Diversity: Don't ask why - ask "Why not?"

Corporate citizenship, if strategically managed and communicated, can have a positive impact on brand awareness and consumer loyalty. Fourteen percent of the U.S. population seeks out good corporate citizens when making purchases. (Council on Foundations)

A diverse employee population adds value to an organization with creative approaches to problem-solving and out-of-the-box thinking. Sharing new and/or different perspectives is good for employees - and good for business. The workplace also serves as a place to develop enriching friendships for all employees. Who has not made at least one or two friends over the course of being employed?

Progressive companies are realizing that in order to serve a broader customer base, they must reflect the customer mix in their hiring practices. There are currently 54 million Americans with disabilities, and that number is expected to increase significantly as baby boomers begin to experience disabilities related to aging while still employed. This customer base is currently being tapped by savvy organizations who understand that increasing the bottom line is a direct result of meeting the needs of a diverse customer population.

Since people typically want to do business with companies who are more likely to understand their needs, hiring from diverse candidate pools creates the opportunity to widen the customer base. Industry leaders such as Microsoft, Oracle, and Cisco are actively recruiting and hiring employees from many diverse groups, including people with disabilities. Increasingly, company visions are incorporating the development of management practices that facilitate the accommodation and success of employees with disabilities.

Microsoft and IBM have made a tremendous impact on creating an environment which makes it possible for more people with disabilities to do their jobs. This, in turn, opens the door for people with disabilities to be able to select career paths with tremendous upward potential and growth opportunities. In fact, the assistive technology that is currently available leaves no reason for a qualified individual not to be able to perform his or her job.

People with disabilities are a valuable source of experience, talent, and education for all employers. However, according to a 1999 Harris Poll, nearly 70% of working-age adults with disabilities are unemployed. Of the working adults, nearly one third earn an income below poverty level. Over 12% of the working populations of the San Francisco and Silicon Valley are persons with disabilities - a total of over 300,000 individuals, ages 16 - 65.

So why is the unemployment rate for workers with disabilities so much higher than the rest of the working population? It certainly is not because of technical limitations:

• A personal financial advisor at a major financial institution has limited movement of his arms and no voluntary hand movement. He is able to serve his 300 clients by using a trackball, a typing splint, and keyboard shortcuts to access customer management and investment software.
• A software developer who is paralyzed from the shoulders down uses a mouse stick to write code, ensuring that his team at a global software giant remains on the cutting edge of technological advances.
• When an enterprise architect with Multiple Sclerosis uses speech recognition software and a trackball, dexterity issues are not a factor. He manages the cross-functional teams and tools that keep one of the government's large scale networks available and operating smoothly - and he can do this from home, too, thanks to the installation of an assistive technology workstation.
• The Vice President of a national leading insurance company is a quadriplegic. He performs the high level executive responsibilities of his role using a puff stick, speech recognition software, a teledictation system, and a keyboard anchored microphone. This technology enables him to review the requisite mountains of claims files, write the accompanying reports, and communicate at any time with colleagues and clients.
• A senior graphic designer with significant hearing loss participates in project meetings at one of the nation's largest over-the-counter pharmaceutical companies by using assistive technology which converts speech to text, speech to video sign language, and text to computer-generated voice or video sign language - all in real time. He is able to fully participate in creative collaboration with members of the design team and other internal partners.
  

Many companies are not including candidates with disabilities simply because they do not know where to find them or how to accommodate an individual during the interview process. Or they do not realize how easy it actually is to create a workspace for an employee who has a disability. Other reasons that candidates with disabilities are overlooked point to the attitudes of current management and employees. In a Cornell University study examining the response to the employment provisions of Title I of the Americans with Disabilities Act, the most successful strategy for reducing employment barriers for people with disabilities was visible top management commitment. And the main difficulty cited in making workplace change was changing co-workers'/supervisors' attitudes. These types of barriers - not knowing where to locate or how to accommodate, not knowing how to create a workspace, lack of management commitment and negative employee attitudes - can be eliminated with information and education.

Organizations can implement plans for organizational diversity by adopting hiring practices that make disabilities inconsequential to the selection process. These methods allow hiring managers and human resource professionals to focus on the candidate's skills and qualifications. For example, an applicant who is deaf can communicate with the interviewer via email or instant messenger, right in the interviewer's office or a conference room.

There are also indications that job candidates include diversity as a condition of favored workplaces. Today's jobseekers use interviews to probe an organization to see if it promotes - and practices - diversity hiring. If an organization appears exclusionary or intolerant, top job candidates will eliminate that company from their potential employer choices.

In some organizations, diversity hiring is tied to managerial compensation. Does this mean managers will only hire diverse employees if paid? No. Linking these efforts to compensation means an organization is serious about its practice of diversity hiring. These incentives encourage hiring managers to reach out for talent in places they may not have considered. Decision makers who take steps to become educated about recruiting from diverse populations will be rewarded with new ideas, fresh perspectives, and employees who feel good about a progressive and creative workplace.

Sources:

• Business 2.0, Ready, Willing, and Able, Carol Pickering
• Wetfeet Inc., Start Thinking About Diversity, Warren Liu
• Microsoft Press, Accessible Technology in Today's Business, Gary Moulton, LeDEana Huyler, Janice Hertz, and Mark Levenson
• CareerJournal.com, Smart Job Search Tips for Minority Candidates, Julie Bennet