Celebrating Disability Blog

Using the experiences of disabled people to create a better service for everyone

Creating a better service for everyone

On a personal note, there are so many occasions (about 4 or 5 a day) where I think “a disabled person was obviously not consulted when this was designed”. It’s so frustrating.

It’s not only me who thinks this, just listen to the podcast. When I ask my interviewees what their biggest barrier to buying products and services are: 9 times out of 10 their answers are something to do with the service; whether it be the changing rooms in clothes shops, the lack of clear signage in department stores, letters and documents that cannot be accessed by everyone, the staff perceptions and attitudes. The results are always the same: disabled people feeling frustrated and unwelcome. The most frustrating elements are that this is unnecessary. There are so many disabled people in our local communities, buying from stores, interacting with our businesses that there is literally no need to not be inclusive of disabled people’s needs.

Businesses no longer have the excuse that ignorance is bliss because the spending power of disabled people is over £260 billion per year. It is getting harder and harder to be ignorant about the needs of disabled people. Obviously, you’ve read all my blogs and listened to all my podcasts but even without these, articles swarm the news talking about how, yet another business has ignored the needs of disabled people.

Yes, there is legislation that states businesses cannot discriminate against disabled people and must put in place provision to enable disabled people to access the services on offer. However, as I have said before in previous blogs, legislation does not change attitude and it does not make a person feel welcome. This part is up to us as business owners. We don’t have to do this alone however, we can involve the experiences of disabled people who have lived through exclusion every day to help design and develop services that are inclusive of disability.

Below, I have listed 10 ways that you can utilise the experiences of disabled people to ensure your service and business is inclusive of all.

10 ways disabled people can help

  1. Ask for feedback

Sounds simple? It is really that simple. Asking your guests/customers/clients what their experience was like and then take note of the answer. It is really as simple as it sounds.

  1. A specific question in your feedback survey

This does not have to stand out like a sore thumb but could be something that is added to your existing survey. For example:

If you had any access requirements, do you feel/please indicate whether you felt these were met.

This can then be followed with a text box for any comments and an explanation of how these comments will be used. It is important that this question is not separated from the others. Make this part of your general feedback form. Don’t forget, access can mean many things to many people. It does not only relate to disability.

  1. Look out good practice

Visit local businesses that offer similar services to your own and find out what they do to be inclusive of their disabled customers.

  1. Assert common sense

This can be easier than it sounds, especially where no one within your business has experience of disability. However, it may help to put yourself in somebody else’s situation and ask yourself how you would like to be treated/what would you expect to happen if this was you. Use this experience to create change.

  1. Try different options

As the saying goes: if at first you don’t succeed, try and try again. This may be at times a more expensive option (but not always as not all barriers have financial implications) and you may come across something you have not tried before that works perfectly. This is also a way to include your employees to help break down some of the attitudinal barriers which could also be preventing inclusion.

  1. Acknowledge the barrier

I hear people say to me quite often “I don’t see your disability” and I wonder how this could be. I am physically disabled and my disability is obvious.  It is so important to recognise disability. Not as a bad thing but for 2 main reasons:

  1. The experiences of disabled people should be recognised and celebrated for offering a different perspective
  2. If you don’t see disability, you cannot see the barriers and as we have discussed, the barriers exist

You must acknowledge the barrier to then find a solution.

  1. Don’t create barriers

Not dissimilar to point 5, do not let attitudes, perceptions, confidence (or lack of), lack of awareness and fear create barriers that do not need to exist.

  1. Invest in training

Training can sometimes feel like an expense. However, it is not so if you think that the end result will be extra customers who are not just satisfied but are excited about your business. As a result of training, your employees will understand more about the barriers that are faced by disabled people and will develop confidence when supporting and interacting with your disabled customers.

  1. Hire disabled people…

… who are not only experts in their field of auditing and making recommendations but are also experts by experience. An accessible toilet that has been designed by a non-disabled person without consulting the experience of a disabled person is never very accessible. Hire a disabled person and get it right first time.

  1. If they are not coming in, you are not inclusive

I would be a billionaire if I had a pound for every time somebody said that they were inclusive but disabled people did not come in. With over 13 million people in the UK being disabled, there is no way that a disabled person will not interact with your business unless you’re not doing everything to ensure that they can feel as included as everyone else.

