How to Become an Inclusive Employer After COVID-19

Moderated by Trish Kelly of the Presidents Group, along with HR and inclusion experts Jamie Millar-Dixon and Kristin Bower, this informative webinar will equip business owners with the tools and know-how to build a welcoming and more inclusive workplace. This webinar was made in partnership with Small Business BC for Access Ability Week 2020.

Transcript

5 TRISH KELLY: Hi, everybody. I’m so happy to be here with

6 you today on the final day of Accessibility Week here

7 in Canada. I wanted to start today by acknowledging,

8 at least for myself coming to you from the unceded

9 territories of the Coast Salish peoples, the Squamish

10 and Tsleil-Waututh and Musqueam First Nations. Thank

11 you to Jillian and to Catherine who are helping

12 improve our accessibility of this webinar by providing

13 ASL and closed captioning.

14 I have a few things that I wanted to say about

15 Accessibility Week. Today, as I mentioned, is Friday

16 of this national initiative to raise awareness about

17 accessibility in Canada.

18 The Presidents Group is leadership table for

19 business owners of small businesses and CEOs of large

20 companies who have made a commitment to employing

21 people with disabilities. So this work means a lot to

22 us, and I’m glad that we could work with Small

23 Business BC and the incredible team there to provide

24 you with this whole week, as well as this really

25 compelling webinar about how you, too, can be an

1 inclusive employer.

2 As I mentioned, the week finishes today, and we

3 finish quite strong. We finished the week with

4 announcement with a — [echo] — that there will be

5 another — added to the…become more accessible

6 during — [echo] — the technology and employment.

7 I’m hearing an echo on my cell phone,and I’m

8 sorry about that. Luckily, I’m pretty much done…to

9 the rest of our presenters. I don’t know if someone

10 from Small Business BC can help with that echo? Maybe

11 I’ll try — how about this. Can you still hear me?

12 Yeah, okay, so…for myself.

13 So we have a really great agenda today for this

14 one-hour conversation with you, just the beginnings of

15 why accessibility and why an inclusion as an employer

16 is important. And Jamie Millar-Dixon and Kristen

17 Bower are going to walk you though some amazing

18 content that really covers the why, which is the

19 business benefit, the what, which is what is an

20 inclusive employer, and how does it impact your brand

21 as an employer and as a company in the community. And

22 then also some of the how. So you get a bit of each

23 of those, and they have great content. I don’t want

24 to delay getting over to them, so we’ll just move

25 along now.

1 Kristen Bower and Millar-Dixon have been working

2 in this space around inclusion for decades. They have

3 so much knowledge that they share, and I’m so glad

4 that we can connect their expertise to you as a

5 small-business audience.

6 So I’ll leave it and say take it away Jamie and

7 Kristen.

8 KRISTEN BOWER: Technical difficulties; right? And the

9 new crazy world of online webinars. So for some

10 reason, I can no longer see my slide deck, so I’m just

11 going to go with my notes of what we’re going to talk

12 about today, Jamie and I. We’re really excited to

13 have this time together to share some things that we

14 have always kind of known to be true through our

15 experience, but even more so we believe them to be

16 true because we spent quite a few months working with

17 some amazing employers in the Downtown Eastside of

18 Vancouver, but also some small business owners

19 throughout metro Vancouver as well. And that is the

20 result — as a result, we have been able to put

21 together an inclusive employment guidebook.

22 And so some of the things that we’re going to

23 talk about today — and you Jamie and I are going to

24 trade back and forth — we’re going to go through some

25 of the key human resources concepts, how to think of

1 recruitment in more inclusive ways. Traditionally we

2 thought about recruitment in a pretty narrow

3 definition: Who is the best person? And we know that

4 there are some things we can apply to make it more

5 inclusive. We’re going to talk about what are those

6 inclusive hiring practises and how they actually

7 benefit your business. So they’re good for people,

8 but they’re also really good for business. What are

9 the recruitment strategies that you can adopt in order

10 to access some untapped sources of really amazing

11 talent. And then share some of the key stories. You

12 can see many more case stories in the free resource.

13 But we’re going to go through some of the key studies

14 of small businesses that are already practising

15 inclusive hiring.

