Organizational-Cultural Elements for Improved Workplace Performance of Disabled Individuals

This chapter embarks from the increasing number of disabled individuals in private companies and public institutions and examines the working conditions of disabled employees in these organizations. Although this case is relevant to a considerable number of international contexts, the author focuses on Turkey as a case, illustrative of countries going through similar processes. The author starts by providing an introduction followed by literature on organizational culture. Next, the author discusses the recent legislation regarding the employment of disabled individuals and discusses with literature on their workplace performance. Next, the author focuses on the relationships between the organizational culture and workplace performance of disabled employees. Finally, the author concludes by recommendations for future practice to enhance performance of disabled employees and future research to conduct robust studies in the area. The chapter assumes that organizations can enhance performance of everyone by creating an inclusive culture surrounded by elements involving positive attitudes, equity, equality, and beliefs of productivity.

Inclusive Human Resource Management (HRM) Practices for Employees with Disabilities as an Effort to Manage Diversity

This study aims to describe the practice of managing employees with disabilities inclusively at PT SAMA by identifying the implementation of disability inclusive principles, regulations and policies, benefits, and factors related to HRM Practices of employees with disabilities. The findings of this study are that the management practices of employees with disabilities at PT SAMA have been carried out inclusively by implementing principles of disability inclusion. In addition, regulations and policies related to the management of disabled employees are in accordance with Law no 8 of 2016 on Persons with Disabilities. The benefits obtained by the company are that the performance of disabled employees is better than non-disabled employees, able to work well together, and can motivate other employees to be independent. Factors that influence the management of employees with disabilities are acceptance and support, communication, flexibility, work-family culture, workload, and physical conditions of the workplace. The Inclusive HRM Practice implemented by PT SAMA brings benefits to both employees and the company. Even so, proactive efforts must be further enhanced, especially in recruitment practices by targeting PWDs. Further research with the theme of managing employees with disabilities needs to be carried out on other types or industrial scales.

Factorial confirmatory analysis to measure the perception of labor inclusion of people with disabilities

Introduction: The objective of this scientific approach was to validate through confirmatory factor analysis a measurement model to determine the perceived importance of the inclusion of persons with disabilities in the labor market, in employees who work or interact during the course of their duties with disabled employees. Method: The study had a quantitative approach with a non-experimental design, was carried out in 4 organizations: a Higher Education Institution, two private sector agencies and a public administration institution, in the Southeast of Mexico; where a total of 120 employees who work or interact during the course of their duties with partners with disabilities participated, the participants were also sought to belong to different departments of those organizations. An exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis was performed to determine the psychometric properties of the instrument. Results: The proposed model ratified by means of confirmatory factor analysis the values of the main fit indicators (X 2 =40.15, p=.216; CMIN/DF= 1.18; CFI=.97; GFI= .91, IFI=.97; RMSEA=.04; CI 90 [.00-.09]). Discussion or conclusion: The results confirm the empirical sustainability of the proposed model to measure the perception on the occupational inclusion of people with disabilities" (POIPD) in organizations with at least one partner with disabilities, the data presented show evidence of a sustainable factor model.

EXPRESS: On ableism and anthropocentrism: a canine perspective on the workplace inclusion of disabled people

Despite growing attention for how disabled people become Othered in organizational settings and similar scholarly interest in the treatment of non-humans at work, no analysis so far has focused on the potential double marginalization that takes place when disabled people go to work with their service animal. In filling this void, this study draws attention to the embodied entanglement of ‘humanimal’ in a number of organizations where animals are unexpected. The study argues that the spatial, discursive and affective treatment of service dogs operates as a proxy for the in/exclusion of employees with mobility and visual impairments. This way, processes of ableism become masked as subtle and indirect performances towards non-human Others. Contributions are made towards several literatures by introducing the idea of a ‘proxy’ to help understand the different modes of peripheral inclusion of disabled employees via their legally accepted service animals, by bringing in the role of affect in workplace disablement, and finally by taking animal labour more seriously.

LEADER-MEMBER EXCHANGE FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF PEOPLE WITH DISABILITIES

People with disabilities (PWD) view the issue of employment as one of endless concern as they are continuously evaluated based on their disability per se. It is reported that that PWDs have to face challenges in finding jobs that suit their capability but they usually eventually quit from their job after struggling with the challenges that come with it. The increasing trend of a high employment turnover among disabled employees in Malaysia has spurred the direction in this study toward examining the concept of leader-member exchange (LMX) which examines the quality of supervisor-subordinate relationships. This study is important because it will bring new insights on how managers can integrate PWDs at the workplace by enhancing their social exchange relationship (dyadic), especially their leadership skills. It was discovered that all components of LMX namely affect, professional respect, contribution and loyalty are all important factors that ensure a good relationship between supervisors and PWDs. In addition, it was found that types of disabilities and PWD working sectors has no mean difference toward the LMX components that influence this dyadic relationship.