If you have found this blog helpful and would like to find out more, why not come along to our event in Basingstoke on 27th March where you can learn some tricks to be more inclusive of disabled people.

Disability Inclusion vs Disability Awareness Training

The Definition

When researching disability awareness training, you may have come across different organisations describing their training as either inclusion or awareness. This may, on the surface, seem no more than a choice of language. For some trainers it may be true.

It can often be easy to overlap disability inclusion training with disability awareness training. However, the similarities that I can see in the two are: Disability” and “Training”. Other than these two words, the models are very different.

I would like you to cast your mind back to a previous blog that explored the attitudinal difference between the terms person with a disability and a disabled person. Just as these identifications embrace or overlook the social model of disability, disability inclusion and disability awareness training do the same.

In the simplest terms, disability awareness is passive. You digest the training session as participants and think upon completion: “That was really interesting, I’m going to go back to my life now”. It is very hard to do anything with a passive awareness training session because as participants, you are being told the facts, the legislation, the basics.

A disability inclusion session in comparison, is active. You leave the session thinking “That was very interesting, I can see how this impacts me and the people around me and as a result, I have an idea of what I am going to do”. During an inclusion session, whilst you are offered the facts and part of the legislation (we will explore why legislation isn’t necessarily a necessity in full in a later blog), you are also encouraged to take the opportunity to empathise and strategise.

Lived Experience

A disability inclusion session would also mainly be delivered by a person with lived experience of disability. i.e., a disabled person or a carer (not to be confused with a care worker). This is because there is immense value from hearing from a person with lived experience and that would be across-the-board, not only related to disability. For example, I would not expect you to attend a course that I was delivering entitled: “What it was like to be a man”. Why? I have no experience of being a man, I cannot imagine what it would be like to be a man, my insight and academic knowledge of being a man would not go very far in helping you to empathise with a man.

The Truth About Simulation

In a disability awareness training session, you may be asked to participate in a simulated activity. For example, the trainer may encourage the participant to sit in a wheelchair, wear a blindfold or blackout glasses or put headphones on with loud music. The participant may be then asked to undertake an activity, i.e, an assault course or something similar.

Disability inclusion training would not have a need for this as, rather than relying on speculation, the trainer with lived experience could give adequate examples to help the participants understand the barriers that disabled people face.

Positive vs Negative

Disability awareness training would concentrate heavily on impairments and what a disabled person could not do as a result of that impairment.

Inclusion training would concentrate on the social model of disability. Stating that we are not disabled due to our impairments but rather, the society that creates barriers to opportunities for inclusion. Having an understanding of these barriers will help participants to think about ways in which disabled people can be included in society and in their work. It will help participants to understand (for example) not only the legislation around reasonable adjustments but why reasonable adjustments exist. Participants would have a deeper understanding of why there is such a big disability employment gap and what they can do to help bridge that gap.

Lastly for today, disability awareness training will help participants to understand the bare minimum on what can be done to avoid discrimination. Disability inclusion training would offer participants the tools that will ensure that discrimination of disability wouldn’t occur.

To sum up, I have created a quick checklist that can help you ensure that the next time you look to commission training, either in-house or outsourced, you will get value for money.

Types of Training Checklist
Awareness Yes/No Inclusion Yes/No
Facts & Legislation Delivered/Co-delivered by a person with lived experience
No input from disabled person Mind mapping of barriers and potential solutions
Simulation Introduction to social model of disability
Concentrate on negative (can’t etc) Insights from a disabled person

You may have looked through my website and are wondering why, if stating what I have above, I talk about disability awareness training when signposting people to my services. This is purely to signpost people to my services. Not everybody would recognise disability inclusion training if they were searching. However, rest assured that any workshop I deliver would be based around inclusion and not purely awareness.

To see how Celebrating Disability can help you by training your staff in disability inclusion, get in touch. Fancy more useful information about disability inclusion and equality? Visit our Learn section, where you can download helpful tools.

Attracting Disabled Candidates

The Right Candidate

When recruiting for a role, whether that role is paid or voluntary, full-time or part-time, you always want to make sure that you’re getting as much value for money as possible. You want to recruit somebody that will do the job to the best of their ability and support you to grow your project/business in the direction that you want it to go.

There has been lots of work, studies, articles, conferences, etc around bias and the importance of being aware of our biases to ensure that we are not letting our perceptions predetermine who we are going to choose for the role.

However, these things still happen and especially in the world of disability where attitude is still the biggest barrier to acceptance and equality.

In previous blogs, I have discussed the processes that a business can put in place to ensure a disabled candidate can have the same access to a vacancy as a non-disabled person. This time, I want to focus on perceptions and attitudes.

The Danger Of..

Recently, there has been a lot of talk on twitter and other social media platforms about the patronising phrases that are used by non-disabled people. These phrases, whilst possibly said with best intentions, do two things:

  1. They undervalue our disability
  2. They create unnecessary perceptions

In a future blog, I will talk more about the first but today, I would like to focus more on the second. Within a minority group that is already undervalued, underappreciated and under-estimated, we are surrounded by phrases such as:

“I don’t see you as a disabled person” and “you don’t look disabled when you’re sitting upright”

These only further embed the notion that disability is wrong, is something that we should be ashamed of and is something we want to get away from. This is not the case. Many disabled people, including myself, celebrate that we have a disability. Don’t get me wrong, we don’t celebrate the fact that society has created barriers to us achieving even the most basic things on a daily basis. But I for one celebrate the fact that without the experiences presented to me as a disabled person I wouldn’t be as confident as I am today and I certainly wouldn’t be running a disability equality consultancy!

Celebrate Difference

So how is this relevant to the recruitment process? Well, if perceptions are the barriers preventing an employer/recruiter from seeing a disabled person as a potential asset, shouldn’t we be concentrating on changing them? Rather than assuming the elements of the role that you think a disabled person will not be able to do, think about all the things they will be able to do. I mentioned above that it is my experiences that has enabled me to run my own business and to be confident and challenge the status quo. Imagine what other skills and personality traits a person has as a result of being disabled. Obviously, every person is different but to mention just a few potentials:

  • Problem solver and solution focused
  • Highly equipped at organising
  • Open-minded and non-bias approach to people and situations
  • Proactive and productive
  • Access to new audiences

Often, non-disabled people feel as though they’re not treating disabled people any differently. However, if a disabled person cannot access your venue or the place where you are holding interviews or indeed the interview process, you are not treating that person equally. Simply because the majority of other people would be able to access all of the above without a second thought. When thinking about how and who you will be recruiting, it is really important to consider the process of that recruitment to ensure that it is open and equal for everyone.

Food for Thought

There are of course, always activities that you can implement to proactively look for disabled candidates. For example; targeted campaigns, advertising on recruitment sites that actively support inclusion in business, investing in disability awareness training to help staff engage with disabled people so disabled people themselves are attracted to your organisation. The above however should offer some guidance on where to start.

To talk further about your specific needs, get in touch

Inclusive Design – Designing For All

Recently I have been experiencing for myself the frustrations faced when going to buy a product.

Thinking the product will enhance my independence however, often it has turned out to be inaccessible. With modern technology moving at the rate it is, we should be assuming that accessibility and inclusion in service/product design is a no brainer, but this is not the case.

We still come across technical products that, although present themselves as accessible, have faults in their design that makes them sloppy and ineffective.

One example of this is the Siri function on Apple products:

The technology in Siri is great for everyone and has extra functionality for disabled people who may have limited dexterity or barriers that prevent them from easily reading or writing. However, the technology does not hold up to the standards required to be a reliable tool. Half of the time, I cannot trust that what I have said is going to type out correctly (or politely).

I have an automatic front door.

This product is specifically designed to support disabled people to enter and exit a room by pressing a button. However, the button is designed in such a way that it is not accessible for all because it is too small and fiddly. It’s mounted on a rounded base; my slightly useless hands mean that I cannot hold the button and press it at the same time. As a result, the button slides around.

To prevent this, the manufacturer could have developed a flat base.

Straw-Gate

I recently purchased a collapsible metal straw that came in a handy case that attached to a key ring.

