workforce opportunity leadership workers with disabilities: ready for tomorrow’s jobs today jane...

WORKFORCE OPPORTUNITY LEADERSHIP

WORKERS WITH DISABILITIES:Ready for Tomorrow’s Jobs Today

Jane Anderson, DirectorMidwest Institute for Telecommuting

Education, Minneapolis MN

Project STRIDE Strategic Telework Research for Innovative Disability

Employment Preliminary Findings from National and Demo Inquiry

• Identify and describe the key elements of telework via a national inquiry and case studies

• Articulate these elements in the context of effective and innovative telework strategies through two demonstration sites



Research Goals(slide master A)

• General Telework• Employees with Disabilities• Newly Hired Teleworkers with Disabilities• Types of job tasks and telework jobs

available



Areas of Interest

• Pre-screening questionnaires to 15,782 human resource professionals and managers in the government, for-profit, and non-profit sectors

• 463 employers qualified and 235 of those completed the full questionnaire



Summary of Findings



% of Respondents

Government Agency, 54

Technology, 8Education, 8

Financial Services, 7

Health Care, 7

Management Consulting, 6

Human Services, 5

Communication, 4

Research, 4

Other, 7

Custodial, Janitorial and Business Management;

Hospitality; Industrial; Retail Sales; Transportation,

1 each

Telework Respondents by Industry

Workforce Size Percent • 100-499 employees 26 • 20 or fewer employees 20 • 1,000-9,999 employees 19 • 10,000 or more employees 15 • 21-99 employees 12 • 500-999 employees 8



Work Force Size Sample

• For-profit and non-profit (non-government) sectors offer more telework in general

• Employers that reported having teleworkers:– 76% of non-government respondents (54 of 71)– 60% of federal, state, and local government respondents (81

of 136)

• Excluding new hires, larger employers (+500) overall provide more general telework opportunities for persons with and without disabilities.



Summary of FindingsGeneral Telework

Incidence• 25% of organizations offered telework to employees with

disabilities; 46% reported practice scattered throughout the organization

• 71% of teleworkers with disabilities worked in full-time positions and 37% of employers reported teleworkers had exempt employee status

• Conditions such as isolated employee situations (45%), teleworking only with supervisor approval (46.2%), and telework being offered in certain types of jobs (32.3%)



Employees with Disabilities Transitioned into Telework

• 56.8% of employers indicated telework has been used as an option for short-term disability leave.

• Employers currently not employing teleworkers with disabilities expressed a strong preference towards a new employee with a part-time telework schedule



Job Types• Office Functions (52.5%) • Administrative Jobs (49.1%)• Research and Analysis (45.9%• Technician (36.1%)• Customer Service (26.2%)• Claims Review (24.6%)



• Identifying jobs that appropriately fit telework tasks (47.7%)

• Difficulty in measuring performance (41.5%)

• Lack of priority placed on telework by management (33.5%)

• Supervisor resistance and uncertainty about managing remote workers (32.3%)



Challenges

• 10% of organizations directly hired new persons with disabilities to telework, while 48% said they have not, and 40% said they did not know.

• Job Functions included research and analysis (62%); office functions (55%); administrative (52%); customer service (48%); and call centers (47%).



Newly Hired Teleworkers with Disabilities

• A higher percentage of for-profit and non-profit respondents had hired new employees with disabilities than respondents from the government sector.

• Of employers who hired persons with disabilities specifically for telework, most (16 of 23) said they would encourage other divisions or groups to consider telework.

• 66% of employers indicated the decision would depend upon the job tasks; 53% said it would depend upon the employee skill levels and 40% said it would depend on the individual’s disability



• Difficulty assessing teleworker skills and work habits (53.6%); difficulties in training and monitoring performance of employees they can’t see (49.1%)

• Perception new employees need to work in-house first (45.5%)



Challenges

• There were more opportunities for newly hired teleworkers with disabilities in employers with fewer than 500 employees.



• Assess teleworker skills before hire through training programs (43.3%)

• Implement training or work experiences to ensure teleworker is job ready (45.4%)

• Telework job try-out experience on a temporary basis before hire (42%)

• Combine specific repetitive functions in several jobs to one job the teleworker could perform



Strategies

Thirty-one percent of respondents indicated

that telework is likely to increase in the next

five years.



Future Trends

• Telework helps respond to specific employee needs and retain employees

• Also cited by respondents:– Increased productivity – Cost savings – Reduced operations costs



Employer Benefits

• Minnesota Resource Center (Twin Cities)• Stout Vocational Rehabilitation Institute

(University of Wisconsin)• Hubert Humphrey Public Affairs• Goal: Place 40 teleworkers in MN and WI.



Demonstration Sites – 2 yrs.

• Virtual call center trend is on increase.• Teleworker training offered quarterly (6 wks

minimum)• Refine training with employer collaboration• Looking for telework opportunities in other job

tasks such as data entry.



Next Steps



Project STRIDE

Jane Anderson, Directorwww.mite.org

[email protected]

http://www.mite.org/

workforce opportunity leadership workers with disabilities: ready for tomorrow’s jobs today jane...

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