How to better support employees with disabilities

New research has revealed that employees with disabilities are seeing lower engagement levels at work.

Culture Amp found that just 7.6 per cent of companies include disability in their demographics, and 5.7 per cent discuss disabilities in company surveys.

Furthermore, disabled employees saw themselves as 10 per cent less productive than non-disabled employees, and disabled men were 17 per cent less likely to be picked for career progression than non-disabled men.

With these statistics in mind, there is more that organisations can do to support workers living with a disability.

“The best thing you can do is ask, ‘Where are we at with this today?’, ‘What metrics and data are we using to assess what our disabled employees need?’, and ‘What people structures, like ERGs, do we already have in place that we can leverage to plan actions that are more likely to be impactful?’,” said Heather Walker, senior people scientist at Culture Amp.

“Once employers reflect on where they are starting, the saliency of their actions are more likely to land with disabled employees at their organisation. Formal conversations, an inclusion or accessibility survey, or a listening tour with your disabled employees are good ways to do this.”

One effective way to create a safe space for disabled employees is to nominate a disability champion.

“Organisations who will move the needle most on disability inclusion are those who have disability champions – disabled employees who will publicly advocate for themselves and others across the company,” said Ms Walker.

“Disability champions have tough conversations and challenge the status quo in ways noticeable to fellow employees. Considering this research, one measured step employers can take would revolve around welcoming disabled employees’ public challenges to work norms and processes that are inaccessible.”

“Leaders can respond positively and publicly to disability champions’ calls to action. This opens up room for other disabled employees who would have otherwise not spoken up, to call attention to their own accessibility needs.”

Creating a culture of communication allows staff to open up and express concerns, which drives change. Some of Ms Walker’s other helpful actions are:

• “Educate/train employees and managers about ableism and how it shows up in workplaces.”
• “Advocate for accessibility – Ensure that all processes and technologies used in the workplace are accessible to neurodivergent employees.”
• “Call out ableism – Speak up when you witness attitudes or behaviours that perpetuate ableism in the workplace.”
• “Provide accommodations – Work with HR and your manager to provide reasonable accommodations to disabled employees, including additional time to complete tasks if needed.”
• “Support self-advocacy – Encourage disabled colleagues to advocate for themselves and provide them with the tools and resources they need to succeed.”
• “Build in extra time for disabled employees to adjust to new systems, processes, and tools. This way, they are less likely to fall behind any org-wide rollouts.”
• “Prioritise diversity, equity, and inclusion in all hiring and retention practices – Make sure that disabled candidates are given equal consideration and that disabled employees are provided with the support they need to thrive in the workplace.”

More education for managers is another crucial step towards inclusivity.

Ms Walker continued: “One common issue we see with untrained non-disabled managers is a pattern of protection. It is with good intentions that they hold back opportunities from a disabled employee because they don’t want to add more stress.”

“But it also means those disabled employees are then systematically disadvantaged; they aren’t getting the same opportunities as their non-disabled peers under the faulty assumption that the manager is helping the disabled employee. The complexity of disability experience alone also calls for more training at the manager level.”

For disabled employees who may feel like they aren’t seeing the attention they need, Ms Walker offered some suggestions.

“As a first step for anyone at any level of self-advocacy in the past, I’d recommend checking out resources that describe their rights as a disabled employee,” she said.

“If the employee is in a work environment where it isn’t safe for them to sound the alarm; the best suggestion might be to hunker down while searching for another role in a company where disabled employees are better accommodated.”

“However, if they are in an organisation with a higher DEI maturity where it is safer to sound the alarm, then the best suggestion might be to use the strength of their voice. If the latter, initiating a conversation with a people partner in HR who is perceived to be safe is a great starting point. Talking with allies is key in creating the change we need to see for disability inclusion to take stronger hold in companies across the world.”

Jack Campbell

Jack is the editor at HR Leader.