Rehiring the Smart Way: Mainstreaming Disability in Recruiting Strategies

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By Tamala Scott

As we envision a return to normal following the pandemic, many businesses find themselves in a position of having to rehire staff to ramp back up to pre-COVID productivity and revenue.

While traditional sourcing strategies—such as online job boards, newspaper ads, staffing agencies— may secure employees in the short-term, your recruiting strategy may be missing the mark in reaching a valuable yet untapped resource—job seekers with disabilities. This article will shed light on the multiple advantages that businesses gain from hiring people with disabilities, beginning by dispelling three of the most common myths that deter businesses from actively recruiting jobseekers with disabilities. We also offer a few key strategies on how to get started on your inclusion journey.

Cost. The first and perhaps most insidious myth is that hiring people with disabilities is a costly practice. The Job Accommodation Network has surveyed nearly 3,000 employers since 2004 to ask them about their accommodation practices and costs. Nearly 60 percent of all of those surveyed have reported reasonable accommodation costs of $0 for their employees with disabilities, while the remaining respondents report an average cost per individual of $500 or less. The same study also lists numerous cost-saving benefits for providing a streamlined and comprehensive reasonable accommodation strategy, including employee retention, increased employee productivity and improved workplace safety.

Productivity. Another misconception is that employees with disabilities are less productive than their peers. One of the country’s leading disability-inclusive employers, Walgreen’s, conducted a study to measure the effectiveness of its disability hiring strategy within its distribution centers. Among the three areas the study examined was the productivity, safety and turnover among its staff with and without disabilities. The study concluded that Walgreens’ employees with disabilities typically outperform or perform at the same level as their colleagues without disabilities, while also experiencing less safety-related incidents and remaining in their positions for longer.

On a macro-level, disability-inclusive companies are also proven to perform better than their industry counterparts. A landmark study conducted by Accenture in 2018 shows that businesses that prioritize diversity and inclusion within their workforce outperform their industry peers and are better able to respond to business challenges.

Difficulty finding talent. The labor force with disabilities has historically been—and remains—underemployed relative to the overall national labor force. The unemployment rate among jobseekers with disabilities is 1.5 times that of jobseekers without disabilities. Despite recent data showing a narrowing employment gap between graduates with and without disabilities, graduates with disabilities report that they are more likely to get part-time or temporary positions and earn on average less than their peers without disabilities. Qualified talent is out there, but due to the barriers to employment, many of these jobseekers with disabilities remain invisible to employers that could benefit immensely from their skill.

For the first time in history, business leaders are realizing that hiring jobseekers with disabilities is not simply the right thing to do, but the smart thing to do for their business. Despite that, many businesses get stuck trying to figure out where to start in their disability inclusion efforts. Here are some achievable steps to getting YOUR business started on a path to a stronger and more inclusive diversity strategy:

Create a group of champions. As a first step, establish a core group of passionate individuals within your business that are willing to dedicate time and resources toward advancing your initiative. This group should include people from a variety of different departments and leadership levels within the company so that there are as many diverse perspectives and skillsets represented as possible.

Cultivate buy-in. Creating a disability-inclusive workplace requires that changes be made to an organization’s culture, operations, recruiting and hiring practices, and many other facets. Now that the business case has been made, your champions need to create an airtight pitch and messaging campaign to inform staff and leadership at multiple levels of the “how” and the “why” to have a disability-inclusive workplace.

Develop partnerships with local and national disability organizations. Once your internal support is secured, the next step is to seek out the expertise from local and national disability agencies to familiarize yourselves with the local disability community and find that aforementioned talent. Establishing your business as a disability-inclusive employer to the surrounding disability community is an important step toward getting individuals with disabilities to join your team.

Start small. It is important to keep an eye on the big picture and how to fold disability inclusion into multiple facets of your organization, but it is even more important to start small to develop a sound strategy that can be scaled in the future. Start small and aim for small wins before scaling.

Thinking about starting a disability hiring initiative? Contact The Arc@Work.

5 Questions That Help Define The Outlines Of Disability Advocacy

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What is the shape of disability activism? There is a lot of natural variation in the large and diverse disabled population, and many different opinions among the smaller core of committed disability activists.

