HR BESTIES - Beyond Compliance: Accommodating Disabilities at Work

Starting point is 00:00:00 You know, so I think one of the funnest things about starting a new job is when you get into that job and you are in discovery phase, right? I mean, you're going into this workplace and every day is just constant learning. You're just bombarded with information. I love that part. I know that's overwhelming for so many people, but I love change. I just love that early discovery phase where it's like, what the hell is going on here? I will never forget a job that I went into, obviously HR leader. I'm also a HR leader. And I got invited to this recurring meeting that was just called LOA review, which stood for leave of absence review.

Starting point is 00:00:53 And I was like, huh, interesting. Is this with the GM? Is this with the leadership team? Is this with Health and Save? Who is this with Health and Safe, like who is this with, right? I click on it and it's with all of the site admins. And I'm just like perplexed, like, okay, like, what's the context of this? Like what are they reviewing?

Starting point is 00:01:17 Right? And so, you know, I asked off to the side, you know, what is this? Oh, we go through everyone who's out and all of this. Oh, wow. Okay. With all the people that don't need to know. I go, how long has this been going on? Oh, years.

Starting point is 00:01:35 This is how we keep track of people, maybe keys or supplies, equipment, uniforms, whatever. Right? Okay. So I roll up into this meeting and it's just as bad as it sounds, but it was actually worse because they had the list, which I don't know how they got the list of people, and they started going into detail. Oh, well, this person is out because they have cancer and it's not going well. And now it's spread and all of this. I mean, this group of like six admins who, you know, admins always know what's going on.

Starting point is 00:02:16 And some of them, not all of them, and bless them, they're my favorite people at the workplace. But, you know, they feel maybe entitled to a lot of information as well because they're constantly getting all the information. They always had the hot gossip and the scoops. And so here they were weekly talking about everyone's medical information. And really, it was a gossip sesh. Like I was like, wow, like after the first one, I was like, whoa, whoa, whoa. Like, questions. I've got all the questions here, you know? Like, why is the first question, you know? So that was the last Leave of Absence review meeting. Yeah, as it should have been.

Starting point is 00:02:57 Isn't that wild? Yes. I mean, ooh. That is wild. And then I can imagine, because the why has to be, well. That is wild. And then I can imagine, because the why has to be, well, this is the way it's always been. And we need to know as a fact. You don't.

Starting point is 00:03:13 But then when you take that meeting away, I can imagine the hornet's nest that that tossed up with those admins. Tell me that's rightly. Right, of course, because it's that kind of entitlement. And well, since it is always the way we've always done it, and HR previous outsourced it to them, to, they gave them the list.

Starting point is 00:03:36 But, you know, I don't think HR knew that they were having this meeting. They just were giving them the information of who's out, and then they were spending the week figuring out why the people were out and then coming together and talking about it. That was like the convergence of the gossip. Like, oh my gosh, it was a water cooler meeting. It was crazy.

Starting point is 00:03:58 But no, they don't like that when you... People don't like being cut off from information, whether they should be privy to it or not. And it's like, you don't need the leave list. Yeah, I was gonna say, whether they deserve to know it or not. Exactly, you do not need the leave list, you know? Someone goes out, we'll let you know. You can turn them off in the system, whatever.

Starting point is 00:04:18 Someone comes back, we'll let you know, reinstate the badge, whatever. I mean, that's it, you know? It's, ooh, wild. Wow, wow. I mean, that's it. You know, it's wild. Wow. Wow. Isn't that something? Y'all ever have a leave of absence review meeting with a whole bunch of people that don't need to know? Yes, but like with a peer and the manager, like someone in HR and their manager to kind

Starting point is 00:04:40 of discuss not what the ailment is, but, you know, return to work date or et cetera. Yeah. So be careful when you start a new job and you're like, Hey, invite me to any meetings I should be on, you know, like you get invited to things you really shouldn't be on either, you know, but glad you were put on, you know, so. I truly think there's no role like HR when you start a new job. It's validating to see how completely jacked up so many workplaces are and the things that happened and you think to yourself, okay, now I'm here, how am I going to fix this? And that's what you got to do.