Perfect you think. So did I

When it arrived I realised that I could not access the straw due to the way the case was designed. The lid had to be popped open with a thumb whilst holding the case… Something I cannot do. And although I attempted many a time with my friend offering advice, the only time I could open it successfully was when I dropped it on the floor.

Wheelchair Whoopsie

A couple of years ago, when I bought my electric wheelchair, I was looking at 4 things: Price, availability, design and comfort. I settled on one that looked to fit all of the above. However, unfortunately it did not. Here are a couple of reasons why;

  • The footplates are too close to the wheels. Therefore, whenever I turn a corner, the wheels hit my feet
  • I use my legs to weight-bare within the chair. However, due to the fact that I push down a lot on the footplate, it keeps snapping. After speaking to several other people and realising that they had a similar issues, I realised it was just a problem that I had. Isn’t the functionality of a footplate designed for this precise reason

There are many more examples of where design, if thought about a bit more, could be accessible and inclusive for disabled people. Equally, I should mention that there are many other products that could be easily adapted for varying ability needs.

Where are we left?

If only businesses were able to spend extra time and resources testing their products or collaborating with the end user. Not just one but a diverse variety of end users with a range of experiences and needs, those businesses could design products that could be truly helpful and innovative.

A Culture of Diversity

Recruit for Diversity

Whether a one man band or a business employing millions, it is imperative that there is a culture that builds on the strengths of employees. As is in all organisations a diverse workforce is the best and only way to achieve this for certain. This is because a diverse workforce can utilise the experiences of everyone from a multitude of backgrounds to create an environment that works for everyone.

One such diverse group are disabled people. Over the years of my career, I have realised that businesses generally find it easier to be inclusive of ethnic groups, gender groups and LGBTQ but they struggle to be inclusive of disability. Perhaps because there are a variety of needs relating to disabled people. Disabled people are never a one size fits all because every person and every impairment is unique. Disabled people cover a multitude of minority groups and therefore a multitude of backgrounds and cultures. This can make it challenging for businesses to think about what needs to be done in terms of strategy to be inclusive.

Attitude Counts

So, how do you make your business inclusive of the fastest growing minority? Quite simply, it all comes down to attitude. I talked in an earlier blog about a report that found that 49% of disabled people still feel marginalised in society. This is despite the fact that we are moving towards a more accessible culture where disabled people can enter and move around buildings, use public transport and live and work independently.

The biggest stumbling block for many people when being inclusive of disability is attitude. Not necessarily because there is a bad attitude but because there isn’t enough knowledge or understanding. A business’ responsibility here is to ensure that every employee representing that business upholds the correct values. This must permeate through every interaction; from the first engagement at the recruitment stage to the last interaction when an employee leaves the business.

Systemic Change

If a business has an employee handbook, a culture of inclusion should be prominent throughout the document. When having supervision meetings, specific conversations should be held around how that employee is working towards the values of inclusion. Every board strategy meeting should have a permanent agenda item relating to how the business is working towards inclusion for disabled people and so on.

If this is successfully implemented, every disabled employee should feel confident, valued and welcome within the business. However, we should not rest on our laurels and these principles should be under permanent scrutiny. This can be tested in many ways:

  • Employee surveys
  • Observation
  • Employee and customer feedback
  • General conversation and communication

Does Your Business Really Need to be Accessible?

Well, the short answer is:

Yes! Absolutely. Without a doubt

Every single business in every single sector needs to be inclusive of disabled people: Disabled people as customers, disabled people as employees, disabled people as suppliers, disabled people as partners. The list goes on and on.

By now, if you have read more than one of Celebrating Disability’s blogs, you will know the business case:

  • 13 million disabled people in the UK
  • A spending power of over £249 billion per annum
  • A wealth of skills and experience to bring to your business and to interact and engage with your customers
  •  A dedicated workforce who will in general take less holidays and less sick days than your average non-disabled employee
  •  A customer base who will recommend you to friends and family
    Etc, etc, etc

So, because you know this, there’s no need for me to talk about it.

Let’s take a look at 5 common business functions:

Marketing

The other day, I was on the phone with a marketing company who felt that they probably didn’t need to worry about accessibility because their business was based in an office that wasn’t accessible anyway. They weren’t thinking about their customers. Marketing businesses, big and small have a wealth of the clients who have a wealth of clients. How many of those may have access requirements that, if prevented from navigating a website will go somewhere else?

