so they put this carpet down that looked like grass and it was pretty long. And it it would for a wheelchair just didn’t work. And you

Mark Miller (33:09)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (33:10)
could get around it because, you know, it wasn’t the whole it was that one main aisle, but he had to get around it. But what if somebody

Mark Miller (33:16)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (33:17)
tripped?

What if somebody because I mean there were a lot of

Mark Miller (33:19)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (33:19)
like women that were wearing higher heels? What if one of them had caught a heel on it and tripped? so it’s never no event ever gets it perfect. And we even really tried and still blew it with something, you know? But do something. Try to do like even that conference

Mark Miller (33:34)
I think we said that we said that on the panels

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (33:37)
that that place you mentioned, Justin, it might not have been perfect, but they did one thing so well

Mark Miller (33:40)
Yeah. They were trying.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (33:42)
that I I’m if I was a wheelchair user, I’m

I’m gonna I’ll try it. Why not? You

Mark Miller (33:46)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (33:47)
know if they if they blow it, at least they try it. I’ll let know in the survey or let them know afterwards, and then maybe it’ll get incrementally better and next thing you know it it is as close to perfect as you can get.

Mark Miller (33:56)
And that’s a point that we made, I think, to that group is like,

if you’re looking for perfection, you’re never gonna even try, right? Like you’ve gotta be willing to fail and you’ve gotta be willing to take on feedback. Particularly from people with lived experiences, you know, that are gonna give you feedback. And the interesting thing about that example, right? So outdoor carpet look because it fit with the theme of this. Great job thinking about accessibility. Just didn’t think about it when it came to this, right? But the really interesting thing is, is we

as a panel started as a solution around it and you know what the solution ended up being? If you had just created a pathway through that carpet in it, you could have done something you could have laid something down that looked like

like a f you know flagstone or or made it look

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (34:42)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Miller (34:43)
like a pathway through a park, it would have been on theme and it would have actually been really cool to enhance the theme because they also had a problem with the theme carrying forward a little bit. So some t sometimes, most of the time, when you get creative enough to solve one of these things, you actually end up with something that is totally better and not just better for people with disabilities. So it’s it’s amazing that that what you can what you can do when you really embrace accessibility.

Alright, so I do want to move on to the next one, and this is interesting because we had discussion as a group here before hitting up the mics that this is sort of this is like the if this were Sesame Street, you know, when there were three

three blocks and they were singing

Justin Stockton (35:22)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (35:23)
the song, like which one of these things doesn’t belong? Well, this would be it, right? Because this next article is the vanishing art of disability reporting. But here’s what’s here’s what’s interesting.

About this. So the article itself is from a gentleman named Grant Stoner who has made a career of reporting on accessible gaming. And I promise you, you don’t have to be a gamer to appreciate this. And he makes a bunch of points in here about burnout and and several other things, but he also talks about the fact that

the world things seem to be changing and the desire for this type of narrative is going away, at least from his perspective. And you know, and and it starts to kinda speculate about that. And, you know, it makes me think like

Is it the narrative that’s going away, or is there something larger going on you know in the in the economic, political, environmental climate that’s causing people to think about these things differently? And that the as we just covered, these lack of discussions actually have a negative impact on business.

Justin Stockton (36:55)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Miller (36:55)
That

business ends up losing out. And I think a lot of the reasons why, like we discussed, that these discussions sort of cease is one because they kind of people people don’t feel like people are listening, but second, it seems to be a hundred percent altruistic. And and it’s very difficult if you’re a business and your goal is to increase a bottom line. It’s very difficult to spend money that is gonna not contribute to the bottom line, but

Everything we just discussed, that is almost never the case. So I thought it was a really interesting

Even though it’s very different than the other two articles, I just thought it was a really interesting thing to think about in context to all of this ROI, event success accessibility, increasing attendance, increasing return attendees, looking at accessibility for multiple things, solving for accessibility and incr in improving experience for everyone, improving the return for the business, all this all this stuff. it does, yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (37:57)
Yeah, I think it talks about burnout. And I I

have a you know, when I try to or when I have tried to kind of sell this over the decades, it was business reasons, it was legal reasons, that’s my least favorite. It was the obvious to

Mark Miller (38:13)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (38:13)
human aspect. Like, look, this could be your grandmother, you know, this could be your son, this could be your your wife, your husband. To me, those things are important. But when I was it will be you if

Mark Miller (38:23)
This will be you in the future.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (38:27)
It when you Yeah. Yeah.