But there are some beliefs, positions, and mindsets that shape the community of individuals and organizations loosely referred to as “Disability Activism.” They aren’t exactly boundaries or litmus tests. They are more like magnets that draw disability advocates in certain directions. What are these key positions? How do we identify them?

Here are five questions that go a long way towards defining disability activism as more than a set of moods and activities, but rather a movement with both diversity and a distinct direction.

Is disability mainly a medical or a social experience?

The disability experience has two main aspects. First, there are people’s own mental and physical conditions, practical impairments, pain, discomfort, illness, and lack or loss of functioning. These form the conventional components of disability itself. It is essentially a person experience, and medically based.

Then there are the barriers people encounter that are related to their disabilities, but come from the outside. This can include lack of physical, sensory, or mental access to essential spaces, processes, goods, and services – and discrimination by individuals, laws, institutions, and practices. These are the social forces that make disability so much more than a purely personal and medical experience.

These two aspects of disability have for some time been referred to as the “Medical” and “Social” models of disability. Most disabled people experience elements of both. But whichever comes to be your dominant concern is both affected by and then further shapes how much you look to yourself for a better life and how much you look to outside people and social forces.

Modern disability activism is mostly based in the Social Model of disability. It is more concerned with collective action to make society more accepting, equitable, and accessible, and focused much less on funding for medical research or development of new treatments and therapies. This less a matter of right or wrong, than it is a difference in focus. But it’s enough of a difference to give disability activism a noticeably different tone, flavor, and direction than, say, fundraising for medical research, or treatment of disabling conditions. Broadly speaking, disability activism seeks to fix society’s ableism, not fix disabled people’s disabilities. That gives disability activism it’s most essential and distinct shape and dimension.

Read the full article at Forbes.

European Space Agency announces call for ‘parastronauts’ with disabilities

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The European Space Agency is diversifying its astronaut pool with its first call for astronauts that is open to candidates with physical disabilities.

In this call for new astronauts, the agency’s first recruitment drive in over a decade, ESA announced that it plans to accept four to six career astronauts (who will be permanent ESA staff) and about 20 “reserve astronauts,” who could fly for shorter missions to destinations like the International Space Station.

As part of this call for astronaut applicants, ESA Director General Jan Wörner revealed during a recent news briefing that the agency is aiming to bring its first “parastronaut,” or astronaut with physical disabilities, on board, according to SpaceNews.

As part of what it calls the “Parastronaut feasibility project,” “ESA is ready to invest in defining the necessary adaptations of space hardware in an effort to enable these otherwise excellently qualified professionals to serve as crew members on a safe and useful space mission,” the agency said in a statement, adding that it will open up this opportunity for one or more applicants.

For this parastronaut, who would be the first astronaut with physical disabilities selected not just by ESA but in history, the agency is “looking for individual(s) who are psychologically, cognitively, technically and professionally qualified to be an astronaut, but have a physical disability that would normally prevent them from being selected due to the requirements imposed by the use of current space hardware,” ESA added in the same statement.

ESA consulted with the Paralympic Committee to determine exactly which physical disabilities would work consistently with space missions, according to a New York Times. Currently, the agency is accepting applicants with leg amputations, significant differences in leg length or who are very short (typically, space agencies have a height minimum for astronaut candidates), according to the Times, though the agency hopes to expand this opportunity to others in the future.

After being recruited, astronaut candidates chosen as part of this project would work with the agency to determine what physical accommodations they might need to fly to space.

Continue on to Space.com to read the complete article.

13 Practical Ways To Help Employees Adapt To New Technology

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Tech continues to play a larger and larger role in businesses and industries of all stripes. As companies bring on more and newer technology to help improve productivity, employees who were initially trained on older systems or who are new to a higher-tech workplace may struggle to keep up or even resist using the new tech at all.

Giving your team the support they need to learn and leverage new tech is a win-win situation for everyone. Below, 13 members of Forbes Human Resources Council share tips for effectively introducing new tech tools to your team members.

Take a multi-pronged approach.