Starting point is 00:05:19 You got to educate people and bring them with you and explain with a caring touch why they don't need to have that meeting and how they'd feel if they were them. And that one recurrent meeting led to so many hours of work, I'm sure, Lee. Oh, of course. And it's like, but why not? Well, laws have evolved since the 40 years ago you started doing this. I mean, shit changes, right? When you know better, you do better too, right? So, ooh, but that was fun. Sometimes searching for the right doctor is like a bad mad libs. You need a blank specialist.

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Starting point is 00:07:30 Oh gosh, the hot goss from the water cooler. Shall we kick off this meeting? Well just a quick rundown of the agenda, if I may, and I will. We'll start with Cringe Corporate Speak and Jamie, she's up at bat for that. And then we will shift into our hot topic of this meeting. And today it is all things accommodating disabilities at work. And so October is actually National Disability Employment Awareness Month in the U.S. And so we want to talk about disabilities at work and all things work accommodations. All right. So pretty big topic there. So, Jamie. Oh, oh, oh. And of course at the end,

Starting point is 00:08:20 my bad. Gosh, of course we will save room for questions and comments like we always do. Oh, God, I don't want you all to think you won't have the stage. So, oh, my bad. Gosh, of course we will save room for questions and comments like we always do. Oh, God, I don't want you all to think you won't have the stage. So, oh gosh, that was a close call. But Jamie, kick us off with our cringe corporate speak. For today, we're going to try to insert ping. So, ping is typically used in teams reference, slack reference. Maybe you have some sort of office chat, but you're going to ping somebody, you know, you're going to check on something. So I know that my boss used it a lot. Like she'd be like, I'm going to ping you later and we can touch base.

Starting point is 00:09:01 I'm like, Oh, it's just, I don't know what it is about that word. I want it to be a fun word because it sounds fun when you say it, but it's not a fun thing. I don't want to be pinged. Yeah. That's a good point. I think I'm definitely guilty of saying it and I do probably cringe when I say it as well. So maybe it's like a workout, but it is true because pinging someone generally means you're going to have a request and have like more things that you have to do when someone, oh, quick, quick,

Starting point is 00:09:29 your quick ping is my long as shit, you know, to do. So that's why it's less fun when you're on the receiving end of that ping. Yeah, it's like I'm going to call upon you for you to, you know, come up and do some crazy action and fulfill your responsibility. It is heavy. So, that's why it's this cute jovial little word, ping. Oh, it's so cute. I'm going to tickle you. I'm going to ping you.

Starting point is 00:09:54 In an appropriate sense. Of course, yes. In an HR-approved way. Yeah. Hands off tickle. They tickle like a feather, like with a feather. Do you feel that? It's close.

Starting point is 00:10:02 Like an ASMR brand. There's an appropriate tickle. In an HR-approved way. Yeah. Hands off tickle. They tickle like a feather, like with a feather. Do you feel that? It's close. Like an ASMR brain tingle or something. Yes. But no, really, I'm going to just fuck your day over is what that really means. Oh my God. No.

Starting point is 00:10:21 Or night. Or your night. I'll ping you later. I'll ping you later. No, please don't. Wait, wait. I got one at 630 this morning. I'm not kidding. And a couple weeks ago, we had a bad email go out and it went out at 1105 and I started

Starting point is 00:10:41 receiving pings exactly at like 1106. This is why I should not have TMS on my phone, but that's my bed and I'm not going to remove it. Jamie wears a harness for a variety of reasons, including that she's a masochist. Oh gosh, ping. Well that's a good one. Try and insert ping. That's what she said. Into your workday today and enjoy that. Hopefully you don't get pinged though. Just ping people. That can be your job today. Offload the responsibilities. Hey, small business leaders, have you ever thought there's got to be an easier way to

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Starting point is 00:13:15 good to shine a light. And so with National Disability Employment Awareness Month in the U.S., it's really a global concept. And this came about in the U.S. now, I think in the 40s. I think it's been in the 40s. Yes, and it did not have as progressive a name as National Disability Employment Awareness Month, but when you know better, you do better. A lot of this isn't about just a U.S. thing. Yes, in the U.S. there's the Americans with Disabilities Act that covers certain employers and there's state laws that know those things.

