Make It Easy — TechDiversity Awards Champion & Tech For Good Winner 2025
[Content Note: The video contains strong language. Sam speaks with authentic passion, we think it’s worth listening to.]
25 Years of Living It. Now Changing It.
Sam Paior is a mum to Ben, a young man with Down syndrome, intellectual disability, and autism.
For 25 years, Sam has worked and volunteered in disability. She’s watched Ben navigate a world where information was designed to exclude him. Where the words, the systems, the technology, none of it was built with him in mind.
So she decided to build it herself.
Sam invented Make It Easy.
Make It Easy is a double TechDiversity Awards winner: Champion (Overall) and Tech For Good Category.
Here’s What Sam Built.
Make It Easy uses AI and new technology to do something simple: make words easier to read and understand.
But it’s not simple because Sam oversimplified it. It’s simple because Sam did what too many tech founders don’t: she co-designed with disabled people. She tested with people who find reading hard. She studied how to make language genuinely accessible. She listened.
It’s a tool that translates complex information into clear, simple words. No jargon. No barriers. Just access.
Why Sam Understands This Better Than Most.
Sam wears hearing aids in both ears. She has ADHD which, as she says, helps her get lots of things started.
She’s not designing for people with disabilities. She’s designing as a person with disabilities. She’s designing with her son, Ben, at the table. She’s designing with the people who know these barriers best.
That’s not consultation. That’s co-creation.
That’s the difference between accessibility that feels like accommodation and accessibility that actually works.
Why They Won. Twice.
Make It Easy took home two TechDiversity Awards because Sam did exactly what we celebrate:
- Saw a broken system (information designed to exclude)
- Didn’t wait for permission, she had 25 years of expertise
- Built solutions with disabled people, not for them
- Used technology to remove barriers, not just manage them
- Created something that works for everyone
They’re not just a tech solution. They’re a Tech For Good champion. Because accessibility designed well is better design for everyone.
To Sam: Thank you for 25 years of understanding disability as lived experience, not theory. Thank you for listening to Ben. Thank you for co-designing with disabled people. Thank you for using ADHD energy to get things started. Thank you for believing that clear, simple words are powerful words.
To Ben and everyone using Make It Easy: You’re not getting accommodated. You’re getting access. You’re getting information that was designed with you in mind.
Download Make It Easy today: https://makeiteasy.com.au/
The TechDiversity Awards celebrate leaders who didn’t wait for permission. Who redistributed power. Who proved inclusive design changes everything.
Sam Paior invented Make It Easy because she understood something fundamental: disability isn’t the barrier. The system is.
She’s spent 25 years learning that. She’s spent the last chapter building a solution.
And now, with Make It Easy, she’s making sure nobody has to navigate a world designed to exclude them.
That’s what winning twice looks like.
Make It Easy is an app that transforms complex information into Easy English, Easy Read, or Plain English for people with low literacy, intellectual disability, or language barriers. Using AI and universal design, users can take a photo, upload a file, paste a link, or ask a question—then receive a simpler version they can hear, read, or share.
It’s trusted by individuals, families, and organisations to make everyday information more accessible. Make it easy works to make the world easier to understand, one word at a time.
Know more about here