Foreword to the Global Assessment by Diane Lightfoot

Business Disability Forum’s Global Assessment

Diane Lightfoot, CEO, Business Disability Forum

Business Disability Forum’s new Global Assessment is designed to help multinational organisations measure and improve their performance on disability inclusion, wherever you operate.

We created this tool in response to strong demand from our global Members and Partners for an assessment based on our UK Disability Smart Framework, adapted to reflect the varying challenges and opportunities faced by global organisations. It reflects the need to navigate different operational, legal and cultural contexts between countries. Our Members and Partners also told us that it was important that the new tool includes an audited element so that they can have confidence in their results and use them externally to report on progress.

To develop the tool, we built on our deep experience of running our UK-based assessment, while refining and evolving the question sets – with tailored versions for global headquarters and for operations in specific countries – to make sure they truly work for global businesses and the different cultures they operate in. Crucially, we did this in partnership with our steering group – global Members and Partners working across different countries – to make sure the questions are relevant and effective in driving meaningful change. We also worked with the steering group to agree what kind of evidence we should request to support the evaluation, ensuring we strike the right balance between rigour and ease of completion.

This combination of deep experience and high-level insight has resulted in a uniquely responsive tool, designed for multinational, matrixed organisations seeking to develop or strengthen your global disability inclusion strategy as well as country-level disability inclusion activities.

Completing the Global Assessment will give you a rich understanding of how your disability inclusion efforts currently perform. Your submitted evidence will be evaluated and scored by a disability inclusion expert, bringing specialist insight and ensuring that your results are both credible and actionable. This expert review adds a valuable layer of external validation that can help build confidence among internal stakeholders and support transparent reporting to clients, regulators, or investors.

On completion, the tool generates a tailored report outlining areas of strength and risk – helping you shape your global disability inclusion strategy, focus your efforts where they’ll have the most impact, and not only avoid risks related to reputation, liability and productivity, but also drive continuous improvement and progress towards best practice wherever you operate.

You can also choose to have a personal feedback session with the disability inclusion expert who assesses your evidence. These sessions are a chance to explore your results in greater depth, ask questions, and get practical, expert guidance on your next steps.

My sincere thanks to all involved in creating the tool, including our Steering Group and our internal BDF project team who have worked incredibly hard to create and launch the tool. And a huge thank you also to our sponsors – Shell, Schneider Electric and Amazon. Without your generosity and support we simply wouldn’t have been able to make it happen. Thank you.

Further information

For more information about what the Global Assessment is, how to register, and what support BDF can provide to help you complete it, see the Global Assessment pages on our website.

If you are BDF Member or Partner, you can contact your Business Partner or Senior Business Partner for more information.

If you’re not sure whether the Global Assessment is for your organisation, you can try our Taster quiz. This provides nine examples of the sorts of questions to expect when completing the Global Assessment.

Read the statements from the sponsors of the Global Assessment – Shell and Schneider Electric – to hear about what global organisations can gain from completing this assessment.