Mark Miller (38:27)
If you’re lucky, if you make it that far into the future, it will be you.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (38:31)
Yeah. Absolutely, 100%, you know? And I I get re energized like when I go to conferences like C Sun and when I present at CVENT Connect, I get more energized. And when I talk to people in wheelchair users, I grew up with two cousins of wheelchairs. When I talk to people in wheelchairs, I it it sparks me more, right? But burnout’s a real thing. And I have

never ever stop pushing that giant accessibility boulder up that hill. And s again, sometimes it’s legal, sometimes it’s regulatory, sometimes it’s the human aspect. Doesn’t matter. But there’s always I’m always pushing it up a hill. And burnout is very real. And why maybe they’re just like, you know, screw this. I I just I want to stop reporting on accessibility. I want to report on AI. That’s the hot thing, you know? And I think that’s a very real thing and that’s what this guy was talking about.

Mark Miller (39:26)
Yeah, for sure.

Justin Stockton (39:28)
And a lot of it

Mark Miller (39:29)
But

Justin Stockton (39:29)
yeah, h his his his article is I mean it’s very passionate. He’s coming he’s very he’s coming at his he sees his role in accessibility gaming diminishing because of

Mark Miller (39:42)
Mm.

Justin Stockton (39:43)
not not because of his necessarily I think not not necessarily because of his burnout, but because he sees the industry for numerous

Mark Miller (39:54)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (39:54)
reasons moving away from accessibility.

Mark Miller (39:57)
Right.

Justin Stockton (39:57)
after a lot of progress that was made. So I kind of the way that when I was reading this article, I’ve immediately kind of thought about the two articles that Steven had suggested. And I was like, this is kind of more of that human aspect of

Mark Miller (40:09)
Mm-hmm.

Justin Stockton (40:10)
like the in between twenty fourteen and twenty twenty six, this is what’s happening. And we’re still we’re gonna see so the concert Live Nation saw this over twelve years. He’s seeing this over the last four years in the gaming industry from twenty twenty two to twenty twenty six.

as how they

Mark Miller (40:27)
Right.

Justin Stockton (40:27)
are starting to backslide and they’re starting to l not focus on accessibility through because of layoffs, because of num a lot of different reasons. and that’s impacting him personally.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (40:38)
I think he mentioned pandemic, right?

Yeah, I think he I I

Mark Miller (40:41)
I think you said

after the pandemic is when he saw the biggest drop. That it seemed to pandemic seemed to be a focusing lens. Yeah. Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (40:44)
Yeah, ’cause I mean, during the pandemic I’d heard somebody say this that during the pandemic we were all disabled. We all essentially

were in some way we were limited to really movement. You know? You’re

Justin Stockton (40:55)
Uh-huh.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (40:55)
stuck in your house, so what are you gonna do? We might play way more video games. So the video game industry, it’s a business, said, Well, let me let me make this let me let me work on this, let me make this more accessible. And then it’s just not top of mind anymore, I think.

Mark Miller (41:09)
Yeah. Yeah, and I and what I’ll say, you know, I’ll speak directly to

I’ll speak directly to to Grant here is that I d I don’t I don’t want you to go away, right? Because I think that this kind of reporting is necessary and I get the burnout. Like I think we all struggle with that at at some time and and I’m sorry for that struggle. I and what I wonder is, like, you know, you talked about AI, maybe there’s an expansion of

of the the content, right? So maybe it is more you know, maybe maybe you need to move. Maybe move into talk about accessibility in AI or accessibility in some other area and hang on to the gaming. The gaming stuff is incredible.

Gods of War Ragnarok. Like I I spoke to the the consultant that made that game accessible and it was just incredible the process and the recognition that that game got for accessibility on top of the recognition it got from for being just an incredible game in and of itself. So I you know, I I think that there’s I would love to see some life breathed back into the accessible gaming discussion. I think particularly with AI.

coming around because you’re gonna see that in gaming more and more. but yeah,

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (42:40)
Accessibility of events, I’d love some more articles on that.

Mark Miller (42:43)
well that’s what I was that’s what w the gr Grant man, you know, there’s a lot of people who would love to have somebody like you

That writes as well as you do, putting words down about all sorts of different accessibility subjects. So if you’re burnt out about accessibility gaming, come come on over and find out some of the you know, f

wor work with a few

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (43:02)
Hmm. Well

Mark Miller (43:03)
people on some of these other things and maybe that’ll maybe that’ll be exciting and and breathe some life back into it. But it is a bit sad to think about.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (43:09)
Y you know what, if eight year if eight years ago he

would have been reporting on Live Nation and Reading Festival and then they would have never

Mark Miller (43:17)
Where the heck.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (43:18)
maybe they would have never got to that point.

