As an employer, ensuring your organisation caters properly for people with a disability can seem challenging when you’re not sure what’s involved.
The issue was flagged in a report from Eurofound, the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions, entitled Disability and Labour Market Integration: Policy Trends and Support in EU Member States.
Part of the challenge is that people with disabilities are not a homogenous group. The nature and intensity of different physical and mental disabilities, the evolution of their manifestations and the existence of invisible disabilities – physical and psychological conditions that are not immediately apparent – define a complex and heterogenous group, it points out. Even where issues may seem similar, people’s experiences are diverse.
“People with disabilities are not all equally disadvantaged. Aspects such as age and gender are particularly important but other factors such as ethnicity and migration status also matter,” the report states.
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Moreover, the type of disability you have may result in different employment outcomes. Among people with disabilities, those with mental health difficulties and those with intellectual impairments, tend to experience the lowest employment rates.
The report investigates policy developments in EU member states supporting the inclusion of people with disabilities in the open labour market. It is important work given that, despite legislation prohibiting discrimination, people with disabilities participate less often in the open labour market and are more at risk of poverty or social exclusion.
Key obstacles to the employment of people with disabilities include disability-related stereotypes, bureaucratic difficulties in accessing available services, lack of strategic vision in governance, insufficient monitoring of policy implementation, limited training resources for employers and lack of specialist support, it finds.
Employers, who play a crucial role in hiring, managing and retaining employees with disabilities, are key. So much depends on their attitude and openness to diversity and flexibility, both of which are, say the report’s authors, “prerequisites for the successful inclusion of people with disabilities”.
Studies show that an employer’s positive attitude towards people with disabilities is fundamental for their integration into the workplace.
[ New grants of up to €25,000 to support people with disabilities in workplaceOpens in new window ]
Unfortunately, a lack of awareness of the composition of their workforce, and a compliance-based approach rather than a genuinely inclusive culture, are persistent barriers. Rigidity in relation to personnel practices and work schedules were also found to be significant inhibitors to the integration of people with disabilities into the workforce.
Other negative issues included a lack of resources to provide support and lack of relevant training to support effective career development interventions.
“The drivers of these barriers mainly consist of negative stereotypical beliefs, preconceptions and stigma from both employers and co-workers,” the report points out.
Worse still, the authors identify the same negative factors operating throughout the entire work cycle, from recruitment to performance management.
In some cases employers display apprehension around the costs of accommodating people with disabilities, including the costs and time required for training. Or else they deny the need for accommodations altogether, the report finds.
As a result, people with disabilities are discouraged from entering or remaining in the labour market, and existing staff are discouraged from disclosing a disability and requesting accommodation, for fear of discrimination.
Yet workplace adaptations can be easily made, ranging from material goods such as work aids, assistants or adjustments, to practices such as flexi or remote working.
Ireland has a range of state-backed measures to help, including the Job Interview Interpreter Grant, which can help people with a speech or hearing impairment during interviews and induction periods.
An Employee Retention Grant supports employers to retain employees who acquire a condition, to help them remain in the workforce productively. The EmployAbility Service supports people with disability into employment.
Yet despite such initiatives, Ireland has one of the lowest rates in Europe for participation in the open labour market by people with disabilities.
“Employers need to be inclusive and make sure that anybody can work at their workplace, including people with disabilities, and have various tools to do that, in the form of government supports,” says Daphne Ahrendt, senior research manager at Eurofound and co-author, with Valentina Patrini, of the report.
A greater level of effort needs to be made to include people with an intellectual disability, and the way to do that is by increasing their visibility ... We need to increase and change the psyche about people with an intellectual disability and how they contribute
— Martin McMahon
There are many reasons why it’s important to get this right. “From an employer’s point of view, it’s important because there is a shortage of labour, yet there is a whole pool of people out there able and willing to work, but unable to do so because of all kinds of barriers that prevent them from participating,” says Ahrendt.
“And from the individual’s perspective, it’s important because all the research indicates that being in work is good for people. It is good because of their ability to participate in society, which is a basic right where everyone is equal, but it’s also important because it prevents poverty and disadvantage.”
The inequalities that people with a disability face is something Martin McMahon, assistant professor in intellectual disability nursing at Trinity College Dublin, has studied throughout his career.
“Employment brings good health for a number of reasons. It gives a sense of worth. It gives us the resources to be able to buy stuff. It gives us social capital. There are biological links with wellbeing, mental health and positive physical health to being employed too,” he says.
There are some reasons for positivity. At a societal level, McMahon points to the closure of large-scale residential care settings for people with intellectual disabilities in favour of dispersed, supported, community living environments, which allows people to be more integrated into the community.
“But I think a greater level of effort needs to be made to include people with an intellectual disability, and the way to do that is by increasing their visibility. If we go to a gym, for example, do we see people with an intellectual disability? Typically not. What about clubs like men’s and women’s sheds? We need to increase and change the psyche about people with an intellectual disability and how they contribute,” he says.
[ Ireland at the bottom of Europe’s disability employment leagueOpens in new window ]
The same goes for making workplaces more inclusive and employers can do more to help, he reckons. “Every job application says ‘We are an equal opportunities employer’ but it’s about asking ‘What can we do to include people with intellectual disabilities?’” he says.
A person’s “subjective socio-economic status” is how they view their position in society, he points out, and it’s typically measured by things like employment, education, occupation and income.
“But these are so codependent on each other,” says McMahon. “If you’re working, you’re bringing in income, so you’ve got money to do nice things. You’ll also take more preventative health measures – you’ll go to the dentist, you might take vitamins, you’ve got money to join a gym and do other things that bring overall positive benefits. Employment gives you all of that.”