Implement a range of training systems, from written instruction to live video training, to accommodate different work styles and preferences. It’s important that executives lead by example by using the technology themselves and reminding employees of support and resources available on a regular basis. – Neha Mirchandani, BrightPlan

2. Create a sandbox for employees.

The one important strategy in any major wave of change is the willingness to create a sandbox for the employees. For any new tech—or non-tech—strategy to succeed, an appetite for and acceptance of failures and mistakes are required. People learn when they know their mistakes won’t cost them their jobs. They are more open to bigger challenges if there is an allowance for a learning curve. – Ruchi Kulhari, NIIT-Technologies

3. Implement annual skills evaluation.

Annual skills evaluation programs are a great way to keep employees engaged and motivated. Digital transformation requires core competencies for virtually any job to evolve. By evaluating skill levels and skill gaps, your organization can easily identify ways to ensure employees are keeping up with the competition. Employers must constantly update employee skills to match the pace of innovation. – Sameer Penakalapati, CEIPAL Corp.

Read the full article at  Forbes.

Bumble Is Driving Powerful Change for Disabled Women Like Me

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Bumble founder, Whitney Wolfe Herd at the Fast Company Innovation

The trailblazing social network Bumble has had a busy, history-making month, one that proves the female-focused company’s strategy is poised to shape the future of social media.

First, Bumble rolled out a new policy on body shaming in an effort to “create a kinder and more accepting internet for everyone.”

Their updated terms and conditions explicitly prohibit “unsolicited and derogatory comments made about someone’s appearance, body shape, size, or health. This includes language that can be deemed fat-phobic, ableist, racist, colorist, homophobic or transphobic.”

Users who engage in body shaming, either in their profile or through the app’s chat feature, will receive a warning and repeated violations will result in a permanent ban. To illustrate the prevalence of body shaming, Bumble also released a video featuring disabled users talking about times they were shamed for their bodies.

As a disabled woman, I’ve regularly experienced body shaming on the internet; in fact, the taunts and mocking has steadily increased over the years. People have made fun of my appearance, called me things like “ugly” and “blobfish” and even used my photo in last summer’s cruel new teacher prank on TikTok.

While I mostly just roll my eyes at these comments now, they still hurt because it’s another reminder of just how embedded ableism is in our culture. And it’s also one of the reasons I’ve avoided joining dating apps altogether — I don’t need yet another place to be bombarded by body shaming and ableist rhetoric.

That’s why I was thrilled to see the disability community represented in Bumble’s video. In a world where we continually view disabled bodies as “less than” and unworthy, this ad is the societal pushback we need in 2021. We need to normalize disabilities and disabled bodies and Bumble is taking a much-needed step in that direction.

Bumble user Alex Dacy agrees. The social media influencer, who has spinal muscular atrophy, appeared in the video and was excited to be a part of such a pivotal moment for disability representation, especially coming from a large company like Bumble. The conversation around disabilities and body shaming is long overdue and Dacy is happy to see Bumble leading that conversation.

Read the full article at CNN.

What To Look For In A Disability Organization

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There’s an important question that may get too little attention in the world of disability services, activism, and culture. If we really care about people with disabilities and disability issues, we should all do better than just tossing pocket change in every fundraising bucket we see, or signing up for every walkathon a coworker’s kid puts in front of us.

But how do we choose which disability-related causes and organizations to support? Some criteria are the same for any kind of charity or organization seeking voluntary support. Look for sound, transparent finances and accounting practices. Make sure they use funds to further an important mission rather than simply enriching top executives. Support organizations that give regular, readable reports of services provided, advocacy accomplishments, and goals achieved. Look for strong oversight by a genuinely representative Board of Directors or similar governing entity.

These are basic tips for choosing any charity or cause, for donations or for volunteering. But what other qualities should we look for specifically in disability organizations? Here are some criteria and questions to ask, and why they are important:

  • Medical research and treatment

This is the most traditional and well-known type of disability organization. Their goals are mainly to fund medical research into treatments and cures for specific disabling conditions, and in some cases to help provide some of those treatments to people with those conditions.

The closest thing to an original is the March of Dimes, started by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1938 to find a cure for polio. But the model continues, with some modernizing alterations, in the March of Dimes itself and in other legacy organizations like the Multiple Sclerosis Society, Muscular Dystrophy Association, United Cerebral Palsy Association, and the Alzheimer’s Association. Notably, many of these organizations are better known to the general public for their fundraising events, and less for the work they do.

