With most large companies, there are policies dictating the hiring of people with disabilities. Company policies also can be a source of exclusion and discrimination.
When our team’s job developer approached a couple of businesses, large corporate companies, she was met with resistance but of course this resistance was couched in corporate ‘lingo’.
When questioned about the company’s diversity policy, one manager acknowledged this policy and then promptly explained the company’s hiring policy that described how an employee was ‘part of a team’. The manager continued to explain that a “team member” would be someone that could, with continued training and education, perform tasks required of all the positions offered within the company. In the manager’s opinion, the door was slammed shut.
Many possess false assumptions of what constitutes a team. The principles that underlie effective teaming point to an extremely important aspect of teaming: There is no ONE right way to structure a team. Then what characteristics have been touted as essential for teaming?
Productive teams tend to focus on asking questions, rather than making statements. The manager had many statements why a person with a developmental disability would not be hired, and asked no questions about how or why a diversified workplace makes good business sense. Effective teams may have team leaders or collective leadership, the key is open-mindedness rather than single-mindedness. Effective teams also have the ability to be flexible – each person has a role and the roles are interdependent. But the roles do not have to be interchangeable.
With effective teams, team members are allowed to bring their own unique ways of learning and meeting the requirements of the job. There is rarely one right way of doing things. The key is that the team is open to strategies that will allow individuals members to be successful. Effective teams are responsive to change, open to innovation, accepting of difference and intolerant of obstacles.
