Having good awareness and understanding of how the workplace can affect disabled people helps ensure compliance - and can deliver significant business benefits
Between January and March 2019, 7.6 million people in the UK of working age reported they had a disability - which is 18% of the working-age population. Having a good awareness and understanding of how the workplace can affect disabled people, and having the appropriate policies and procedures in place, not only helps ensure compliance but can deliver significant benefits to businesses.
The following sets out some brief guidance on employing disabled people.
- Make sure you’re compliant with all current legislation involving disabilities
- Audit your policies and procedures
- Ensure your facilities are fit for purpose
- Develop personal emergency evacuation plans (PEEPs)
- Provide an occupational health (OH) service for employees
- Provide an Employee Assistance Programme
- Send a clear message
- Provide diversity and inclusion training for all staff
- Offer disability awareness training
- Promote an inclusive recruitment process
- Making it work
Make sure you’re compliant with all current legislation involving disabilities
The Equality and Human Rights Commission and the Equality Act 2010 are excellent starting points, though remember: there may be additional legislation affecting your staff and colleagues. All managers need to know their responsibilities if they are to play a meaningful role, and all guidance should be accessible by staff.
Laws can change, so make sure you keep up to date with all rules and regulations that affect your staff and business.
Audit your policies and procedures
Carrying out regular equality assessments will help identify any policies, practices and processes that inadvertently disadvantage disabled people. The Statutory Employment Code of Practice is helpful. This should include an audit of employee diversity
Ensure your facilities are fit for purpose
The Employment Statutory Code of Practice clearly states that employers must take reasonable steps to implement reasonable adjustments to the workplace and working arrangements for both staff and job applicants. This is highly contextual and wide ranging, and could include the provision of additional services or facilities, assigning employees to a different location of work, altering work hours, or training to use special equipment.
Develop personal emergency evacuation plans (PEEPs)
HR or management need to ensure specific arrangements are in place to manage the safe egress of individual staff or building users who cannot get themselves out of the building or premises unaided, in the case of an emergency.
Provide an occupational health (OH) service for employees
This could include Access to Work, and other health and safety-related initiatives.
Provide an Employee Assistance Programme
This could include counselling and guidance services, either on-site or remote access.
Send a clear message
It’s vital that inclusivity, diversity, and the promotion of equal opportunities are integral to your workplace culture. Senior management should take the lead and promote this ethos at all times. Anyone failing to promote a culture of fairness and inclusion should be managed appropriately, as soon as possible. Find out more about eLearning training for diversity in the workplace.
Provide diversity and inclusion training for all staff
All employees should be trained on disability awareness to help dispel misconceptions, confront unconscious bias and ensure they are sensitive towards their colleague’s needs. Training is one of the most popular, accessible and successful methods for promoting workplace equality. Find out more about eLearning for disability awareness.
Offer disability awareness training
This should be offered to all employees, and should cover all interactions with disabled people and their needs. It could include a variety of themes, such as how to communicate with people who have a hearing impairment, awareness of the impact of mental health conditions, and accessibility issues. The training should be as interactive as possible to demonstrate impacts and encourage people to share their experiences, especially disabled people.
Promote an inclusive recruitment process
This means taking account of equality and diversity in recruitment. Always make sure you use inclusive language and images in advertisements, job descriptions and application forms.
During the interview process, all candidates must be allocated the same amount of time, asked the same questions, and be informed beforehand about any tests they have to take. Interviewers must focus on the candidate’s experience and abilities that relate to the person specification, and select the person who best meets the essential criteria.
Candidates who have disabilities are not obliged to make a disclosure of any disability until a job offer is made. Yet HR should encourage applicants to disclose their disability as early as possible, so the organisation can implement any support that may be needed for them to avoid any disadvantage or potential discrimination.
Making it work
Many people don’t tell their employer they have a disability, for fear of being treated differently, disadvantaged, or discriminated against. By ensuring your business has the appropriate policies and procedures, your staff is educated, and your working culture is fair and inclusive, it can all help to include and benefit everyone.
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This content was initially published on Marshallelearning.com (July 2019) and has been uploaded to and lightly amended on Ciphr.com as part of the brand amalgamation in August 2024