  • Direct services

Most disability organizations provide at least some personal and material assistance directly to disabled people and their families. For some, direct service is the main focus. Services can include funding for adaptive equipment, paying for certain high-cost medical procedures, or enriching experiences like support groups and summer camps. In local chapters and offices, direct services may also include one-on-one information, counseling, and advocacy assistance to address disabled people’s everyday needs, concerns, and barriers.

Read the full article at Forbes.

‘Framing Britney Spears’ Doesn’t Bring Up Disability and That’s a Problem

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Britney Spears is physically able-bodied, beautiful, and successful. It’s not what disability narratives have historically prized throughout the years.

Everyone has an opinion on Britney Spears, even if you think you don’t. Since the pop star’s infamous series of erratic decisions starting in 2007 — which led to her being placed in a conservatorship for the last 12 years — there have been numerous opinions stated about whether Spears is a prisoner or being protected. This week, FX’s “The New York Times Presents: Framing Britney Spears” sought to lift the veil on what many people have heard about Spears and her confinement, but one word was noticeably absent throughout the hour-long broadcast: disabled.

Last year, as the #FreeBritney movement started up, disabled rights advocate and writer Sara Luterman brought up Spears’ conservatorship with regards to disability rights issues in The Nation. A conservatorship, as Luterman lays it out, is “generally imposed on people with a documented disability who are determined, by a judge, to be unable to care for themselves.” A conservator determines how the conservatee spends their money, takes care of themselves day to day, and anything else falling under a wide swath of things deemed necessary.

As Luterman points out, “Guardianship is most commonly used on young adults with intellectual disabilities and older adults with dementia. It isn’t clear how many people are under guardianship in the United States, but in a 2013 report, the AARP’s ‘best guess’ was 1.5 million Americans.

Yet within “Framing Britney Spears” the topic is never couched with regards to disability. Instead they make it clear that conservatorships are usually reserved for those who are elderly. The distinction is pertinent, as elderly doesn’t always mean disabled — but too often disabled always means elderly. The series also limits their discussions to #FreeBritney allies or those with legal connections to conservatorships, and never does it solicit the opinions of disabled rights advocates.

And this is disturbing, because there are elements of Spears’ life that definitely sound troubling — but when you factor in the more nefarious ways conservatorships control a person’s medical and, especially, sexual and reproductive health, it’s reminiscent of the numerous ways those with disabilities have been controlled and prohibited from being considered actual people.

Read the full article at Indie Wire.

The First Blind Man to Climb Mount Everest and Other Inspiring Athletes Star in Super Bowl Ad

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Erik Weihenmayer

Guaranteed Rate, one of America’s top 5 retail mortgage lenders, announces that the newest ad in its national brand campaign, Believe You Will, will air during this year’s Super Bowl.

The 60-second spot will feature some of the Believe You Will campaign’s ambassadors, including Dustin Poirier, who recently defeated UFC legend Conor McGregor, and Ryan Newman, who will be racing to win his second Daytona 500 next week, marking the one-year anniversary of his infamous, fiery crash.

“It’s exciting to be a part of the most iconic sporting event in the world,” said Guaranteed Rate President and CEO Victor Ciardelli. “Our new Believe You Will campaign is authentically us. We are a mortgage company that believes ‘We Grow For Good’–the more we grow, the more good we can do. We believe people are amazing and can do anything they want in the world; they just have to believe they can.”

Guaranteed Rate’s ad, as well as the entire Believe You Will campaign, was produced by the company’s in-house creative team. The Believe You Will campaign’s ambassadors were identified based on their personal stories and philosophies, which connect directly to the idea that incredible goals can be attained through the power of positivity and belief.

“At Guaranteed Rate, our core values are rooted in the power of belief and positive thinking, to achieve audacious goals,” said Guaranteed Rate Chief Marketing Officer Steve Moffat. “To share that philosophy, we found remarkable stories of people who believed in their abilities to overcome challenges and achieve their goals. We hope that people around the world will be inspired by these stories and will believe that they too can achieve great things.”