16 So as an employer — and if somebody could

17 advance the slide for me because I don’t have that up,

18 that would be great — as an employer, you’re very

19 likely seeing that many of the things that we thought

20 of as non-negotiables before COVID-19, are really now

21 back on the table. So for employers, you know, the

22 idea that many jobs could be done remotely probably

23 seemed impractical, and certainly I know that in the

24 work we do, working with different clients and

25 employers, there was always a little bit of reticence

1 around allowing employees to work remotely. But we’re

2 seeing through COVID-19, that actually it became an

3 imperative, and so employers were able to make it

4 happen.

5 You probably are much more aware of what your

6 employees need, you know. So, for example, who has

7 care-giving responsibilities for children, for

8 eldercare, who is having to juggle working from home

9 and managing childcare responsibilities? Who has

10 underlying health conditions? One of the things that

11 I will mention as well is that the Angus Reid

12 Institute did a study — they just related the results

13 three weeks ago. Typically we have heard the

14 statistic repeatedly: One in five Canadians will

15 experience a mental health challenge at some point in

16 their life. Angus Reid, through their study, were

17 able to ascertain that, as of right now, not in the

18 future, 50% of Canadians are currently experiencing a

19 mental health challenge as a result of what we’ve been

20 going through with the global pandemic. And then when

21 you add on top of that all of the things that we’ve

22 been seeing in the news in the past week or so in

23 regards to the death of George Floyd.

24 So there’s a lot going on, a lot of mental

25 health which is an invisible disability, and certainly

1 some visible diversabilities as well. And the good

2 news is that, you know, open communication,

3 transparency, encouraging your employees to talk about

4 what those challenges might be, and encouraging them

5 to bring their whole selves to work are really all

6 practises in inclusive employers. So employers who

7 weren’t doing that before have kind of had to, as a

8 result of the shifting replaced landscape over the

9 last few months.

10 The other thing that you’ve probably noticed of

11 late is that consumers are becoming much more

12 interested in how their purchasing decisions can

13 impact their community. So with the start of COVID,,

14 you know, as the global pandemic started to take hold

15 and impact Canadians businesses, Canadians were

16 becoming very aware of which were the organizations

17 that were donating to different charities, first

18 responders, who were pivoting in terms of the products

19 that they were creating and distributing. You know, a

20 really great example is all of the breweries that

21 we’ve seen from coast to coast that immediately

22 started, you know, saying, “Hey, we’ve got alcohol;

23 we’ve got bottles; we can make hand sanitizers.” And

24 a number of them were not only selling them, but

25 donating them. And so that is a huge thing.

1 The other thing I will add, because I think that

2 it’s, you know, really, really relevant that we do

3 talk about this. And I know Trish and Jamie and I

4 were just talking about it before we got on the

5 webinar is, you know, acknowledging what is happening

6 in terms of race issues.

7 And so I think a great example of an

8 organization back in 2017 that took a stand for

9 something that they believed in was Nike. And they

10 signed Colin Kaepernick to a sponsorship deal. And

11 that was a very controversial thing to do in 2017, but

12 boy, fast-forward three years, and it’s incredibly

13 relevant.

14 So, you know, consumers are taking, you know —

15 they’re watching what organizations are doing and how

16 they’re treating their employees, absolutely. And I

17 would also add that they’re — consumers are very

18 concerned that it’s not just about lip-service. So

19 don’t talk about being inclusive unless you’re

20 actually being inclusive. So the action is the really

21 important part to think about.

22 And so with that, I’m going to pass this over to

23 my partner, Jamie, and she’ll start to get into some

24 of the things that we learned within our research.

25 JAMIE MILLAR: …inclusive employment, and we developed a

1 business-to-business guide for employers on how to

2 adapt each stage in the recruitment and retention

3 process. This project was led by Mission Possible, a

4 social enterprise on the Downtown Eastside, and was

5 funded through the Ministry of Social Development and

6 Poverty Reduction.

7 A little bit about the guide. A hard-copy

8 launch, formal launch, of the guide was produced. We

9 were set to launch on March 11th, and on March 10th we

10 made the very difficult decision to postpone that

11 formal launch, and fortunately we did. But the

12 document is available online as a resource, and it’s

13 hosted currently on the Presidents Group site. We’ll

14 give you a links to that resource as well so you’ll

15 have that.

16 And in addition, we’ll be developing a series,

17 an e-learning series, of modules over the next couple

18 of months funded through the project I lead, BC

19 Partners in Workforce Innovation, BC WiN. And these

20 e-learning modules will be offered on a complimentary

21 basis to both BC WiN and for Presidents Group

22 employers, as well as the employers that Kristen works

23 to support in this field as well. So if you’re

24 interested, feel free and reach out following.

25 So much of what we’ll share with you is coming

1 from the guide, but also coming from the years of

2 experience that both Kris and I have had working with

3 employers on their inclusive hiring initiatives.

4 So what is inclusive employment? Well, it’s

5 really about having a workforce that reflects

6 community, the communities that we live in, do

7 business in. And in this case we’re talking

8 specifically about people with disabilities or those

9 with diversabilities, as I prefer to say, or others

10 facing barriers to employment. And those barriers

11 could be low literacy, cycles of poverty, lack of

12 stable housing, lack of stable social connections and

13 so on. And what it really involves for us, as

14 employers and as organizations, it means looking at

15 our traditional hiring practises to identify and

16 remove barriers that we may not even be aware of, that

17 unintentionally prevent people from being employed in

18 our businesses.

19 A little bit about the demographics here in

20 Canada. So approximately, and as Kristen said, 1 in 5

21 Canadians with mental health — will experience a

22 mental health condition in their lifetime.

23 Approximator one in five Canadians have some form of

24 disability or barrier, whether visible or not. 6.2

25 million Canadians, roughly 75% of people, acquire

1 their disability as adults, which is something that

2 surprised me when I first saw that stat. Canadian

3 Mental Health Commission tells us that by the time

4 Canadians reach 40 years of age, one in two will have

5 had or have experienced a mental illness. It includes

6 depression, anxiety, PTSD and addiction. Roughly 10%

7 of Canadians live in poverty. And the employment rate

8 for people with disabilities is half of what it is for

9 people without disabilities. So there is a largely

10 untapped pool of people who are ready, willing, and

11 able to work out there.

12 I’m managing two screens here, so pardon me as I

13 go back and forth between them.

14 So there’s a lot of really clear data. The

15 research is clear, hard to argue with. Hiring people

16 with diversabilities is actually good for business,

17 and we’ll share some of that information with you.

18 Pre-COVID we were facing fairly significant labour

19 shortages in Canada. You probably experienced this as

20 you were hiring before March of this year. We

21 actually have no indications that these advantages

22 will change post-COVID. And actually may become even

23 more relevant than ever as consumers become more aware

24 of their purchasing and as our society comes out of

25 this period more compassionate than ever, which I

1 happen to believe we will. We still have an aging

2 baby boomer population, we still have increased

3 retirements, declining birth rate, although this year

4 may be an exception, I’m not sure. Fairly steady job

5 growth, and fewer people to fill those opportunities.

6 That’s what we were experiencing just three months

7 ago.

8 The 2018 report by the Business Development Bank

9 of Canada concluded that those labour shorts were

10 holding Canadian businesses back and were most serious

11 in Atlantic Canada, British Columbia, and Ontario. A

12 recent study, Deloitte study of 750 hiring decision

13 makers, 76% indicated that attracting candidates was

14 their No. 1 challenge in their organization. Yet

15 there’s this whole pool of people who can work and

16 want to contribute and are often overlooked.

17 Recruitment practises — we look at this as our

18 traditional employment practises — those were

19 recruitment practises that we have in place in many of

20 our organizations are typically aimed at screening

21 candidates out. They once served a purpose, when

22 there was an abundance of candidates for every job,

23 but in today’s labour market it’s simply outdated.

24 Some really great data on the Presidents Group

25 website. If you haven’t seen this, I encourage you to

1 have a visit to the site. There’s a lot of great

2 resources there.

3 Why is hiring people with disabilities good for

4 business? Well, we were trending by 2029 BC employers

5 will need to fill an estimated 861,000 job openings,

6 and we have an opportunity to engage the over 614,000

7 working-age British Columbians to fill those job

8 openings.

9 And the data shows that, as consumers, we prefer

10 to see ourselves reflected and valued in the companies

11 we do business with, and that may get even stronger as

12 we move ahead. Being inclusive of people from

13 different backgrounds with different skillsets and

14 abilities actually increases an organization’s

15 financial success through an increased consumer base.

16 And the research shows us that staff retention rate is

17 higher, attendance is average or better. This is

18 reports from employers. 90% said employment was equal

19 to or better than co-workers without disabilities.

