The Ripple Effect
Businesses that have the vision to welcome people with disability in their day-to-day operations have a powerful impact on the whole of society. In Australia this will help to level the playing field for people with disability and boost the competitiveness of our economy.
For example, IBM has a global corporate instruction that all products must include important accessibility features and functions, so that products, tools, applications and services are either directly accessible or compatible with assistive technology. In Australia and New Zealand, IBM has accessibility built into its supplier engagement processes to ensure that all products and services are accessible to people with disability.
Manpower Services is a key recruitment and contractor workforce supplier to IBM and is actively engaged in assisting IBM to achieve its diversity goals. As a result, Manpower is increasingly gaining a reputation as a barrier-free recruitment company, and is now helping other Australian organisations also attract more candidates with disability.
Australian businesses have a compelling opportunity to tap into the potential of this talent pool while also retaining existing employees with disability. Targeting this market with products and services will also boost business performance and increase marketshare. By realising human potential and addressing disability-related exclusion we will create a sustainable society. Taking advantage of this opportunity will result in far reaching benefits, not just for individual businesses, but for Australian society as a whole.
IBM is 100% supportive in a phenomenal way – when I tell people about the benefits I received following my accident it takes their breath away. IBM has been caring, understanding and flexible. This pays off in many ways, including engendering the loyalty I feel towards my employer. Today I’m a walking advocate for IBM”
Dr Tim Littlejohn, New Employee Learning Lead for IBM Australia, who had a traumatic brain injury.
"At the end of this decade there will be a change in the dynamics of the Australian labour market: more baby boomers will exit the workforce than Generation Y’s will enter, leading to an exacerbation of the skills and labour shortage that is already restraining the capacity of the Australian economy. An open mind and an understanding of the looming crisis is what is required to start to tap into labour from non-traditional sources, including people with disability. Here are vast pools of talent and labour that can make a valuable contribution to this nation’s economic output in the early years of the new decade”
Bernard Salt, Partner, KPMG.