Design keyboard navigation by default, not as an add-on

Introduction

Focus order, visible focus rings, roving tabindex for toolbars, and the checklist we run before calling any interactive component done.

What usually goes wrong

Teams that skip this step tend to share three failure modes:

• Optimizing a number nobody agreed to move.
• Copying a setup from a project with different constraints.
• Deferring the decision until it is expensive to reverse.

How to approach it

1. State the problem in one sentence, in the words your users would use.
2. Pick a signal you can measure weekly, not just at launch.
3. Timebox a small trial; a two-day spike beats a two-week debate.

Wrap-up

If UI taught us anything, it is that boring consistency beats clever one-offs. Bring the lessons back to your team before they fossilize into folklore.