A major survey into the workplace experiences of disabled people has found they are still waiting too long for the adjustments they need to reduce or remove the barriers they experience in their jobs.
The Business Disability Forum (BDF) published a report into the workplace experiences of disabled people and people with long-term conditions in the UK.
“The Great Big Workplace Adjustments Survey 2023” looks at the experiences of nearly 1,500 disabled employees and 400 managers of workplace adjustments and inclusion.
Facilitate, the website of the Institute of Workplace and Facilities Management, reported that the survey shows that managers feel more confident talking about disability than they did previously and play a key role in the adjustment process.
But multiple internal processes and limited powers to make changes in the wider organisation create additional barriers and leave managers feeling frustrated.
The study finds that employees are also having to push for adjustments or even fund them themselves. Common adjustments include flexibility over hours and location, time off for medical appointments, as well as ergonomic equipment and assistive technology.
Disabled people also face a number of other disability-related barriers at work, which go beyond changes to their individual roles. These include bullying and harassment, limited promotion and development opportunities, inaccessibility of programmes and initiatives intended to support wellbeing, and wider inaccessibility of buildings and systems.
The analysis finds that for both disabled employees and managers, the Covid-19 pandemic had – and continues to have – a significant impact on workplace experiences.
In response to the findings, the Business Disability Forum is calling on employers to:
• Simplify their workplace adjustment process.
• Provide more support for managers and the role they play in workplace inclusion.
• Develop a wider workplace approach to understanding the experience of having a disability and to removing disability-related barriers.
Diane Lightfoot, CEO of the Business Disability Forum, said: “Workplace adjustments play a vital role in enabling disabled people to thrive at work. Access to adjustments needs to be simplified and improved but adjustments only remove some of the workplace barriers that disabled people experience.
“To be fully inclusive, employers need to have a greater understanding of how disability affects a person’s life as a whole. Accessibility and inclusion need to be embedded in all aspects of the organisation and its culture, with policies and premises designed with disabled people in mind. Senior leaders should start by challenging poor workplace culture and driving organisational-wide change which better supports disabled employees and managers.”