Hiring Disable People to Avoid Staff Turnover and Enhance Sustainability of Production

Companies struggle with maintaining staff turnover at a low and sustainable level. Hiring a new employee means costs for the company, such as recruitment, medical examinations, and training, etc. In addition, new employees must learn to perform their tasks properly and quickly, which can take up to several months. Disabled employees change jobs less frequently due to the fact that it is difficult for them to find a new one. For employers, such an employee, if they have the same skills as a fully functional employee, can therefore be very valuable, for example, in relation to the reduction of costs associated with frequent employment of new employees. In addition, employing people with disabilities also brings social benefits related to counteracting social exclusion and the possibility of independent living by such people. The human factor is an element that greatly influences sustainable production. The objective of the research was to verify the potential of hiring disabled employees in order to reduce staff turnover. In other words, the analysis has been designed to understand if hiring disabled staff, making expenditures to prepare the workplace and training for them could be potentially efficient in terms of obtaining a higher level of sustainability of the employment in the company. The research has the form of direct (in-depth) interviews in the case of representatives of the companies involved, and a paper questionnaire for the disabled subjects (employees). It took place from September to December 2020 and was the basis for the statistical hypothesis testing. The conducted research was based on a statistical U Mann–Whitney test and fi Yule index calculation. The results showed that people with disabilities remain employed by the same employer longer in comparison to “able-bodied” employees, meaning it may be worthwhile to make extra expenditures to hire disabled persons who could become loyal employees for years. Moreover, it has been statistically proven that the key factor influencing the attractiveness of a given job for a disabled person depends on the type of disability they have.

Job Satisfaction of Disabled and Non-disabled Employees

Despite increasing interest among researchers in the job satisfaction of disabled employees, surprisingly little attention has been directed to the difference in job satisfaction between disabled and non-disabled employees in Korea. This research intends to understand the levels of job satisfaction between employees with and without disability. Another important goal of the current research is to understand which job characteristics can explain the difference in job satisfaction between disabled and non-disabled employees. This paper analyzed Korean Labor and Income Panel Study (KLIPS) data collected in 2018. The result showed that disabled paid workers’ job satisfaction was lower than that of non-disabled workers. Mediation tests indicated that the difference in job satisfaction can be explained by several job properties such as lower monthly income, fewer fringe benefits, mismatch between job and skill, and greater proportion of part-time workers of disabled (vs. non-disabled) employees.

“One of My Basic Necessities of Life Is Work. That’s Just Broken Away.”—Explorative Triangulation of Personal and Work-Related Impacts for Supervisors and Disabled Employees in German Social Firms during the COVID-19 Pandemic

Social firms are located on the general labor market and employ 30–50% of severely disabled people. Findings on personal and work-related impacts for employees and supervisors during the COVID-19 pandemic are not yet available and will be investigated in the present study. Using the approach of a method triangulation, focus groups with employees and individual interviews with supervisors of several social firms from the North of Germany were combined and collected in parallel. Between July and November 2020, 16 semi-structured telephone interviews with supervisors and three focus groups with 3–6 employees each working within the same team (14 employees in total) were conducted. Both formats were recorded, transcribed, anonymized, and analyzed by using Mayring’s qualitative content analysis. Because a large proportion of the employees and supervisors interviewed worked in the gastronomy sector, they were particularly affected by the “restriction of social contacts” beginning in March 2020. Hygiene and distance regulations were implemented and personnel planning and distribution of work were adapted. Challenges were raised for employees with disabilities due to the implementation of hygiene and distance regulations, a sudden loss of work, lacking routines, additional work, a lack of movement, social contacts and financial challenges. Both employees and supervisors reported fears of infection, conflicts, additional work and fears of job loss. Additionally, supervisors dealt with less staffing, challenges in detaching from work and a strained economic situation. Overall, new insights were gained into the work-related impacts for employees and supervisors in inclusive workplaces during the current COVID-19 pandemic but further research on health-promoting structures is needed.

Ethical Design of a Robot Platform for Disabled Employees: Some Practical Methodological Considerations

This paper explains the process of developing a scenario involving the use of a robotic platform to enhance the work experience of disabled employees. We outline the challenges involved in revealing the potential unintended consequences of introducing elements of Artificial Intelligence, automation, and robotics into a socially and ethically complex and potentially fragile scenario, and the practical challenges involved in giving a voice to vulnerable users throughout the design process. While an ideal case scenario would involve the disabled employees as much as possible directly in the design process, this can, realistically, be a challenge. In this paper, we detail a methodological and analytic approach that is centered around ethnography and design fictions. It is designed to provide a deeper understanding of all the stakeholders involved in the scenario while encouraging ethical reflection. Based on our findings, we argue that, while it is relatively easy to adopt an a priori ethical stance through notions such as inclusivity and accessibility, there are risks involved in making such a priori prescriptions with respect to the perspectives of different stakeholders in an applied research project. More specifically, we highlight the importance of understanding the broad organizational and bureaucratic characteristics of a business or workplace when devising HRI scenarios and tasks, and of considering elements such as business models, operating philosophy, and organizational hierarchies in the design process.

I see you but you don’t see me: the “two-way mirror effect” of gender and disability in employment

Purpose This paper aims to contribute to prior gender-based conceptual models within organisational and management studies by incorporating an additional lens of disability. The authors present a context specific and embodied based model that we call the “two-way mirror effect” which accounts for the environmental and discursive effects of gender and disability within the workplace. Design/methodology/approach The paper reviews existing literature on gender, disability and employment and uses that literature to construct and support the concept of a two-way mirror effect. Findings By drawing on organisation and management-based studies, the authors have shown how previous models do not currently account for the experiences of disabled women within the workplace. Disabled workers, and especially disabled women face a myriad of unique barriers, including masculine and able-bodied employment practices (e.g. performative expectations) and exclusionary physical spaces (e.g. access, location to required facilities), that exclude them from full employment participation. Practical implications The review of existing literature and conceptual models reveal the gaps in research that academics and practitioners can build upon and the paper identifies the dominant norms that are embedded within organisational practices, which can be challenged to promote inclusion and equality. Originality/value The authors present a new intersectional-based conceptual model to fill a gap in organisational and management-based studies that accounts for the unique employment experiences of disabled employees, specifically disabled women.