Starting point is 00:13:50 But I think it's super important to think in HR, the way I phrase it a lot with organizations, and I'll do training on these, and I've had to do training for organizations that, well, they've been required to do it by the EEOC in the US, especially things like accommodations for the deaf and hard of hearing, and having those type of accommodations if someone applies and needs an interpreter, things like that. We will not ever give legal or professional advice on this show, but telling someone no without a consideration of that is generally just not a good idea. But in a lot of the trainings, I will talk about technical things, but a global principle

Starting point is 00:14:30 is when people have different needs at work, and those may be physical, mental, emotional, is flipping your thinking instead of what do we have to do, saying what can we do? What can we do to support this person? And sometimes you will have situations where, especially maybe there's physical aspects of a lifting requirement that's like an absolute lifting requirement or a driving requirement and someone can't do that. But people with disabilities at work, physical, especially physical, but even mental, emotional, those invisible disabilities or different abilities, they're often really fearful in their job search or what that work experience is like.

Starting point is 00:15:10 There are people that in every aspect of their life, they have people stare at them, they have comments, they go through challenges. While we all do, there are people that bear the brunt of that a lot. They're coming into the workplace, whether applying for your job or coming to work, assuming they're going to see more of that. And so by thinking about how can we support this person and see them as someone that's just trying to come and have the same experience, have a normal experience at work, that's what I think can transform the actual support and understanding that often those needs and asks

Starting point is 00:15:43 aren't really large and it's just about treating that person with respect. So what about y'all? Yeah, no. I mean, in the organizations that I've worked at, I think there really was more of that what can we do mentality, which was refreshing. I know not everyone faces that within the businesses you work within. But that was because, hey, as a billion dollar business, you really can't show up in court and be like, it was a hardship for me to buy a $200 monitor that was bigger to help this visually impaired person, whatever, right? I mean, you don't have a lot of excuses there. And so at least, you know, for me, I've been trained to as much as I can go above and beyond and

Starting point is 00:16:32 see it through and create, you know, a supportive employee experience really for everyone, but especially for those that, you know, come and they are requesting accommodations. There's always a long process. I've always had a long process in my organizations, or a thorough process is a better way to say it, sure, but you know what I mean, of seeing what we can do, exploring all of the potential accommodations, et cetera. So that's been positive, at least in my experience. Yeah. And of course, I've worked for the flip of that, right? What the employers would be like.

Starting point is 00:17:11 For instance, a stand-up desk. Does this person really need a stand-up desk? Can't they just buy the $200 addition for the desk themselves? Or they need the pad that goes underneath their desk for foot pain or, I mean, you know, same thing monitors and like that mostly it's usually the man, their manager, because it's maybe going to come out of their budget and they're like, oh, you know, and I'm like, this is fucking ridiculous. Like is the, is the employee a good employee, regardless of it,

Starting point is 00:17:43 they're a good employee. But you know, if, if they're a great employee, what does it matter if we spend $200 on the additional lift up desk piece for standing desk? And even back in the day, there wasn't such thing as a standing desk. Thank god I'm making myself sound old. But there wasn't. There was no such thing as standing guests. People made them. And so even like just having that ability and not worrying about a budget, but like having to convince a manager that this is a simple thing we can do to for this employee,

Starting point is 00:18:22 like it might even increase their productivity. What? Yeah. See, there should be a centralized budget for that. Yeah. Because I know what you're talking about. Like, you know, and that should be approved and managed elsewhere. Like I love the organizations that have ergonomics. Yes. Like as part of their health and safety where you can request those things. Exactly. Back in the day, I was with GE. And I'm a big bitch, right? I'm like six foot, and I have large hands, and you name it, right?

Starting point is 00:18:54 They just had the little mice. I mean, my hand, I couldn't. It was like picking up a penny every time I tried to use the mouth. Through the ergonomics, I could make the request and actually have a mouse that fit me just for my ergonomics. And they would come and do assessments at everyone's desks because we are all different.