It’s true that some people fumble along struggling with inaccessibility without ever saying anything. The majority of disabled people these days won’t. And they probably would never say anything, they will just never return.

A marketing business that offers support with branding as a service should really be thinking about how they represent the type of customers a business wants to attract. With one in five people in the UK having a disability, not having the representation of disability through the promotional material could be detrimental to the bottom line.

Sales

The main role of Sales Executive is to make the sale and most of the time, this is done by understanding the needs of the customer or the client and adapting their pitch accordingly. The best Sales Executives can sell a product or service without the customer even knowing that they are being sold to. How is that ever meant to happen if a substantial number of the population is misunderstood, pigeonholed, stereotyped and under-estimated?

Business Development

To develop a business, a rounded team of experts to support a development strategy by seeing things from all different experience backgrounds is essential to identifying the varying and demanding client and consumer needs. Lived experience of disability is very prominent in this; the prevalence of disability is growing and there are so many more opportunities presented to disabled people. Which means that disabled people demand more from a business. Having a workforce representative of this group will mean that you’re off the starting block. But that workforce won’t appear out of the blue, work needs to be done to ensure they feel valued and welcome.

Communication

Everybody communicates in different ways. In your business, do you know how many different communication methods there are for internal and external communication? Newsletters, intranet, blogs, social media, emails, videos, posted mail…

If you have something important to communicate to your employees or customers, is priority given to ensuring they can access that communication? If a disabled person can’t access what you are trying to communicate, they will not receive that special offer, that important memo, that bill.

Legal

This may seem the least obvious because if you are in the legal profession you should already know all the legislation, right? But it’s not just about legislation, it’s about people being treated as human beings. Having enough facts to develop an understanding of the situation of others.

All you need to do is glance at a recent report published on RightsInfo.org stating that despite legislation, disabled people still feel marginalised. Or look through the papers at the stories that appear week in, week out about disabled people in airports having to wait for second rate support.

Not Another Wheelchair User!

The Situation

As a wheelchair user and a non-driver, I rely heavily on the train service to maintain relative independence.  I consciously chose to live in an area that was not only on a train line but central to stations that would connect me to a large part of the country.  Over the years, I have found that the service I receive on the platform and on the train has fallen into steep decline.

The Problem

Almost every time I go to board a train I am greeted with the negative attitudes of platform and guard staff who see me as an inconvenience and an annoyance rather than a passenger like everyone else. I require a ramp to board the train. Once on the train, I need to find a space in the designated wheelchair spaces where I can comfortably park myself for the duration of the journey. The general public are never a problem and I find (admittedly unlike some) my fellow passengers to be very helpful and accommodating; the attitudes held by passengers towards my disability are positive – what lets my journey down? The train staff.

If I have successfully debated my way onto the train after being reprimanded for not booking in advance, I am questioned as to why I have not printed my ticket.   Please don’t get me wrong, I have purchased a ticket but the printing machine itself presents a barrier so I store my ticket on the app.  This I explain to the guard but my explanation is rarely accepted as valid, presenting another opportunity for reprimanding.

I then reach my destination. At this point, my nerves are like razor blades as I wait to see if assistance is being provided for me to disembark. Will I be continuing my journey to an unknown destination? Or will I fall on the mercy of an unsuspecting passenger who is trying to wave down assistance on the platform?

The Solution 

  1. As a disability equality and inclusion advocate it would be amiss for me not mention customer experience and disability equality and inclusion training: not to be mistaken for disability awareness training which is something very different.  My blog: Disability Inclusion vs Disability Awareness Training highlights the main differences.
  2. A major audit of the sector’s policies, processes and attitudes towards disabled people.

I am sure you will hear a rebuttal along the lines of disabled people being required to book assistance to speed up the process, therefore making it easier for everyone.  However let me ask you this: putting aside general 9 to 5 jobs which, quite frankly are few and far between these days, how often do you know 24 hours in advance the exact time you will need to catch the train? Especially with so many delays and cancellations. And isn’t that the point of the train service to be agile and convenient for the general public?  But with a society prevalent to diversity, disabled people are the general public.

To end this article, let me just add

Not all train staff that I come across treat me with such disdain.  In fact, some of them are very welcoming and friendly but what is written above offers a general overview of my experience of using a service which is meant to be fair and equal for everyone.

To find out more about the barriers facing disabled people everyday and to discuss ways to mitigate them within your business, get in touch today

The Advantages of Using a Disability Mediator

There are many advantages in using a disability mediator to help you resolve conflict.

This can arise in family, community or in the working environment and it is particularly beneficial if you feel too intimidated to speak out and make your voice heard.

Where the family conflict is about separation, divorce, finances or arrangements for children you would need to see a specialist family mediator who is accredited by the Family Mediation Council. To find out more about family mediation,

The benefits of mediation for people with disabilities

Disability mediation maintains a communicative and positive approach to resolving conflict, significantly lowering tension, stress, anxiety and antagonism, all of which are associated with conflict.

Your mediator will have had years of experience working with a wide range of disabilities. Trained to a high standard, he or she can adopt an impartial viewpoint, without favouring one side.

It is available for both employers and employees, whether individuals or in a group and service users.

You can talk about your disability without embarrassment, tension or feeling self-conscious which can otherwise lower self-esteem and make you feel inhibited.

Specialities

Mediators that specialise in disability will have the knowledge and skill to be able to ask more appropriate questions. This will save time, money and anxiety and ensures a better focus on the key areas of importance to find the best solution.

By engaging with a specialist mediation provider, you are likely to enjoy a successful outcome, which will mean both parties leaving with satisfaction, avoiding expensive and lengthy litigation.

You may find that you feel more empowered as a participant to mediation to resolve personal conflict because the process is voluntary, as opposed to being summoned to attend a Court hearing, which may take years to go through, with possible appeals. This can add a heightened feeling of control, and you will be able to continue with your normal daily life, feeling more at ease than if you were to go to Court.

How long will mediation take to resolve my conflict?

Often, only a day is required. Resolution will happen in an amicable way and it can occasionally restore or improve a fractured relationship. Both parties usually feel a sense of satisfaction at the result, rather than being told an outcome by a judge, tribunal or disciplinary panel, after which the agreement may fall apart, at a later date.

What about The Equality Act?

Dispute resolution with disability mediation will reduce the risk for business owners and employers of negative publicity and will ensure best practice for conforming to The Equality Act 2010.

After mediation, many people report that they feel better understood, listened to with respect and enlightened.

If you are an individual in employment who wishes to manage conflict you may wish to visit our conflict coaching page.

For more information about Centre for Resolution please click the link. They also have a Facebook Group called Everything Disability that you may wish to join, where best practice and knowledge is shared about disability.

Disability Equality – The Overlooked Essential for Any Business

It costs to overlook disability

Along with the other supplier processes that you need such as HR, Business Development and Sales, Disability Equality is an essential. A lot of people think that disability equality and inclusion is “a nice to have but not an imperative”. I’m going to tell you why this statement is wrong.

Human Resources  

The HR process is essentially attracting people to the role and making sure they stay there. Disability Equality plays a MASSIVE role here:  from attracting disabled candidates and ensuring that they feel engaged, welcomed and valued throughout the recruitment process. All the way through to promotion and succession to ensure your disabled employees stay in your business for a long time.

There are, clearly other areas in between; creating your inclusive culture, implementing and supporting with reasonable adjustments, etc. But get the above covered and the rest will be a lot easier to implement.

The cost of recruitment

On average a new employee will cost about £3,000 to recruit. By retaining disabled employees in your business, you’ll be saving money on recruiting new people, training them up and making sure they have got everything they need.

Not everybody is disabled when they join your business. 78% of disabled people acquire their disability later in life. Having that environment that encourages that inclusive culture tells employees, regardless of disability that they too will be supported if they were to become disabled.

Sales & the Purple Pound

The Purple Pound is the spending power of disabled people and is currently worth over £250BN per annum.

According to a recent Papworth Trust report, three quarters of disabled people have left a shop or business because of poor disability awareness or understanding.

In order for disabled people to want to spend money in your business they need to know  and feel that they are welcomed. Supporting your staff to develop confidence and competence when working with disabled customers will support those customers to want to return to you again and again.

