“Transforming Human Resources (HR) Through Innovative Disability Policies and Practices” participants identified challenges to disability recruitment 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 (EARN) hosted a virtual Think Tank, “Transforming HR Through Innovative Disability Policies and Practices.”
The Think Tank convened employers, consultants, community-based organizations, and disability advocates to identify innovative strategies for increasing workforce disability employment, both across industries and at the individual organization level. Discussion centered on access throughout the employment lifecycle, including a session focused on recruitment. This report summarizes challenges to disability recruitment identified by participants during that session and potential solutions for addressing them.
Challenges: Recruitment
Participants were asked to think about common barriers to recruitment of people with disabilities. The following is a summary of participants’ responses.
Key recruiting staff need more relevant training and education. Recruiters and hiring managers, some of whom may be early career professionals, often have limited experience with workplace disability issues and may make assumptions about people with disabilities. For instance, recruiters who lack experience interacting with disabled people may conclude that such candidates would not be a good cultural fit for the organization. Recruiters may perceive disabled candidates as lacking social skills or assume that others will be uncomfortable interacting with someone with a disability.
In addition, recruitment teams are often not disabled themselves, and this may negatively impact job offer outcomes for people with disabilities or for other candidates from historically underserved communities. Recruiters also may not know how to respond to hiring managers who have concerns about candidates with disabilities. Finally, neither recruiters nor hiring managers may fully understand their organization’s process for providing candidates with accommodations.
Company job application portals are not always accessible, which discourages candidates with disabilities from applying to organizations. Online career fairs need to consider best practices that enable a valuable experience for people with disabilities, including people who are d/Deaf, blind, or neurodivergent. Organizational procurement personnel and vendors often do not require accessibility in their purchases. Technology-based HR applicant tracking systems and artificial intelligence (AI)-based interview tools are some of the biggest barriers for applicants with disabilities because they can be discriminatory, are often inaccessible, and may limit access to needed accommodations.
AI as a recruitment tool is still evolving. Research indicates that job application portals that use AI may screen out candidates with disabilities. There are also additional potential issues within AI screening tools. For example, discrimination might occur when there is under- or overrepresentation of particular demographic groups, when data collection methods inadvertently favor specific segments of the population, or when outdated or historically inaccurate information is used to train AI.
Recruiter outreach typically focuses on universities but does not engage enough with VR or community colleges. Recruiters could conduct more outreach to state VR agencies, other state agencies, and community colleges. State-funded programs that support job seekers with disabilities often lack branding and marketing that would identify them as a trusted source to help employers meet their workforce needs.
The traditional interview process often does not focus on job skills. Rather, it prioritizes social interaction skills, which may disadvantage some people with disabilities and fail to provide a true picture of a candidate’s ability to do the job.
Small businesses may experience additional specific barriers to the recruitment of disabled candidates because they lack the infrastructure of larger companies, such as employee resource groups or targeted recruiters focused on specific populations.
Recruiting and hiring metrics may disincentivize recruiters. Key performance indicators and measures are generally not focused on disability hiring. Measures by which recruiters are evaluated, such as the number of qualified candidates or time to hire, may discourage them from focusing on candidates who may require accommodations or additional support in the interview process.
Solutions: Recruitment
To identify solutions that promote disability recruitment, Think Tank participants were asked what changes in policies and practices would have the most significant impact. The following is a summary of participants’ responses.
Organizations must take an active role in building more supportive cultures. Using a maturity model would assist in assessing the distinct levels of maturity on workplace disability access issues, which may vary depending on different factors. This would allow organizations to identify appropriate starting points and expectations given their industry and size. Internal organizational representatives and leadership need to be actively engaged in organizational culture change efforts around accessibility. Leadership should consider talking about their disabilities to signal an open and welcoming environment.
Employers need to design and implement training that informs their recruitment and hiring managers on accessible communication approaches, including interviewing techniques. Topics that should be addressed include creating job descriptions; setting expectations for in-person and virtual interactions; communicating about and responding to requests for accommodations; and using alternative approaches to traditional job interviews, such as allowing the candidate to demonstrate that they can do the tasks needed for a particular job.
To ensure the accessibility of digital resources, organizations must ensure procurement staff, accessibility experts, disability-focused employee resource group (ERG) members, and technology teams work together to ensure compliance with accessibility standards. Organizations should welcome feedback from employees with disabilities. Industry leaders should partner with state or federal agencies to create or enhance programs to support apprenticeships in digital accessibility targeted to people with disabilities. Consistent accessible technology procurement standards and processes should be developed and promoted at the federal and state levels.
Recruiters should use targeted strategies to attract and retain employees with disabilities. These include attending job fairs for people with disabilities and establishing relationships with disability-related organizations such as state VR agencies, local workforce development offices, and disability offices at community colleges, historically Black colleges and universities, Hispanic-serving institutions, Tribal colleges and universities, and other Minority-serving institutions, among others.
Employers should engage disability-focused ERG members and those of other historically underrepresented groups to identify barriers in the recruitment process. This may include a review of the applicant screening and interview processes and skills assessment protocols.
Organizations should reach out to ERGs and those with personal experience in recruitment to gather feedback on the recruitment process and ways to make it more accessible. Organizations should move beyond traditional interviews to provide alternative ways for candidates to demonstrate relevant skills.
To assess the effectiveness of their efforts, organizations should use recruitment and hiring metrics, including gathering and analyzing data specific to recruitment (e.g., the percentage of people with disabilities in the overall applicant pool who apply for jobs, secure interviews, and are hired). Metrics can also be used to assess the effectiveness of different referral sources, as mentioned above. Organizations should also consider establishing performance evaluation measures for recruiters and hiring managers to assess the effectiveness of training and its impact on outcomes. Finally, organizations should take steps to gauge employees’ perception of the workplace climate throughout the employment lifecycle; such tools may include anonymous satisfaction surveys, focus groups, ERG feedback, and exit interviews.
Broadly, organizations must continually bring fresh and multigenerational voices into the conversation about how to encourage disabled candidates to apply. Representation in HR departments generally and, more importantly, in recruiting teams should be increased. Other changes may include recruiters using innovative technology platforms and social media as recruitment sources in addition to traditional methods. They may also include reviewing job descriptions to ensure they reflect essential job functions and assessing whether current interview processes are the best way to judge a candidate’s ability to perform the job.
Resources
The following resources can help employers implement the solutions above:
Building a pipeline of qualified applicants with disabilities is key to disability-focused outreach and recruitment. Learning about recruitment sources is a critical first step in this process.
Learn how to ensure your organization’s career pages use messaging and outreach techniques that are accessible and welcoming to job candidates with disabilities.
Disability-friendly words and images go a long way toward communicating your commitment to disability employment and should be featured in all recruitment materials, from online career pages to individual job descriptions.
Working with state and local service providers, such as VR agencies, American Job Centers, Centers for Independent Living, and other community-based organizations, is critical to helping find disabled candidates with the skills, experiences, and interests an organization needs.
Organizations need targeted strategies to attract employees with disabilities.