Starting point is 00:19:15 And so I love the orgs that will focus on that because then you know they're putting a lot of strength behind medical and disability accommodations, you know, even more so probably than others. Well, and now you see states like, for instance, California actually has that because work from home remote has changed so much since the pandemic that California now says that you have to have as the employer pay a budget for those, not just office supplies, but in addition to anything ergonomic.

Starting point is 00:19:48 So like, I remember one time, this was early in my career, but a manager having a come apart about the person wanting to have one of those keyboards that's ergonomic. So like, you know, it's kind of like curved. And it's not even that much money, but the person requested it. And I said, I tell you what I said, this person is complaining about their wrist hurting. It's going to cost us more money to pay for their carpal tunnel surgery than the $25 keyboard. And I remember like, I was in my twenties when I told this manager, but I was just so shocked. And they were like, well, we wouldn't have to pay for the company.

Starting point is 00:20:27 Actually we would. It does not matter if a claim gets brought up. It does not matter if they have 40 years of typing experience. Their current employer is responsible to pay for that surgery then. But it's things like that. It's just like educating managers and knowing there are simple things we could do that's actually more cost effective than you being an ass. Jamie, I think that's such a good point is treating people with dignity and just treating

Starting point is 00:20:53 them with basic respect. Whether the answer at the end of the day is yes or no, and frequently it really should be and can be yes. But in the US, there are some healthcare you know, health care in the US is tied to employment generally often and our litigation system, things like that. And so I, as a lawyer, especially when I worked in the law firm environment, I spent a number of years working as a law firm. I gave guidance on the, what do we have to do?

Starting point is 00:21:22 You know, what's that floor as opposed to what can we do? That's why I really loved when I moved into HR and could bring that perspective. I tried to bring it as a lawyer as well, but I frequently had the conversation about what do we have to do. So things like, to the point, like a keyboard. And people would be shocked. They'd say, well, in the U.S. it's undue hardship, so if we have to spend money. And I'm like, well, I mean, do you want me to rattle off these court cases that will say like, this money is not? I mean, or do

Starting point is 00:21:48 you want me you know, what's an undue hardship is pain. Like I have I have a I have a good friend who I was like, what's your hourly rate? Employment, employment lawyer for businesses, $1,700 an hour. And she's she's roughly roughly my my year. So about,, so about 16 years in practice. And so I say that because, from the numbers perspective, so in HR, sometimes you have to get those leaders' attention by talking about things like legal costs, data, what is that requirement? And you have to start with your own floor. And so you can look up and see examples of things like training your managers. I guess I've said I've done

Starting point is 00:22:32 this training. The EOC had to approve my training. I had to go through a whole bio to show that I know what I'm talking about, which thankfully the EOC agreed. But the cost of doing that, and so there's a lot of examples of that. So doing it before you have to. And so talking to your managers, some very basic training where your managers, unless you're in the healthcare profession, they are not healthcare professionals. They don't need to be. But the most important thing managers can do if an employee comes to them with a disability

Starting point is 00:23:02 accommodation request is to be respectful. And if you don't know, say, OK, let me figure it out. And I'll reach out to our HR so it's confidential as possible. And either they may reach out directly so they have that conversation. Generally, I say that's the best path. But it is training them to be respectful of the individual, not promise anything if you don't know.

Starting point is 00:23:21 Yeah, yeah, yeah, no worries. Exactly. We'll take care of it. And also then, if you're the manager and someone has gone to HR and you only find out about it because HR is telling you, hey, this person gets this accommodation. Well, why didn't they come to me? I'm their manager. Because there's so much fear in the workplace and things of disabilities, again, especially in this situation, if it's that invisible disability that you can't see, see it.

Starting point is 00:23:45 And so they're uncomfortable letting you know about it and just knowing its comfort levels. You know, beyond just the cost that you mentioned, Ashley, and the importance of educating leaders, absolutely. They're very data-driven, as are we in HR, just FYI. But sharing that data with them is very, very critical and important. But beyond the cost piece is that it's hard to do. And what I mean is, is we make it hard

Starting point is 00:24:12 to do. And let me give you an example. You know, we've had to back in the day in previous disabilities by renovating bathrooms, or building ramps, or tearing down walls to modify offices and things like that. When you do internal vendor shopping and you do the invoicing and you do the... We make it so hard internally to do anything, really. But for me, I'm like, hey, this space would probably be better managed third party or perhaps outside of some of that so you can move a little quicker and perhaps people, internal managers, HR, whatever, be more apt to support some of these requests. Does that make sense? We need to make this easier to do because this is about our people that we care for.

