Is your disability holding you back from finding a job?

Disabled candidates are being left out of the recruitment process, writes Aimee Stanton

“I just can’t do them,” says one job hunter with a hearing impairment. “Recruiters constantly wanting to talk to me on the phone is annoying.”

“Being unable to drive meant that I didn’t even get an interview in a number of cases,” explains another candidate who has difficulty attending interviews because of their visual impairment.

Unfortunately these cases aren’t unusual, as latest research from the Recruitment Industry Disability Initiative (RIDI) has discovered that as many as 75 per cent of disabled people find their condition has impacted their job hunting.

The study also revealed that more than half (53 per cent) of respondents said that they first faced barriers as early as the application stage during the selection stage, and 54 per cent also reported encountering hurdles at multiple stages of the recruitment process.

The survey, conducted by RIDI, in conjunction with inclusive job board, Vercida, surveyed over 200 disabled jobseekers with a variety of physical and non-visible disabilities and long-term conditions.

Kate Headley, Director of Consulting at diversity consultancy The Clear Company and spokesperson for RIDI explains more about the findings: “While it’s unacceptable that so many disabled jobseekers continue to find the recruitment processes challenging, these results confirm that we’re certainly moving in the right direction.

“Over the past two years, I have witnessed a groundswell of awareness and understanding around disability in the workplace. This is in no small part thanks to the work that RIDI and our partners are doing in this area – but we still have further to go.”

In addition to the findings, the research also provided feedback for employers on how to actually make their selection process inclusive.

The feedback included: being offered a choice of contact method; extra time for assessments; fixed deadlines to plan applications; online interviews rather than face-toface and an allocated parking space.

Kate adds, “The organisations we work with are no longer asking ‘why?’ they should become more inclusive, but ‘how?’. Employers are increasingly realising that unless their processes are inclusive, the best person for the job may never even apply for the role – let alone make it to the interview.”

“Employers are increasingly realising that unless their processes are inclusive, the best person for the job may never even apply for the role – let alone make it to the interview.”

Kate Headley Spokesperson for Recruitment Industry Disability Initiative