20 Organizations that are diverse and inclusive are

21 twice as likely to meet or exceed financial goals, six

22 times more likely to be innovative. How important is

23 that these days? And six times more likely to be able

24 to effectively manage change.

25 For your business, that gives you an expanded

1 consumer reach. Over $55 billion Canadian, that’s the

2 annual buying power of Canadians with a disabilities,

3 and when you add family and friends into that and the

4 stories that are told about how your business is

5 valued, how you are valued by that business, that

6 grows to over $366 billion Canadian annually.

7 So a consumer advantage, a financial advantage,

8 talent advantage, innovation advantage. The question

9 really is can your business afford not to be

10 inclusive? When Kris and I spoke with different

11 leaders and organizations that were seen as being

12 inclusive and supportive, we asked their leaders,

13 “What is motivating you to be inclusive?” And there

14 are many reasons why business leaders choose to

15 provide an inclusive workplace. It’s different for

16 every company. But many will say they are driven to

17 be inclusive because (a) they clearly understand the

18 business advantage; they get it, or they have personal

19 experience, either themselves or a family member,

20 close friend with adversity or barriers to employment,

21 they’re motivated to make a positive difference to

22 others, they take intentional steps to make sure that

23 their workforce reflects the communities and customers

24 that they do business in. Really interesting data for

25 the millennial generation. They’re a generation where

1 inclusion is valued and expected. And for some it’s

2 their mission, and they’ve established their business

3 with inclusion in mind. We think of some of the

4 social enterprises in particular.

5 I love this quote from an employer…and the

6 employer quote is hiring manages who believe in the

7 value of everyone in the workplace, it really pays

8 off. When employees enjoy coming into work, there’s

9 such a real sense of purpose. They feel connected to

10 each other and the community, they have increased

11 self-esteem by contributing to something, and this

12 holds true for all employees, not just people with

13 barriers.

14 So we are still operating in a time where we

15 need talent on deck, we need all talent on deck. And

16 we need to address those challenges and barriers that

17 have typically excluded people from the workplace.

18 Kris is now going to talk to us next about

19 employer branding. I’m going to turn this back over

20 to my colleague Kristen.

21 KRISTIN BOWER: Great, thanks, Jamie. And I’ll ask you to

22 keep moving the slides forward for me, please.

23 So yeah, we’re going to talk a little bit now

24 about external brand image and internal brand image.

25 So how do you promote what that external brand is to

1 drive recruitment, and to tap into that really large

2 talent pool that is largely untapped, and promoting

3 the internal brand that really drives retention,

4 engagement and productivity.

5 So let’s talk a little bit about what are the

6 five key elements of a really strong employer brand.

7 So those would be culture, work environment, career

8 opportunities, compensation, and benefits. So let’s

9 explore a little bit about what these are from an

10 inclusion perspective, because I think that when you

11 see those five if, you know, worked in this — in

12 human resources or recruitment or any business,

13 really, you get that those are really important

14 elements. But what do they mean from an inclusion

15 perspective?

16 So really when we start to explore a little bit

17 about culture, a healthy workplace culture is really

18 one that is built on trust, collaboration,

19 responsibility, and support. And so it’s about, you

20 know, aligning your employer brand with the company’s

21 values, and it’s made up of positive relationships

22 between colleagues, managers, and leaders. It’s about

23 relationship building, and how you build relationships

24 is through trust and collaboration. Can you hear my

25 dog barking in the background? I apologize that.

1 Just ignore him.

2 So, yes, to go back to workplace culture.

3 Caring, empathetic managers are really crucial. And,

4 you know, I think probably 10 years ago if we brought

5 up the idea of empathy in the workplace, you know, we

6 might think oh, my gosh, there’s no place for empathy

7 in the workplace, it’s about work. You come to work;

8 you do your job; you go home. But the more that we

9 learn about what inclusive leadership is, we know that

10 empathy is actually a superpower. So I really can’t

11 underline that enough. Empathetic managers are

12 absolutely crucial to inclusive workplaces. And

13 through coaching and encouragement, you can set up

14 your employees for success.

