Community Conversation: What is Important?

Mainstreaming on Main Street conducted its second community conversation on perceptual challenges facing disabled professionals On Thursday, May 13^th. The gathering was held at the Badger Association of the Blind and Visually Impaired offices.

The topic for the conversation was “What is important? With a specific focus on what disabled professionals identify as important topics which must be addressed in the process of advancing their own careers.

The assumptions for the gathering included the following:

–         It is less likely an experienced professional with a disability will have a third-party advocate acting as a mediator in the process of climbing the career ladder.
–         An experienced professional knows what accommodations are required to be productive in the workplace
–         There may be financial considerations which must be clearly understood before moving to a new (or expanded) job role.
–         Experienced professionals who have been identified as having a disability were invited to attend with the caveat all participants were expected to represent only themselves and the experiences they brought to the gathering.

The following comments are highlights from the conversation:

1. It is significantly simpler for a disabled professional to move into a work environment which has experience with others with similar disabilities.
2. Co-workers are able to work effectively with a person with disabilities once the members of the workgroup get to know each other.
3. Effective workgroups can overcome some of the needs for specialized tools for a disabled professional by simple transfer of certain work duties. The trade-off between the development of specialized tools and overall workgroup productivity becomes a matter of cost/benefit analysis.
4. Leaving support of specialized equipment or software to generalized support services can be a challenge if the support providers do not appreciate the productivity impact these tools have on the disabled professional.
5. Well intentioned assistance can be easily undermined by incomplete communication.

It is important to note this gathering was a conversation rather than an effort to determine a definitive set of steps for overcoming perceptual issues associated with the career development of disabled professionals. The group recognized additional time would be required to fully explore the many issues effecting perceptions of disabled professionals.

The group will reconvene in June and is actively seeking additional participants to join in the conversation. 

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