About - The Sustainable Change LLC

Frequently Asked Questions + Answers

What is The Sustainable Change (TSC)?

TSC is a consulting company that partners with the public and private sectors to provide guidance and oversight on digital accessibility content and applications.

So Why the Name?

We support positive social change, namely, accessibility. Changes towards an inclusive society will only happen with sustained effort and focus.

What kind of Work Do You Do?

Principal Consultant Sam Kanta, Ph.D., leads TSC. Uh-oh, someone with letters after their name – does that mean just research? Nope! Dr. K has over two decades of experience applying knowledge and skills in Learning and Development, UX Design, Industry Research, and IT Project Management.

Do You Work Onsite or Remote?

Yes (That doesn’t sound very clear, does it?). It depends on the nature of the consulting engagement. We typically work across multiple time zones in the United States and often Remotely to maintain a small Carbon Footprint. Working with people in person is important. How else can you buy someone a Latte? Onsite engagements add cost to your projects, and we can always have Zoffee (That’s a Zoom Conference, each participant with a coffee or non-alcoholic beverage of their choosing).

The Person Behind the Brand

Sam Kanta, founder of The Sustainable Change LLC and creator of UXologie, has been a multi-skilled User Experience and IT Practitioner in the field of digital accessibility for over two decades.

After not quite graduating from a graduate degree program in music performance (Double Bass) back in the 20th Century, she concentrated on Music Education with Technology and, early in her career, was full-time Teaching Faculty at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music High School in Australia.

The Technology Bug (pun very intended) saw Sam go back to school, enrolling in a Masters of IT in Education AND joining the Charles Sturt University Online Learning Institute as an Educational Designer, developing and designing online interactions and content for Web and Interactive Video Conferencing (IVC).

Then, with a swag of digital media experience, she went to the ~~dark side~~ private sector, where she became a Senior Manager for IT Projects and Web Design in a leading Australian Financial Services company, championing User Experience Design practices for B2B, Philanthropic Services, and Investor Reporting.

A change was inevitable. Sam took the opportunity to live on Ramen Noodles in the early aughts as a Ph.D. Student in Computing Science at the University of Technology, Sydney. There, she focused on distributed cognition and information systems. She published a few papers on technology work practice in information architecture (IA) and how technology shapes a person’s cognitive activity in the workplace.

Since then, Sam has worked in eCommerce roles that leveraged all of her UX and IT experience in user-centered design and behavioral research. Not to be outdone by herself, Sam proceeded to work in Senior IT Management, have a baby, and complete her Ph.D. (finally) at Walden University, Minneapolis, USA.

Over the recent decade, Sam has been awarded Invited Expert status with the W3C Web Accessibility Initiative, namely the Pronunciation Task Force. Her research on Pronunciation scenarios for Text-to-speech (TTS) resulted in the W3C First Public Working Draft in this area of accessibility.

Sam’s recent achievements include establishing the first Digital Accessibility Team at Northwestern Mutual, Milwaukee, USA in her role as Lead Accessibility Specialist for Web and Native Mobile Design Teams and Design Systems for Policy Holders and Financial Advisors. and also Chair of the Reporting Standards Stewardship Panel for the Standards Accessibility Reporting Initiative with SAR, Inc.

Sam is based in Wisconsin, the land of Beer, Bratwurst, and Cheese, where she enjoys her life with her family of six: husband, teenage son, two dogs, a psycho kitty, and a bird named “Birb.”