Mark Miller (43:20)
Yeah. So, but I do get it and I do get that that feeling like you’re you’re you’re a handful of

of helium balloons are starting to float away one one at a time, you know? And you’re like,

Justin Stockton (43:36)
I’ll

Mark Miller (43:36)
what do I do now? Yeah. So so I too totally get it. I and I agree that the world, the focus on accessibility seems to be shifting, I would say overall. but I think it’s people like all of us, that includes you brand, you know doing our best to chase those balloons down, fill up more.

pick some different colors and keep moving forward with it because the more we do that, the more when the when the tailwinds do shift back, the more we’ll be ready to take advantage of that as well. Any last thoughts, gentlemen?

No? It’s

Justin Stockton (44:16)
Okay.

Mark Miller (44:18)
three o’clock on a Friday? Did you run out of brain?

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (44:17)
no, I I c I No,

I I kinda wanna feel bad. It sounded like we were like Live Nation. I know we mentioned them just ’cause they were specifically you know, listed in that article, but I feel bad because at least they got it right. I

Mark Miller (44:31)
Yeah.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (44:32)
I would love to know what happened. and it could have just been actually

it could have been that nobody was reporting on it or the attendees

Mark Miller (44:40)
Mm-hmm.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (44:41)
never let know it may have been no fault of their own, you know?

there was just a slide

Mark Miller (44:46)
Well I’ll I’ll say this. I

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (44:48)
over over over a decade, you know?

Mark Miller (44:50)
I think it

goes back to what we were talking about before. You have to be willing to make mistakes and you have to be willing to listen to feedback. And that doesn’t mean like you don’t get to pick your mistakes, right? They they pick you. You get to pick how you react to And you could look at this and say, well, way back when they didn’t make any mistakes

They maybe they didn’t. I’m sure they did, but maybe the big mistake that they can learn from is the mistake that led to it falling off. So from that standpoint, it’s a positive. It’s you tried, you got there, and then slipped. How do you figure out a way to stay? Is the next thing. So I think the only true

failure that can be done here is if they don’t circle back around to the beginning and start over, get back to where they were, learn from that previous mistake, and take some measures to figure out how to stay there. Doesn’t mean they’ll stay there the second time. It just means maybe they stay there longer.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (45:50)
Mm.

Mark Miller (45:50)
Maybe they slip again and they’ve got to do it a third time and make more corrections. But this is the there’s a great model called the model c of from cognitive behavioral therapy called the model of

behavioral change. And it’s a circle. And it and it contemplates failure and it contemplates resetting and doing it again. But each time when you do it you learn from that. You

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (46:14)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (46:15)
each time you go through the cycle you learn from that failure. So I think to your point, Steve, it’s not I don’t look at any of it as a negative. I look at it all as a positive or potential positive, depending on how it’s received.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (46:26)
Yeah.

Mark Miller (46:26)
You know? And it’s a pretty big shot over the bow to have a a whole enforcement action against you, but

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (46:31)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Miller (46:33)
That’s part of the that’s part of the learning right.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (46:35)
Yeah, and I I’d love

to know that third article. Maybe they just lost their champion. Maybe they lost their accessibility champion and then it was only that one person that was driving it and suddenly it it went off. So maybe they got burnout, you never know.

Mark Miller (46:49)
Yeah. Well, hopefully we’ve given Grant some ideas so he can s keep hanging

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (46:55)
Mm-hmm.

Mark Miller (46:56)
in there, fighting the good fight. But you gotta do, you know, you gotta go where you’re called to. So if if if Grant goes and does something different, then hopefully there’s somebody that looks and goes, Hey, maybe maybe it’s my turn to pick this up. You know.

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (47:07)
Mm. Get a new champion.

Mark Miller (47:09)
Get a new one. Yep. All right. Well, thanks, gentlemen. That was great. I appreciate

The discussion and it was great having you on s Stephen. and you know, the event accessibility thing’s just so interesting. It’s such an interesting sort of thing to put together out there. So I love every time we get to to talk about it. And I love the people that you pull together and and and

circle around that topic. So thank you for all that. Thank you for the articles. And

Stephen Cutchins (Cvent) (47:44)
Always a pleasure.

Mark Miller (47:45)
yeah, you bet. Now that we have broken down accessibility for you, we hope you go forth and keep it accessible.