Disabled customers don’t live in silos. Disabled people have friends and family who all need to socialise, shop at and get their services from somewhere. If your business is not inclusive of disability, you are not just loosing one disabled person but everyone around them as well.

Business development

A diverse workforce nurtures growth. Disabled people bring into the workplace a wealth of the experience that may not otherwise be there. Disabled people face barriers everyday and every day, manage to overcome these barriers in order to continue their lives. This experience of problem-solving is a must have in any office environment.

Disabled people are also customers. A business that intrinsically understands the needs and barriers of disabled people and is able to confidently and competently provide solutions to these, will attract customer upon customer.

As a colleague said recently ”disability equality and inclusion is not all about ramps and rails”. It is time we change the conversation and to look beyond the obvious physical barriers to the enormous benefits of working alongside disabled people.

Our training provides the much needed first step to developing your inclusive business.

The Value of Disability Inclusion

In This Blog: Esi, Managing Director of Celebrating Disability tells a little of her personal story that led her to advocating for disability inclusion. She talks about many of the barriers that she has faced in her life that have been pivotal to her decision to set up a business

My journey to equality

Over the years, my personal opinions of disability have changed and developed as I, along with my experiences have done the same.  As a teenager, I believed and adhered to the medical model of disability; believing that disability was the problem of mine and mine alone.  As a result, I had to be grateful when the environment around me was accessible and had adaptions that would fit my needs.  I thanked people when they included me in conversation and I apologised when I was “in the way”.  I was undervaluing myself.  I believed that I was a lesser person because of my impairment.

The change

I don’t believe this anymore.  As I grew older and developed my experiences and knowledge of the world around me, I came to understand that like every other disabled person, I was entitled to live a life that was mine.  A life that I chose for myself and that was not diminished by lack of privileges that other people took for granted.

I understood that I, like all other disabled people, am of value and that my personal experiences, likes and dislikes only enriched the businesses that I worked for and spent money in.

Angry man pointing whist saying You Can't

Attitude is everything

My attitude and the attitudes of others had a lot to do with how I felt about myself and my value to the world.  Due to my opinion of my disability, I did not challenge when a situation was designed in a way that made it hard for me to feel included.  As I didn’t challenge, nobody else did.  My mother was consistently battling for inclusion on my behalf. However, as a teenager, this only succeeded in embarrassing me.  So while she was fighting for my inclusion in school, college, youth clubs, etc, I was contradicting her at most, if not every stage.

I was the easier voice to listen to and so it gave the institution of exclusion a “get out clause”.

Businesses miss a trick

As there were so many things that I could not participate in due to lack of accessibility and awareness from others, I missed out on a lot of events.  Events that if they were accessible and inclusive, would have attracted not only myself but my friends and (begrudgingly because of my age) my mother.

The events that I could attend were often limited by the barriers that were blocking my path.  On occasions, I could only stay for half the party, as the accessible taxis would stop running at a certain time.  My mother would come to theme parks with my friends and I because the service at the theme park was not designed to support somebody with access needs.

I’m making my teen years sound as if they were doom and gloom.  They weren’t. The point is that everything I did was rarely without a plan, a challenge or a compromise in order to enjoy the same advantages as my peers.

Now what would life have been like if I hadn’t had to do any of that?  If my mother hadn’t had to challenge every time her daughter wanted to participate?

Well, apart from fewer arguments in the Hardy house, less time and energy would have been taken up on the needless task of fighting for inclusion and more time would have been spent on the doing.  This in turn, would have allowed more time for spending, learning and experiencing.  All of these things obviously cost money. Money which would have been spent on businesses that offered the activities that I wanted to participate in. Businesses like;

  • Youth Clubs
  • Cinemas
  • Transport services
  • Hotels
  • Shops
  • Restaurants
  • Bars (obviously when I was of appropriate age)
  • And so on…….

Inclusion isn’t just valuable for disabled people. It’s valuable for wellbeing. It’s valuable for society. It’s valuable for business.

My question to you is this:

What can your business do to ensure that everyone regardless of ability or disability can feel included?

Let’s Talk About Inclusion

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Celebrating Disability
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