15 So the second one here is work environment,

16 factors that really contribute to a positive work

17 environment range really from understanding what your

18 job responsibilities are to having a healthy work/life

19 balance. And of course I will mention that, you know,

20 these things also mean — they have different

21 definitions to different people, because we are all

22 different; we are all unique. So work/life balance to

23 me might mean something different to Jamie or to

24 Trish. A sense of autonomy, personal achievement,

25 respect, recognition. And I will say that all of

1 these things, if you’re ever curious about the

2 national standard for psychological health and safety

3 in the workplace, these are all psychosocial factors

4 that have been identified as really crucial to

5 creating a psychologically safe and healthy workplace,

6 and really you could use another word which is

7 “inclusion”.

8 Career opportunities. So inclusive employers

9 will focus on capacity building through training,

10 coaching and feedback. They provide flexible job

11 opportunities which goes to — it’s about engaging

12 people in a number of different ways to work. So

13 traditionally we used to think, you know, you put a

14 round peg in a round hole, and that person has to fit

15 that work. Inclusive employers will also identify

16 what someone’s capacity is, what they can do as

17 opposed to just focussing on what they can’t do, and

18 making them fit into a box.

19 Compensation and benefits, we know those things

20 are important. But there’s also another way of

21 looking at them from an inclusive lens. So employee

22 satisfaction with compensation and rewards. Some

23 considerations would be fairness and equity. Equity

24 is an important concept. It doesn’t necessarily

25 always mean equality. Equity is a really important

1 thing.

2

Supportive employers also consider whether

3 nontraditional compensation may be of value, including

4 bonuses, meal plans, transit passes. I know that

5 these are some things that employers are already

6 doing. Not all of them, though, so it’s important to

7 take a look at what might provide value to your

8 employees overall. And to help really attract, you

9 know, a diverse talent pool. And benefits could be of

10 course, you know, certainly like the sort of the

11 standard typical benefits such as health care. But

12 other things such as personal days, wellness

13 initiatives. There’s a client of mine that I work

14 with that have just said, you know, you get X number

15 of dollars per year. If buying a bike is your thing

16 to be well, then here is your money to buy a bike. If

17 taking that money to take a course, and maybe it’s a

18 guitar class, but that helps your mental health.

19 That’s what you use the money for. There’s also a

20 member of the Steering Committee, one of the inclusive

21 employers from the Downtown Eastside, who Jamie spoke

22 with, and he spoke about the fact that they have a,

23 it’s almost like a cabin, I think on Vancouver island

24 that they had in the past used that for employees as a

25 benefit, something that some of their employees from

1 the Downtown Eastside have never even gotten out of

2 the Downtown Eastside. And so for them to be able to

3 go and spend time in nature was a really wonderful

4 benefit and opportunity for them.

5 So there’s opportunity to think outside of the

6 box. Just because we’ve always offered standard

7 benefits doesn’t mean that those standard benefits

8 meet everybody’s needs or are even valued any longer.

9 So there’s opportunity absolutely right now to take

10 another look at what we’re offering in terms of our

11 employee value proposition and our brand.

12 So some of the tips that we have around how to

13 strengthen your brand would be around championing

14 inclusion. So that means that you’re actually walking

15 the walk on it. You’re not just talking about it, but

16 you’re actually doing it. You’re hiring people.

17 You’re focussing on abilities. This is something I

18 mentioned earlier. You’re focussing on what a person

19 can do as opposed to what they can’t do. So when you

20 are looking at adding somebody to your team — and I

21 think a good recruiter will always do this, they’ll

22 talk with the person who is hiring and say, “Okay tell

23 me about your team makeup right now. Is everybody —

24 if you’re hiring accountants, are they all at a really

25 senior level and you could actually afford to bring in

1 somebody who is perhaps a little bit more junior and

2 train them up?

3 You know, it’s really important to talk a little

4 bit about what is the current composition of your

5 workforce, where are your skills and abilities, and

6 who can you bring in to complement those skills and

7 abilities, and not just for now, but in the future.

8 So what can somebody bring to your organization over

9 in the next few years? You know, I think we’ve heard

10 this a lot, Simon Sinek has said it before: Hire for

11 fit and train for skills. So there’s opportunity to

12 do that as well.

13 Set and communicate inclusive hiring goals. And

14 this is important. I’m working with a client right

15 now around increasing representation of women in tec.

