Increasing trend of inclusive employment

The next time you walk into a Costa Coffee outlet, watch out for something other than your steaming coffee. A differently abled person could be working in the back area, and quite possibly with more élan than your usual attendant! Like the coffee chain, several food retail outlets in the city are now hiring people with disabilities to build an inclusive environment at the workplace. But what is more interesting is that certain organisations are now also hiring only differently abled people.

Meet Dhruv Lakaria of Mirakle Couriers. His workforce, even in a highly competitive and increasingly crowded market, comprises four management staff and 64 employees with hearing disorders. His back office is run by 20 hearing impaired women who have been trained in data entry and manipulation, tracking and scanning, sorting and other branch operations. On the field, his team of 44 male deaf courier agents navigate the complex lanes of Mumbai.

"Our main challenge lies in instilling confidence in them; that someone can really give them a job that makes a difference to their life. We do not have any discrimination in our hiring process," says Dhruv, adding that the on-the-job training process ensures that the new employee is sent out after just a couple of days.

Some clients were initially sceptical about Dhruv's hiring model but it took just a few weeks to change their perception. "I think more employers are realising how committed to their jobs people with disabilities are, especially since society is not yet that democratic towards them," Dhruv says, adding that the differently abled are not just committed but have a much higher retention rate. They are equally aggressive about meeting targets and taking home performance incentives.

Laura D'Souza, a receptionist at JAK Printers who was 80 per cent blind when she joined the company 10 years ago and has now lost her complete vision, is one such worker, committed to her career and anxious to make it on her own.

"I had a dream when I was a small sighted girl—that I want to be a working professional. But when I became blind, the dream seemed to fade away," she says. Her disability has not come in the way of her work or the cheer with which she does it.

While Laura did have initial fears of "how will I take calls, and how will I write", she eventually found her way by transferring all the data from the sighted book to her Braille-scripted book. "I don't compete with the world. We can't run the race with the sighted but we can run our own race, at our own speed," she smiles.

Her employers — who have two more visually impaired people on their rolls — don't regret the decision, even in pure pragmatic terms.

"I consider them more efficient as they will not stop in the middle of the road if there is an accident, they will not chat with anyone on the road and they are given preference in the bank. So, work actually gets done faster," says Khushru Patel, a partner at JAK Printers.

"We wanted to create employment and not donate money at the blind school. We believe in empowering so they can earn a living for themselves," says Khushru.

One fundamental is not to pity them, he says.

Dadabhau, who is visually impaired and recently started work as a delivery boy for JAK Printers, would agree.
"Daya kisiko pasand nahi, hum log bhi normal hain (no one likes being pitied, we are normal like any one else)," says Dadabhau. Does he like being helped? "Madad ki toh zaroorat hoti hai, lekin hamesha nahi. Hum log bhi khuddar hain (We do need help but not always. We have our respect), he says, picking up a delivery packet from Laura.

And, as if to demonstrate his philosophy of life, walks out, stops by the signal and seeks help from a cabbie to cross the road.

Laura and Dadabhau are amongst India's 26.8 million differently abled population. According to 2011 census figures, over 5.4 million people have some kind of physical disability, 5.07 million are hearing impaired and 5.03 million have problems with their vision. While some like Laura and Dadabhau have been lucky to find jobs and respect at their workplace, there are many who struggle everyday for acceptance and equal working rights.

Thankfully, the bandwidth of employers wanting to go the extra mile to hire the differently abled is increasing.

Pavithra YS, a Bangalore-based entrepreneur, is another employer who prefers action to words. She set up Vindhya E-Infomedia Pvt Ltd, a business process outsourcing company offering IT and IT-enabled services, and gives employment preference to the orthopaedically challenged, hearing impaired and dyslexic.

"I have noticed that they are very efficient and have only gained more confidence... We must understand that their learning curve is a little higher as compared to others," she says.

Training and development play an important role. "The training is designed depending on the skill level of the resources. It involves classroom training about the process and applications used on a daily basis," Pavithra explains.

Besides training, it's important to create an inclusive environment and reciprocate their loyalty and help them shed their inhibitions. At Vindhya, these are basics, says Pavithra. "Some small changes like moving a wheelchair-bound person to an office chair with a bigger base and better wheels have helped. We have included sign language as part of the training to every employee"

The effort is to constantly innovate to ensure an equation of trust and confidence. "Trust has been the biggest asset in retaining them," says Dhruv, whose firm also hires differently abled women in keeping with its diversity agenda.

Khushru, Dhruv and Pavithra are amongst the few employers who are willing to step and bring change in the order. But their numbers are growing. More power to this breed!