Starting point is 00:25:19 And please do not underestimate the effect, the profound effect it has, you know, to welcome someone open arms with especially a visible disability and have them feel at home. You know, I remember hiring a hearing impaired welder and he could not get a job for like over a decade. And he brought his wife, you know, to the interview. And she did the interpreting. And he was basically like, I know you're not going to hire me because I mean, I need support. I need a welder. And you know what? Welder. I need an interpreter. We needed a welder. But, you know, he, bless him. I mean, he was just so emotional about

Starting point is 00:26:04 it and just wanted that chance and opportunity, but was already defeated. For me, I took that like a personal thing that I ran that accommodation. I had to get a third party interpreting service. I had to do the iPad thing. I had to put a monitor at his workstation that could display the words his boss was using. The boss wore a mic.

Starting point is 00:26:30 I mean, that shit was so hard to do. It was so hard to like invoice and what I mean, that took so much of my time, you know, to do it. And I'm like, damn, well, I mean, gosh, we don't make it easy on ourselves, you know, to support everybody and whatever, you know, people are going through. But really see the solutions were easy. It's just it was a bitch to actually put it in, you know, oh my God, the bureaucracy. Yeah, it's just the red tape.

Starting point is 00:27:00 Yeah, it's all the jumping through the hoops. Oh, but he cried when we hired. He literally cried just the red tape. Yeah, it's all the jumping through the hoops. But he cried when we hired, he literally cried, just the joy. And it was like, he was the most committed, the most loyal person and just so thankful. And he shouldn't have had to be, like we should all get an opportunity to work, right? And have gainful employment.

Starting point is 00:27:18 But, you know, just that investment there, which really monies wise was like a rounding error for that organization. I mean, you know, it really was, but it was just such a bit. All of that. Right. But it's approval, approval. Oh, I don't know. Four people, I mean, another one I've seen is because frequently what you see is the manager that says, well, then everyone's going to want it. Okay. Well, this person is like service animals in particular. Well, this person has a service animal. Well, now everyone's going to want to bring their pet to work.

Starting point is 00:27:48 Okay, you know what? Fair enough. That is a human question that people are going to have. There are people that, by the grace of God, don't have to think about these things and haven't thought about other people, but your job is going to be to educate them in a way and explain. We support people with their needs. When you have things like a service animal, all the time, I've heard that question a number

Starting point is 00:28:10 of times, there's differences in service animals at work as an employee and service animals, customers bringing them in. It's really important that organizations get that training for customer facing environments, but also for employees to see. People will say, I have a fear, I have an allergy. A lot of times, it's figuring out how you can accommodate those things. There's a great website, I think it's Jan.org, the job accommodation network. Oh, wait, no, that is not Jan.org. Brokamp-I hope it was. No, no, no, no, no.

Starting point is 00:28:43 It's AskJan.org. AskJan.org. Yeah, yeah, yeah, there we go. But it's a really great free resource that can be used. And it gets not a substitute for individual advice, but it has a lot of conditions. So if someone comes to you and says, I have this, without asking them all the questions, just doing a little bit of work, it can say, okay, we explained you information on that. What kind of accommodations are possible? It gives a lot of real-world examples. Again, a lot of this is just about figuring out what you can provide and showing that, to Lee's point, people deserve the opportunity to work gainfully. Whether it's technologies that have been created for remote work and those

Starting point is 00:29:22 third-party interpretation services, or just knowing just because someone is hard of hearing doesn't mean they're visually impaired. Just because they're visually impaired doesn't mean you have to yell at them. And so a lot of times these trainings are really important. And some people haven't encountered different people in their lives. But so you can learn about them and learn about them in a respectful way is super important. Mm hmm. I love that. Even if, you know, the training that you do isn't, doesn't have to just be on disabilities or what, I mean, that's so important for leaders, thousand percent.