16 And to really explain the “why” is so important,

17 because you don’t want to fall into that pitfall,

18 really, which is, “Oh, we’re just firing to get that

19 number up. We need to have X number of women, X

20 number of people with diversabilities.” No, it

21 shouldn’t be that, it should be that you’re doing it

22 for all the right reasons, but you also need to

23 communicate that.

24 Set the goals. I think there is value in

25 setting goals and working towards them, but the

1 communication and the “why” is really crucial.

2 Something Jamie and I both really strongly

3 believe in is partnering with community organizations

4 for recruitment. When I was an in-house recruiter and

5 an in-house diversity and inclusion manager, we worked

6 very intentionally with some really wonderful

7 organizations, certainly BC WiN — sorry, Jamie, I’m

8 going to put a plug-in for you guys — but there’s a

9 lot of really great organizations out there. And if

10 you build a relationship with them, not just when you

11 immediately need someone to hire, like, yesterday, but

12 if you build a relationship with that partner and get

13 to know them; they get to know you, you’re going to

14 have a higher-quality of candidate, and, you know,

15 that supportive organization, that community

16 organization with that expertise. And it could be in

17 a number of different areas. It could be around

18 people with diversabilities, it could be indigenous

19 organizations, it could be new immigrants or refugees,

20 people with mental health challenges and lived

21 experience. There’s a lot of really great

22 organizations to partner with. So don’t feel like you

23 have to be the expert. There are a lot of great

24 experts out there that can support you.

25 I think the fifth — sixth point here is a

1 really important one. We’ve been talking about it a

2 lot over the last few years, and certainly more and

3 more organizations are investing the time and the

4 money in unconscious bias training. I do believe it’s

5 a foundational element when you’re having these

6 diversity and inclusion conversations, and working

7 towards inclusion, because we all have bias. As David

8 Rock of the NeuroLeadership Institute in the US says,

9 if you have a brain, you have biased. So we need to

10 recognize that bias in order to mitigate it. And so

11 there’s differently some great work that can be done

12 in that area that will provide some lift within your

13 organization.

14 So you really want to shift, prepare for, create

15 a culture of inclusion in your workplace, and that can

16 include a number of different things that I’ve spoken

17 about. It could be training, you know, it could be

18 having conversations. Even just starting

19 conversations is an important piece.

20 So when we talk now a little bit more about

21 inclusive employer branding, you can be really

22 creative actually when it comes to designing your

23 employment brand. So just some quick tips that we

24 have seen that have worked really effectively in the

25 past for other employers, and certainly again I’ll

1 direct you back to the guide book, because there are

2 some great case studies in there. You know, highlight

3 your employees. Put your employees on your website.

4 Maybe a “day in the life,” so that those potential new

5 employees can see what it’s actually like to actually

6 work in your organization.

7 You can have video testimonials; you can

8 highlight employees with diversabilities, and just in

9 fact diversity overall. I know for myself, and

10 perhaps I am a little biased because I’m a diversity

11 and inclusion specialist, but whenever I work with a

12 new client, or if I’m curious about an organization,

13 the first thing I do is I look on their website and

14 look to see who their senior leadership is. Is there

15 diversity in their senior leadership? What does their

16 careers page look like? You know, is it just a bunch

17 of white people?

18 So it’s a really big opportunity on your careers

19 page to showcase who you are, what you believe in, and

20 what your people look like. And I mean that literally

21 and figuratively.

22 Yeah, the other thing I would mention, and,

23 again, I’ve heard this from colleagues, I’ve

24 experienced it myself when I worked in-house, but

25 employee resource groups, so seeking feedback from an

1 ERG, which is an Employee Resource Group, is an

2 amazing resource. Employer resource groups, if you

3 don’t have them in your organization, I would

4 recommend that you consider starting them. They can

5 be a wonderful tool, not only to give employees from a

6 wide variety of backgrounds a voice in your

7 organization, but they can also provide you really

8 valuable, important feedback. So they can advise you

9 on your employer brand, and things that I spoke about

10 earlier, like your compensation and benefits. Go to

11 the experts; ask your employees what’s important to

12 them, and how, you know, they can help you to attract

13 diverse candidates.

14 You know, an organization, a business that is

15 seen as providing employees with a caring, respectful

16 place to work is really highly valued in today’s

17 employment market, absolutely. Jamie and I hear this

18 constantly from our clients, we certainly heard it

19 from the steering committee members and the research

20 that we did for the guide book, and I think it’s worth

21 mentioning that we also did a number of focus groups

22 with employees from those organizations, and they were

23 all, you know — everybody was singing from the same

24 songbook; they were saying the same thing. You know,

25 this can really be leveraged to make it easier and

1 more cost-effective for you to hire and retain from a

2 much wider talent pool.

3 The next slide is an example of an inclusion tip

4 that we’ve included — no pun included — within the

5 guide book. There are a number of tips that really

6 stood out from the steering committee members. And

7 this is one that I love, and I think it’s fair to say

8 it’s one of Jamie’s and my favourite tips, and that is

9 really about asking the experts. So what this tip

10 says is the best way to ensure that your employee

11 value proposition hits the mark with inclusion is to

12 ask the experts: Your employees. Ask what they like

13 most about working with your company. If they view

14 the business to be supportive, and what you can do to

15 provide a more inclusive environment. Including all

16 staff in these conversations. You can do this through

17 team meetings and informal online survey, one-on-one

18 meetings, focus groups, or through an employee

19 engagement or inclusion survey. You can also reach

20 out to a community partner for ideas and support. You

21 know, I’ll share just a really quick example of an

22 organization that a few years ago decided that they

23 were going to hire somebody with some significant

24 diversabilities, significant barriers to mobility.

25 And they had the right intention: They got a number of

1 people sitting at the table to ensure that the hiring

2 and on-boarding would be successful. And guess who

3 was the one person that was not literally at the

4 table? It was the person that they were hiring. And

5 unfortunately the person ended up leaving because they

6 hadn’t been engaged in the conversation.

7 And so it’s so important to always go back, ask

8 the expert. If it’s somebody that has been

9 experiencing barriers and challenge for most of their

10 life, I’ll tell you, they’ve got a lot of life

11 experience that they can share.

12 So I’m going to pass this back now to Jamie, and

13 she’s going to take you through some of the next

14 steps.

15 JAMIE MILLAR: …Kristen on employers branding, thank you

16 for that. So I’m going to cover off different stages

17 in the recruitment process, the hiring practice,

18 various ways to make sure or adapt your hiring

19 practises so that you make sure inclusion is included

20 in that process. And before looking at specific

21 practises, we’re going to start with barriers to

22 employment. Barriers can be personal barriers

23 experienced by the individual, or barriers that are

24 present in the workplace, combined with unconscious

25 bias towards people who face multiple barriers. This

1 can keep an individual in a constant cycle of

2 unemployment, underemployed, and poverty.

3 So some of the typical barriers to employment

4 are attitudes towards people who are different. Some

5 HR policies and practises, whether intentional or not,

6 can be a barrier. Rigid hiring processes

7 traditionally aimed at screening people out: If an

8 individual has a learning disability, poor

9 self-esteem, a mental illness, lack of readiness, or

10 lives in poverty, that can be a fairly significant

11 barrier to employment, and of course unconscious bias

12 and stereotypes, and Kristen touched on that a little

13 earlier as well.

14 Rethinking work. So we have an opportunity,

15 especially now, to rethink how work is performed in

16 our organizations. Not all jobs need to be full-time;

17 not all job seekers wants or needs to work full time,

18 and I think especially through this period of being

19 redeployed from home and working from home, it’s going

20 to provide us with some interesting opportunities

21 going forward.

22 When you’re rethinking work, being flexible is

23 key, and it can be a real win for both the

24 organization and the individual. You can rethink how

25 jobs are structured and delivered and performed. Your

1 business may even have temporary needs or one-of needs

2 that, for someone to do certain tasks, either once a

3 week, once a month, a casual basis, part-time, as well

4 as full-time. We’ll talk a little bit about that as

5 well as we move forward.

6 We do have inclusion tips sort of scattered

7 throughout different phases of the hiring process, and

8 this is one that we heard from an employer.

9 Flexibility is key, so with new distancing guidelines

10 comes more spacious workplaces, in some settings at

11 least, which could result in the workspace being more

12 contusive for somebody who uses a wheelchair for

13 somebody for mobility, for example. But if you are a

14 move supportive employer, you will gain access to a

15 wider talent pool. Are you open to being flexible,

16 working-from-home options as a result of the COVID-19

17 experience? What alternative work arrangements are

18 now more possible than they were before? It certainly

19 accelerated working from home.

