Supporting Employees with Disabilities

Name: Supporting Employees with Disabilities
Rating: 4.8 (1442 reviews)

How to Make Your Workplace More Accessible and Inclusive for People with Disabilities

Created byHaley Moss

Last updated 1/2023

English

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What you'll learn

Identify the areas of concern surrounding disability bias, and how to reframe and overcome those preconceptions
Build an inclusive workplace that celebrates disability as diversity and identify the strengths of disability in the workplace
Expand upon a workplace culture that is accepting and accommodating towards employees and candidates with disabilities
Reflect on disability's role in our own lives

Course content

6 sections • 20 lectures • 1h 15m total length

Introduction2:03
Explore disability inclusion in the workplace and learn how accessibility, including subtitles and captions, supports equal access to job training and employment.
Course Overview3:07
Explore what disability means, learn respectful language and etiquette, and identify barriers, accommodations, and advocacy to foster inclusive, supportive workplaces.
Reflection: What Is a Disability?2:05
Reflect on what disability means across mobility, hearing, sight, health, and cognition. Build empathy, identify daily obstacles and barriers, and set intentions with respectful language and etiquette.

Understanding What is a Disability2:55
Explore the legal definition of disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act, including physical or mental impairments and major life activities like seeing, hearing, and working.
Disability Language5:18
Explore disability language by comparing identity-first and person-first preferences, examine terms like disabled and people with disabilities, and practice mindful, inclusive phrasing such as accessible parking.
Disability Etiquette and Boundaries5:19
Develop disability etiquette by understanding cultural competence and respecting boundaries, avoiding intrusive questions, and favoring presume competence in interactions with people with disabilities.
Activity: Hypothetical Situations7:07
Explore disability etiquette through hypothetical scenarios about asking for help and offering assistance. Reflect on respecting boundaries and how reception of help affects inclusion.

Ableism and Unintentional Exclusion5:32
Explore how ableism devalues people with disabilities, rooted in the medical model, and examine benevolent and internalized forms that limit autonomy and leadership through everyday choices.
Supporting an in-person vs. a hybrid workplace4:46
Remote and hybrid work expand accessibility for employees with disabilities, challenging old ableist assumptions. Implement accessible meetings with captions, clear agendas, time-zone considerations, and hybrid options to include everyone.
Disclosure and Self-Identification5:16
explore how and when to disclose disability in the workplace to access accommodations, distinguish soft and hard disclosures, and respond with empathy, privacy, and support.
Interviews and Culture6:32
Explore how to assess culture fit and conduct accessible interviews for candidates with disabilities, using ADA guidelines, reasonable accommodations, and skills-based assessments.

What the ADA Says3:08
The ADA, signed in 1990, prohibits discrimination by employers with 15 or more employees in hiring and other terms of employment, and requires reasonable accommodations for essential functions.
Dispelling Accommodation Myths3:17
Dispel myths about accommodations by showing most are reasonable and not prohibitively costly, and that they level the playing field so employees with disabilities can perform at the same level.
Designing with Everyone in Mind3:10
Learn how universal design embeds equitable use, flexibility, simple and intuitive use, perceptible information, error tolerance, and ample space, to minimize accommodations and benefit all users, including via captions.
Activity: A Universally Designed Workplace3:44
Explore universal design in a new office, evaluating a colleague's wishlist items (quiet space, open plan, desk height) through best practices for accessibility and diverse learning styles.

How to Better Advocate with Others and Show Solidarity2:20
Develop self-advocacy and allyship to support colleagues with disabilities, promote inclusive policies such as fragrance-free environments, and ensure accessible meetings through proactive communication.
Envisioning a Culture of Acceptance1:52
Foster a culture of acceptance by centering disabled voices, ensuring psychological safety, and leading with accessibility to embed disability education as a continuous, inclusive practice.
Creating Disability Inclusion Initiatives2:11
Create disability inclusion initiatives with short- and long-term commitments, dedicated programs, and ERGs to foster community, accessibility, and disabled and neurodivergent talent through Disability:IN roundtables.

What you can commit to in your workplace4:53
Commit to disability inclusion by joining affinity groups, combating ableist language, and diversifying your learning. Encourage organizations to prioritize accessibility, inclusive hiring, and clear accommodation information.
Final Goodbye and Thank You0:45
Learn to foster an equitable, inclusive, and accessible workplace for employees with disabilities. Be an ally and resource on your disability inclusion journey.

Requirements

No experience with people with disabilities needed, just an open heart, mind and willingness to learn.

Description

About 15% of the world's population lives with some form of disability. However, disability is often an uncomfortable or taboo topic - we don't know what to say or how to act, or we think it's something that isn't part of our workplace culture. Whether you know it or not, you're working alongside people with disabilities each and every day. People with disabilities deserve equal opportunity and a work environment where they feel supported, empowered and can thrive. You have a role to play in making work more accessible, and this course can be a part of that journey. Taught by a disabled and autistic instructor, you're sure to learn from both first-person experience and professional expertise.

In this course, you're going to learn about:

What disability encompasses
How and what to say to people with disabilities without offending somebody
Best practices for in-person, remote, and hybrid work environments
Bias that disabled employees encounter
Ways that recruitment and hiring can be especially challenging for people with disabilities
Creating a more accessible work environment that benefits all types of workers
Accommodating all types of different people
Building disability inclusion initiatives
Active allyship and inclusion
And more!

Disability doesn't need to be intimidating, and we're going to break it down so you can be part of a more inclusive and equitable workplace for all. The future of work, after all, is accessible to everybody.

Who this course is for:

Employees who may encounter disabled colleagues or applicants who are unsure of what to say or do, but want to create a positive and inclusive culture change

Supporting Employees with Disabilities

What you'll learn

Explore related topics

Course content

Introduction3 lectures • 7min

Disability 1014 lectures • 21min

Barriers and Disparities for Employment and Inclusion4 lectures • 22min

Rethinking Accommodations4 lectures • 13min

Empowering Employees with Disabilities3 lectures • 6min

Conclusion2 lectures • 6min

Requirements

Description

Who this course is for: