“Transforming Human Resources (HR) Through Innovative Disability-Inclusive Policies and Practices” participants identified challenges to inclusive advancement and potential solutions to address them.
On July 27, 2023, the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) and its Employer Assistance and Resource Network on Disability Inclusion (EARN) hosted a virtual Think Tank, “Transforming HR Through Innovative Disability-Inclusive Policies and Practices.”
The Think Tank convened employers, consultants, community-based organizations, and disability advocates to identify innovative strategies for increasing workforce disability inclusion, both across industries and at the individual organization level. Discussion centered on inclusion throughout the employment lifecycle, including a session focused on advancement. This report summarizes challenges to inclusive advancement identified by participants during that session and potential solutions for addressing them.
Challenges: Advancement
Participants were asked to think about common barriers to advancement for employees with disabilities, including those who are also members of other historically underserved communities. The following is a summary of participants’ responses.
Negative attitudes and assumptions about the skills and competencies of employees with disabilities are still pervasive in the workplace and pose barriers to advancement. Participants commented on the lack of coaching or encouragement for employees with disabilities, which limits their chances of developing new skills or growing in a position.
In some cases, the accommodation process itself can create barriers to success. For example, if an employee points out an inaccessible system or requests a costly or complex accommodation, HR may consider the employee to be a potential source of problems and intervene in discussions about promotion. (EARN note: This may constitute illegal retaliation under the Americans with Disabilities Act.)
Participants noted that a lack of clearly defined advancement measures means that many promotion decisions remain subjective. Given the stigma around disability, participants felt that people with disabilities may be disproportionately impacted by this subjectivity.
Mentoring programs for people with disabilities are often just “buddy” programs rather than programs that sponsor career advancement. Very few mentor programs actively support people with disabilities or educate mentors about the lived experience of those who work with a disability. These supports are necessary for the advancement of employees with disabilities.
Many professional development programs do not adequately consider accessibility. Improvements to professional development programs in this regard are necessary to support disabled employees.
Currently, little information is available on organizational success in disability-inclusive advancement. Increased data would allow organizations to select and implement effective strategies to support the advancement of more employees with disabilities.
Solutions: Advancement
To identify solutions that promote disability-inclusive advancement, Think Tank participants were asked what changes in policies and practices would have the most significant impact, especially for employees with disabilities who are members of historically underserved communities. The following is a summary of participants’ responses.
Organizations should adopt a change management process to support the development of inclusive organizational cultures. Change management processes are approaches that organizations use to describe and implement changes in internal and external processes. Steps include defining a needed change, planning to prepare and support employees for the change, outlining the necessary steps to achieve the change, and collecting data to measure its effectiveness.
Accommodation programs are often overly focused on compliance rather than ensuring that employees have the tools and supports they need to be successful. The responsibility to support the process should be moved to a service-oriented department within organizations, and accommodation offices should be led, where possible, by people who have experience with the accommodation process.
Employees who seek mentoring want to work with people who understand their lived experience. Several changes to traditional mentoring programs would aid this goal for employees with disabilities, such as:
matching employees with a mentor who shares their lived experience and is an organizational leader (paired mentor matching);
allowing flexibility in selecting a mentor for the employee’s current career stage; and
improving training and development for mentors to create more effective mentoring relationships.
These changes would move programs beyond mentoring and toward professional sponsorship of employees with disabilities and those who are members of other historically underserved communities.
To advance, employees must understand how the organization defines employee success. While the shifting nature of business can make clarity in job descriptions and requirements difficult to maintain, there is ample opportunity for improvement. Strategies include providing greater transparency in job requirements and promotion criteria, developing measurable performance goals, and establishing clear metrics to measure success. Direct and honest performance feedback is also an essential element. Managers should help their employees chart a clear path for career advancement within the organization.
Organizations should prioritize the advancement of disabled employees as part of organizational diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA) programs. Organizations can use HR metrics and analytics for affirmative action planning that include data breakdowns for employees with disabilities.
Organizations should consider evaluating candidates for promotions using de-identified information or crowd-sourced feedback from employees.
Many organizations that support historically marginalized groups have developed models to empower their members to manage their careers. Similar models could benefit people with disabilities and help them to learn skills like self-promotion and career advancement strategies from one another. A “master class” or related storytelling approach can promote peer-based learning opportunities and foster connections and understanding within the disability community.
The addition of affirmative action measures for disability that target pay discrimination and promotion would further hold organizations accountable in the advancement of disabled people. To measure success in advancing people with disabilities within their workforce, organizations could initiate data collection efforts (similar to the way data are collected for race and gender) in the absence of mandated reporting.
Resources
The following resources can help employers implement the solutions above:
