Last reviewed: October 2023
By Diane Lightfoot, Business Disability Forum CEO
Where we are now – Why global disability inclusion matters
Business Disability Forum has over 550 members. We support them to get better at recruiting and retaining disabled employees and at serving disabled customers. We see our role as critical friends – and we support our members wherever they are on their disability smart journey. Some have been with us for 30 plus years, some are brand new.
Over 50 per cent of the organisations we work with are global – operating beyond the UK, whether truly international or operating in a few overseas markets. To support them, we established our Global Taskforce back in April 2018 and since then it has gone from strength to strength. It’s been instrumental in creating a range of reports and resources:
- Firstly, our global version of our Disability Smart tool – our Global Business Disability Framework, which is designed as a maturity model.
- Then our first report on how to develop a Global Disability Inclusion Strategy, supported by Shell, which launched in early 2020.
- It was followed by four “deep dive” reports (all supported by HSBC) on global data monitoring, workplace adjustments/accommodations, built environment and language.
Data particularly is a subject I’ll come back to.
Changing the narrative – disability is not “too difficult”
Across the piece we still see that disability is still too often put in the “too difficult” box. The message we try to get across is that it doesn’t have to be, via lots of very practical pragmatic support and advice. I also try to move people from “why?” to “why not?”; from “why should I do this/provide this?” to “why on earth wouldn’t I want to give all my employees the tools they need to thrive?”
This is especially true around workplace adjustments or accommodations which are pivotal and often the difference between thriving or surviving at work; or worse, falling out of the workplace altogether. It’s a consistent top topic to our Advice Service, including how to decide what is “reasonable”. And earlier this year, we carried out the second iteration of our Great Big Workplace Adjustments Survey to find out more about the experience of getting adjustments in 2023 – and post pandemic. You can find all the results on our website.
Ultimately this is about talent – it’s so important we change the narrative. We know that diverse teams are more productive, creative, bring better problem solving and better reflect the communities they serve – customers, clients, services users, patients, students, families…
So, at a UK level there is still more to be done. But at a global level it’s of course much more complex with different attitudes around disability, different legislative frameworks where you can, can’t or must ask about disability, quotas and targets.
Making disability inclusion “business as usual” using ESG reporting
We started thinking about ESG reporting in earnest in 2022. It was inspired by a conversation at the Disability Confident Business Leaders Group some time back when Microsoft’s Hector Minto asked me if we did anything on ESG. And we didn’t. The fact we hadn’t even considered it probably says a lot about how we traditionally think about corporate reporting! There used to be CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) and in the context of disability inclusion that was too often positioned about doing good/charitable works, outside of the “real work” of the business, not as a fundamental to good business and success.
It also highlighted for me how, in the current climate, the focus in the media is very much on just that: climate change and the environment – the E of ESG reporting. Which of course is very important – including for disabled people! But what about the S and the G?
Where does disability fit in the ESG framwework?
So we got to thinking, where does disability fit in? And the answer is – it should fit in everywhere. Yet disability inclusion is too often forgotten in ESG reporting (and other reporting – I’m sure we’ve all seen numerous reports about diversity that don’t mention disability).
Disabled people and the environment
But climate change and the environment and energy prices disproportionately affect disabled people. Whether it is needing to heat your home to a higher temperature to manage pain, fatigue or conditions like Sickle Cell or needing to charge electronic equipment – assistive technology or a wheelchair – with the cost of living crisis this is very real issue. Motability’s CEO told me a couple of years ago that electric cars couldn’t be adapted for wheelchair users because the car battery is in the base – which means the chassis couldn’t be lowered. Hopefully that has changed now but it shows the problem if you only look through one lens.
Disabled people and governance
At a governance level, how many businesses ensure disability is central to how they report on their corporate decision making and how on policies and procedures are monitored, reported, and reviewed? We also need to see disabled people in senior roles and talking about disability to become role models for others. As the saying goes: “You can’t be what you can’t see”.
Disabled people and social
When it comes to the S, of course disability inclusion is a global societal – and social – issue. But the S is still ill-defined, and I believe businesses need to look at their social purpose – beyond the scope of what they need to report to lead the agenda. From compliance to best practice if you will. For example, the disability employment gap overlooks that there are multiple gaps underneath that. In the UK, the headline figure of 53 per cent of working age disabled adults in work vs 81 per cent of their non-disabled peers masks that, for autistic adults, the figure is more like 16 per cent. For adults with learning disabilities, it’s less than 6 per cent.
How can businesses get better at disability-inclusive ESG reporting?
That can feel overwhelming and it’s difficult for businesses to know how they can make a difference. This all links to storytelling too. At our global conference last year, I interviewed John McCalla Leacy, global head of ESG reporting at KPMG on the trends he was seeing. I’m paraphrasing him but one of his key messages was that we need to get better at finding a compelling narrative around ESG. Something that excites people and brings the numbers to life (and we know when it comes to disability, the numbers can be tricky – which I’ll come onto in a moment!).
Why telling a story about disability inclusion matters
So how can you do that? Take HSBC for example – they have a project in the UK to recruit disabled people who face greater barriers to work than those who might usually think of HSBC as a career option. The numbers aren’t huge yet – and if they were included with no narrative in an ESG report, would probably feel quite insignificant compared to the scale of HSBC’s overall workforce.
But hearing first-hand the stories of the young people they have recruited, seeing them grow in confidence and for example, hearing that they are now able to take their mum out to dinner and how proud they are to be able to pay, paints such a different picture – one that really is compelling.
Disability-inclusive ESG reporting makes businesses stronger
And it’s not just the right thing to do, it’s good for your business too. What I think is missing in the context of ESG reporting is a narrative about talent and opportunity – it isn’t just a moral imperative but critical for business survival. With skills shortages in so many sectors no business can afford to exclude a significant part of the talent pool – or consumer market, come to that.
It also sends a clear message about your values as a brand – and consumers will see that. Indeed, the World Economic Forum lists sustainable purpose among the growing business trends citing three reasons:
- Customers prefer businesses that do good,
- It will mean that employees want to work for them,
- Increasingly investors are demanding it.
Wouldn’t it be great if we could create a virtuous circle; one where businesses commit to proactively, voluntarily including disability in their ESG reporting and in turn, where customers, employees and investors actively look for that information – and act on the results.
I saw a definition of ESG in a report that came out last year as “Actively aiming to reduce harms and increase benefits that result from the way [businesses] operate”. I think we can do better than that! Small steps add up and by working together we really can make a difference and become a powerful movement for change that transforms opportunities for disabled people.
How to measure disability inclusion – The role of data collection
So, on to the challenge of data! Given that over 90 per cent of disabilities are not immediately visible, so much of this is about building trust so that people feel safe to tell you they have a disability rather than fearing negative repercussions, which sadly is still too often the case.
Data collection is a top topic for our global members which is why we created a report which we called ‘Collecting Global Employee Disability Data – the challenges and enablers for global disability-smart organisations.’ In it, we identified four key building blocks that are fundamental to successful data collection:
1. Purpose
A clear and compelling reason, or set of reasons, why you are collecting data and what you want to achieve. Start with the end in mind – what data are you seeking and why? What do you want to know – and what will you do with that information once you have gathered it?
Map the legal requirements and restrictions where you work – what is necessary (for example, in reporting on quotas). And map the legal restrictions too – what is possible? Bear in mind the constraints of where you are working – if you don’t know what the law says in different countries, I highly recommend the ILO website which gives lots of information on where there are quotas and targets for example.
And think about the fundamental question: how can we use data to improve the working lives of people with disabilities?
Once you’ve established a clear purpose – communicate this clearly and consistently.
2. Fundamentals
This is about systems. It’s also about globally consistent and locally resonant terminology.
We encourage our members to go beyond compliance to best practice, and to adopt a global approach and definition of disability that goes beyond minimum in country requirements. We typically recommend the United Nations definition which is very broad.
Take HSBC again – they very clearly say, this is our definition of disability globally and it doesn’t matter if (for example) mental health or neurodiversity doesn’t “count” as a disability in x country, it counts to us, it matters to us, and this is about talent. That visible and global commitment speaks volumes.
On systems: some key things:
- Create a platform where employees can feel safe to self-I.D. and where they are confident their data will be secure.
- Be clear about whether they will be identifiable or anonymous, and in either case, who has access to the data and how the data will be used.
- Create a globally acceptable and resonant question, for example do you consider yourself to have a disability or long-term condition such as x, y, z – develop it with your people. You can create in-country questions if you need to ask for more detailed information.
And use relevant data that may already exist, such as workplace adjustments data, this can help avoid duplication and you can also triangulate data to make sense of what you are seeing. Bear in mind too the bell curve – both the most inclusive and the least inclusive companies can have the lowest rates of people telling them they have a disability; the latter because people are fearful/don’t see the point and the former because they are intrinsically flexible and allow people to work in the ways that suit them – reducing the need to ask for something different.
Look behind the numbers and what they are telling you. In this space, data is an art not a science.
3. Leadership
Senior leaders have a key role in driving change and that is just the same for data collection. The HSBC project worked because it was championed by the UK CEO and global disability champion, Ian Stuart.
Communicate your commitment to disability inclusion from the top of the organisation. Encourage senior leaders to use their position to role model inclusion and to open up the dialogue for others.
4. Culture
The well-known Peter Drucker quote is that: “culture eats strategy for breakfast”! Key is creating a culture of psychological safety and trust, which enables employees to talk openly about disability and lived experience, without fear of detriment.
This links very much to leadership and also remembering the privilege that we have as senior people in feeling safe to self-ID. Again, this links back to the purpose for any data collection and what the benefits will be: the “what’s in it for me?” factor. Work with your Employee Resource Group if you have one to create the best approach and ask for their support to enable people to participate.
What data should global businesses collect?
What data should you collect? This goes back to what you can collect and what you are going to do with it! We also believe that it’s important not just to look at numbers but at the quality of the employee (and customer) experience. So rather than just “prevalence” of disabled people in the workforce, things like the quality of the workplace adjustments experience, job satisfaction, progression, engagement. What does it feel like to work here?
Regardless of legal reporting requirements, we are very much in favour of driving up voluntary reporting so that proactive reporting becomes an attraction strategy which says “we are serious about this and about getting it right”. And remember that the value of the data – collecting it, reporting it – is in the conversations it sparks. That’s the message we get loud and clear from our Members and Partners when we talk to them about data. It’s about understanding what’s going on behind the numbers, sharing that, talking about it with your people and together, figuring out what’s next.
Where should global businesses begin?
So, if you are starting out:
- Start at the top – get a champion to drive this.
- Embed and measure – make sure there is accountability to make this happen.
- Don’t boil the ocean – it’s bad for climate change! If you want to try something new, it doesn’t have to be large scale – start small, take it outside of your normal process/HR machine if you need to and try it out.
- Focus on priorities – where can you make a difference?
- Celebrate successes – we often forget this.
- Use the levers that resonate locally – we are looking for global consistency, but you’ll only get engagement and traction if you are relevant locally. More than anything else, our global research made clear that organisations needed to be prepared to flex their approach to each context; using the messages and “hooks” that work in different countries and different cultures. This very much echoes the key message of our first global report – focus on intention, not perfection. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good!
Businesses have a huge power to do good and to drive change in our society so let’s make sure we harness that power in a positive way.
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