🏆 Best DEI Use Case — Microsoft HackTogether: Power Platform Global AI Hack · 2023
In 2023, I was selected as one of just four global winners of Microsoft’s HackTogether: Power Platform Global AI Hack — winning the Best DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion) Use Case category for my project Make Life Easy. The hackathon received 115 submissions from across the global Power Platform community, and was organised by April Dunnam and the Power Platform Developer team.
The project — Make Life Easy
Make Life Easy is a specialised Power Apps canvas app designed to support parents of autistic children in their daily routines. The app’s primary goal is to simplify and enhance the lives of both parents and children by providing visual and text-based guidance for various daily activities.
Key features
- Visual and text-based task lists — so a child can see and read each step of a routine
- Customisable activities — parents can tailor the app to their child’s specific needs
- Scheduling — predictable, repeatable routines that help reduce daily anxiety
- Accessibility features — designed with sensory and cognitive needs in mind
- User-friendly design — for both children and busy parents
- Feedback and improvement loop — so the app keeps evolving with real-world use
The AI underneath
From the Microsoft judges’ announcement post: “The judges loved that the Power App connects to DALL-E to generate the images used and Azure OpenAI to create the list of steps. And most importantly, the judges loved the use case of helping kids with autism and their parents.”
- Azure OpenAI generates the step-by-step instructions for each activity
- DALL-E generates the visual icons that accompany each step
- Power Apps + Power Automate + Dataverse deliver the app, persist data and wire the workflows together
Why this matters
Daily routines are not background noise for many neurodivergent children — they are the scaffolding of the day. Visual, predictable, customisable instructions can dramatically reduce friction, anxiety and conflict at home. The technology stack here is almost incidental: what mattered was using generative AI to personalise that scaffolding at scale, so parents do not have to manually draw or write out every step of every routine.
This was also a personal lesson about what Power Platform is really good at: shipping a working, customer-grade app in days, not months — which is exactly what a hackathon format rewards. Combined with Azure OpenAI and DALL-E, citizen-developer tooling becomes a serious vehicle for accessibility-first software.
Thank you
Huge thanks to April Dunnam and the Power Platform Developer team for running HackTogether, the judges for picking Make Life Easy in the DEI category, and AlfaPeople for their support along the way.
PowerAI Labs 
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