Starting point is 00:30:01 But just putting training in like on empathy or unconscious bias, I mean, you see it just has that trickle down that, you know, just blankets across so many different subsets here like this, you know, and just having a more supportive understanding sort of workplace, right? Yeah. In our stories, we'll put in like, you know, as you're listening to this, our stories on our at HR Besties Pod social media, on Instagram in particular. We'll have links to some of those resources. The AskJam.org I talked about.

Starting point is 00:30:33 A YouTube video by a friend of mine from college who works now for the Department of Justice doing AD education that's really, really, really good. It's about eight years old, but it's a very good one. It can open your eyes about what that experience is like and is a good one. I've had organizations share that with their managers. We'll share some of that on our stories because we know we are not the solve for everything, but on the business end of business and bullshit, it's really important that HR be the champion of inclusion at work. Totally agree with that. We also put video toI, if you want to see some snippets from our podcast, those are also on the social. So make sure you go and follow us there.

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Starting point is 00:31:56 to the on the go cup. Make every morning unforgettable with Nespresso. Discover a world of possibilities with or without milk. Visit nespresso.ca to learn more or a Nespresso. Discover a world of possibilities, with or without milk. Visit nespresso.ca to learn more or an Nespresso boutique near you. Jamie, anything else to add to this conversation? No, but I've been trying to think where I can insert ping.

Starting point is 00:32:18 Ha ha ha. Ha ha ha. Say, I'll ping you later about it. Ha ha ha. Oh gosh. Well then, let's shift gears to questions and comments. I know we have a hard stop, Jamie. Any questions or comments, ladies?

Starting point is 00:32:35 What do you got today? I think a comment I'd add is in addition to your employees and applicants and their abilities and different needs, is being mindful of your employees who may have family members that have those disabilities and those different needs. So, thinking about whether it's benefits or inclusion. Again, I know we talk about events outside of work and optional ones. Just thinking about that when you have team members. If you have team members and you know their kids have different physical abilities, talking to them about some of your ideas of things to do. When I was in Australia, I volunteered for All Abilities Football, which is soccer. Every Saturday morning, I finished up work for the U.S. time. I would go over and I'm not a soccer player but I was able to pretend

Starting point is 00:33:26 to be one but it was working with those and so it was eye-opening and people in those situations would talk when they knew I was in legal and HR they would talk about experiences at work and ask in the US how are things in the you know we had a lot of conversations about that and they had said they never realized some of the levels of support until they had you know know, things happen at work and some of their employers do supportive things. So being mindful of family members as well. I was just going to say, you know, one thing that I've done in the last few places I've been is actually added that question onboarding. Do you, you know, not not like asking, do you have a disability?

Starting point is 00:34:01 I'm like more like, do you, is there any accommodations that we should be mindful of? Um, because even though right now the company I'm at were like completely remote, we do have meetings from time to time where we would ask someone to fly in or et cetera. So knowing those ahead of time and being able to like pull a report and then, you know, figuring out who needs what access or who needs what for those. It's just something really simple. And you're being thoughtful, because I'm

Starting point is 00:34:32 sure those people may not have experienced that prior in other companies. That's a good one. Not a question for me, but just a quick comment. Request those accommodations. And if you're with an employer that doesn't, maybe you need another employer. Maybe you need another employer that's going to accept you and support you for who you are. If you're not going to accommodate

Starting point is 00:34:56 me and make me feel like I belong or I'm supported, then should I invest in you if you want to invest in me? So just something to think about. I know we all have bills to pay, but it takes time to find new employment. But just know that you deserve to be accommodated. Anything else? Any other questions or comments? I have that hard stop. I'm being pinged.

Starting point is 00:35:19 Oh, all right. Good. You fit it in. Love it. Well, besties, we appreciate you, and we value you so much. Thank you so much for listening. Don't forget to like, follow, share, all that fun stuff.

Starting point is 00:35:32 ["The Daily Show Theme"]

HR BESTIES - Beyond Compliance: Accommodating Disabilities at Work

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