Employer's in need of education on workers with disabilities

When it comes to the workplace and the treatment of those of us living with a disability, some employers are simply missing the mark. This is a result of the employer’s lack of understanding of what individuals with disabilities go through on a day to day basis. What employer’s need to learn is that accommodating workers with disabilities means more than just adding a few handicap parking spaces and putting in some automatic doors. It’s going to take the education of the employer and it's employee’s about the facts about working with people with disabilities.

 

The major issue for me is that in society, if people don’t see a wheelchair or a cane or some sort of obvious sign of a disability, they jump to the conclusion that you must not have one. These types need to learn that it’s not always easy to tell if someone has a disability or not. To me I really believe that employers need to start educating their employees in the area of working with those of us with hidden disabilities. And sure some employers are doing a great job in this area but those who are failing need to wake up. For me the last place I ever thought I would run into a problem at work was with the HR department.

 

One year I happened to miss quite a few days of work, first for a work-related injury and other times due to poor weather conditions. I was accused once by the HR department of using my disability as an excuse, this really upset me. You see there was a snowstorm overnight and by the morning there was so much snow I couldn’t even get my car out of the driveway. Unfortunately, this was the one day my street hadn’t been cleared yet so I wasn’t going anywhere. My work actually told me I should have taken a taxi or a bus to work, but as we know living with Becker's the winter can be a very tough time. They actually expected me to walk 5 kilometers through deep snow, and climb over snow banks just to get to the bus stop! Truly ignorant as they have no idea how much of a problem that would have been for me. As far as the suggestion of taking a taxi if I couldn’t get down my street then they couldn’t either.

 

As you can see the lack of education of my workplaces HR department and even its employee’s led to a lot of frustration at times. At one point I was put on modified duties due to my work-related injury it meant at times I was off the phones and some of my coworkers didn’t like this. So here comes the rude comments and dirty looks. It was crazy that this was going on at my place of work, but what would yelling at people really solve? So I just ignored them and went on with my day. To me when it comes down to it, I believe some employer’s need to do a better job of educating their employees, team leaders and HR department’s concerning workers with less recognizable disabilities. This way these simple problems I faced would be a thing of the past, making the workplace a friendlier environment for those of us with disabilities.