The spot airing during the game highlights several of the campaign‘s inspiring ambassadors, including:

  • Dustin Poirier, who believes he will regain the UFC lightweight title after having just defeated the legendary Conor McGregor in a vicious 2nd-round TKO on January 23.
  • Ryan Newman, who believes he will win his second Daytona 500, one year after being in one of the sport’s most shocking crashes ever.
  • Erik Weihenmayer, who believed he could defy the odds to become the first blind person to climb to the summit of Mount Everest.
  • Rose Namajunas, who believed she could rise above extremely tough circumstances and become a UFC champion.
  • Seth Jones, who believed that even though his dad was an NBA veteran, he could forge his own path to become an NHL All Star.
  • Starr Andrews, who believes she can accomplish her dream of being an Olympic figure-skating champion in Beijing.
  • The voice of the ad and the entire Believe You Will campaign is motivational speaker and coach Dr. Eric Thomas, known to many as “The Hip Hop Preacher.”

Guaranteed Rate rolled out its Believe You Will campaign after a year of momentous growth for the company as it met record-breaking consumer demand and launched various high-profile sports sponsorships. Well known for its title sponsorship of the Chicago White Sox’s Guaranteed Rate Field, the company sponsored a wide array of sporting events in 2020, from mainstream sports like NASCAR, IndyCar, MLB and NHL, to more niche sports like professional bass fishing, figure skating, bowling and lacrosse.

To preview Guaranteed Rate’s Believe You Will Super Bowl ad, please visit:
rate.com/about-us/purpose and follow the company on Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook @GuaranteedRate and #believeyouwill.

About Guaranteed Rate Companies

The Guaranteed Rate Companies, which includes Guaranteed Rate, Inc., Guaranteed Rate Affinity, LLC, and Proper Rate, LLC, has more than 9,000 employees in over 750 offices across the United States. Headquartered in Chicago, Guaranteed Rate Companies is one of the largest retail mortgage lenders in the United States, funding over $73 billion in 2020. Founded in 2000 and located in all 50 states and Washington, D.C., Guaranteed Rate Companies has helped homeowners nationwide with home purchase loans and refinances. The company has established itself as an industry leader by introducing innovative technology, offering low rates and delivering unparalleled customer service. 2017 marked the launch of Guaranteed Rate Affinity, LLC, a mortgage origination joint venture between Guaranteed Rate, Inc. and Realogy Holdings Corp. (NYSE: RLGY), a global leader in residential real estate franchising and brokerage. In 2020, the company launched Proper Rate, LLC, a mortgage origination joint venture between Guaranteed Rate, Inc. and @properties, one of the nation’s largest residential brokerage firms. Collectively, the Guaranteed Rate Companies have earned honors and awards including:Top Lender for Online Service for 2018 byU.S. News & World Report; Best Mortgage Lender for Online Loans and Best Mortgage Lender for Refinancing by NerdWallet for 2021; HousingWire‘s 2020 Tech100 award for the company’s industry-leading FlashCloseSM technology; No. 3 ranking in Scotsman Guide‘s Top Retail Mortgage Lenders 2019;ChicagoAgent Magazine‘s Lender of the Year for five consecutive years; Chicago Tribune‘s Top Workplaces list for seven consecutive years. Visit rate.com for more information.

SOURCE Guaranteed Rate

So You Want A Diverse Workforce? Then Truly Welcome People With Disabilities

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graphic of a diverse work place

About 1 in 4 Americans live with a disability. Here’s how organizations can become disability confident.

By now, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) has been in place for over 35 years and roughly 62 million adults in the United States live with a disability — that’s about one in four people.

Yet how many of us can honestly say we are confident when it comes to including persons with disabilities in our workplace culture?

 

(Image Credit – The Hill)
According to a report from the Return On Disability Group, although 90 percent of companies claim to prioritize diversity, only 4 percent consider disability in those initiatives.

To be clear, a disability-confident organization is one that puts policies and procedures into practice that ensure people with all types of disabilities are included equally. Similarly, a disability-confident employer thinks about the unique needs that may arise when designing their products, services, collateral, and even job descriptions.

In order to excel in today’s evolving marketplace, you must not only acknowledge the importance of persons with disabilities to your business but also embrace actions that support their success as both employees and consumers. Furthermore, persons with disabilities account for total disposable incomes of over $500 billion, so it’s critical to businesses to ensure that persons with disabilities feel welcome to apply and contribute to your existing team.

  1. Screen In, Not Out

Like any employer, you want the best person for the job. This means, you must be prepared to show your disability confidence by guaranteeing that persons with disabilities are truly welcomed — and that starts before the interview. This can only be done if you and your hiring team are committed to “Screen In, Not Out.” This important Inclusion-ism is literally an Human Resources litmus test.

Anyone who has ever attended a Human Resource course has been advised to screen out in order to minimize the number of resumes and to weed out less desirable applicants. There are two clear issues with this practice that disability confident employers need to consider; first, by choosing to screen out you are knowingly shrinking your applicant pool in a time when a different perspective could be crucial to your company growth. Secondly, the “screen out software” that is being used by larger businesses perpetuates unconscious biases that result in a lack of diversity among applicants and, ultimately, your team.

  1. Stay Curious

The second Inclusion-ism you will want to embrace, in support of more disability confidence, is to stay curious. In short, never assume that you know what is going on; by contrast, you should be genuinely open enough about the why and hear the reason without judgement. Instead of asking “what is wrong with you?” you may question, “Why does it seem that you are regularly late on Wednesdays?”

Often, the reason comes down to a simple issue requiring minimal accommodation. You may soon discover that this employee could be a top producer on your team (aside from being late on Wednesdays).

Bottom line: embracing a “stay curious” attitude means being open to and looking for ways of doing things. By encouraging your entire team to ask questions, listen, and observe with the primary goal of understanding any given issue, you are on the road to becoming disability confident.

  1. Win, Win, Win

In the 1989 publication: “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective,” Steven Covey describes the significance of a win-win situation which leads to mutual benefit.

It is time to refresh that concept to gain relevance in today’s diverse workplace. This is where “Win, Win, Win” comes in. The fact is it takes three wins to be truly inclusive. When you promote a person with disability from within, the business wins (you’ve selected the best candidate), the individual wins (they receive an opportunity that less disability-confident employers may not offer), and the entire team wins (benefiting from an innovative and adaptable leader who has overcome barriers). Plus, there are significant benefits to your customers who may see themselves reflected in the diversity of your team!

As we all know, people living with disabilities are everywhere; at work, play, traveling, shopping — just like everyone else. The more we strive to be Disability Confident Leaders, the more we can be sure we are practicing from a true Win, Win, Win perspective!

Tova Sherman—a TED Speaker and thought leader with more than 25 years of experience in diversity and inclusion—is the award-winning CEO of reachAbility, an organization which provides supportive and accessible programs dedicated to workplace inclusion for anyone facing barriers. She is the author of Win, Win, Win! The 18 Inclusion-isms You Need to Become a Disability Confident Employer.

Read the original article at The Hill.

 

Is the Beauty Industry Glossing Over Disability?

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As marketing moves to be more inclusive, people with visible disabilities are still largely missing from mainstream beauty ads. Teacher and advocate Xian Horn discusses the changes she hopes the industry makes next.

Growing up a biracial Asian girl with an X in my name who had Cerebral Palsy and walked with two adapted ski poles for support, I never expected to see myself represented. I identified strongly with other women, but I was too niche and, for the most part, I liked that. My family cultivated the best in me, so I grew up believing my disability was an

(Getty Images. Design by Bella Geraci)

asset. My mom, an art director for Estée Lauder and Avon, always said, “There’s always going to be someone smarter than you, prettier than you, taller than you, and that’s OK, just be you.” But not everyone receives that level of support, and the beauty industry has long touted a perfectionist, no-flaw standard free of wrinkles and stretch marks. Perhaps it is this vantage point that the industry struggles with marketing the beauty of disability. The beauty industry created a fantasy that society still feels pressured to make a reality.

It was in 2006, after this Dove Evolution video was viewed by millions, that I noticed mainstream advertising imagery that included plus-size and older women with the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty. Two years later, I got excited when a photo of a plus-size model with her belly exposed went viral. This is also when I realized no beauty company had focused on disability.

In 2010, a friend helped me film a 1-minute pitch to the Dove Campaign for Real Beauty in my mother’s living room in which I asked the otherwise inclusive brand to start also including people with disabilities. Once on YouTube, the pitch’s visibility expanded, with people around the world watching and sharing its message. I received letters of support from people in the Philippines, Australia, Japan, and all over the U.S.

Read the full article at Allure.

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