20 When things to do — when you’re looking at your

21 website and careers page — start by making sure that

22 the website is accessible, that your application

23 process — you know, is your application process

24 creating an intended barrier? Some of the things to

25 include on your website and careers page: Your mission

1 and vision and values, any employment recognition

2 awards that you’ve received, either as a small

3 business, a medium business, or a large business.

4 What makes you stand out as an employer of choice, as

5 an inclusive employee of choice? You should include

6 how to apply to positions, including accessible

7 options for someone who can’t navigate an online

8 process, for example. You should highlight the

9 recruitment and selection process, and any supports

10 that are available for people with diversabilities, if

11 required. And then who to contact if that person

12 requires support with the process to apply to work

13 with your company.

14 If you’re not sure if your website or your

15 careers page on your website is accessible, ask a

16 diverse group of people to test-drive it for you. Be

17 sure to include people who are — blind or have a

18 visual impairment, people with autism or diverse

19 cognitive abilities, or people who live with a mental

20 illness. It will give you a fairly wide advisory

21 group on how accessible your careers page really is.

22 Job postings. Consider whether where your

23 posting opportunity — where your posting

24 opportunities and where you might draw the best

25 candidate pools. Some things to think about: Do

1 invite applicants from diverse backgrounds and

2 abilities to apply? Do you have a statement that

3 encourages people who — from diverse backgrounds to

4 apply with your company? Partner in local job fairs

5 and hiring events hosted by community partners. I

6 know there’s lots of organizations, especially here in

7 the lower mainland, that provide job fairs, and

8 they’re free of charge to participate most times.

9 People with disabilities actually use Linked-In and

10 Indeed as part of their job search, too. And if you

11 have need for one-of, casual labour there are groups

12 like EMBERS Staffing Solutions, for example, in the

13 Downtown Eastside who can help with that, some of the

14 social enterprises as well. You could be creating

15 some info employment for people in your community by

16 expanding how you source candidates.

17 Language. Another key thing, before posting

18 your job, is to review the language in your job

19 description for anything that is not inclusive. You

20 can ask for someone else’s feedback on that. They

21 might even help you identify some unconscious bias

22 that’s in there, again, whether you realize it or not.

23 Do you really need to have that level of

24 qualifications, skills, and previous experience that

25 you’ve always asked for, or have things changed since

1 the last time you posted or hired for that job? Have

2 a look at your job descriptions and look at what you

3 can reasonably adjust to be more inclusive and

4 encourage applicants from a larger talent pool to

5 apply with your business.

6 Some of the things you can do to be deliberate

7 and intentional with your recruitment: First of all,

8 taking an intentional active outreach to recruit

9 diverse talent, look at developing candidate

10 pipelines, work with some of the service organizations

11 in the lower mainland. I think we’ve got two really

12 great organizations that I could see earlier

13 registered on this webinar. Open Door Group works

14 with a lot of the Vancouver catchments and WCB works

15 with employers in the Burnaby catchment. Reach out to

16 those organizations, and see what they can do to help

17 you develop a candidate pool, provide training, help

18 you support job seekers. Again, a lot of it is free

19 to you as an employer. And then hire from a trained

20 candidate pool, so you can develop training to prepare

21 people for opportunities in your organizations, and

22 then hire from that candidate pool when people have

23 finished their training. Adapt your interviews and

24 assessment tools. Behaviour-based interviews, for

25 example, can be really tricky, and we’ll talk about

1 that next. Invite people on site for exclusive hiring

2 events in your organization on a specific day.

3 Disclosure is a big one, but have some open

4 dialogue on expectations with a focus on abilities in

5 relation to the opportunity. You know, asking what

6 adjustments would bring out the best in each candidate

7 will help benefit every candidate. Working with a job

8 coach, if that person requires the job coach that

9 will help bring out their best in the interview, and

10 help set up that employment relationship up for

11 success. You can use work experience, job shadowing,

12 internships, practicums, all the way to build a

13 candidate pool for your organization — and again,

14 another shameless club for BC WiN; we’re happy to

15 help.

16 When you’re considering your applications, I

17 guess, you know, is there a way? Are you open to

18 prioritizing job seekers with diversabilities? Are

19 you — that’s one way to sort of — I’ve heard this

20 referred to as “stack the deck.” If you’re

21 intentional about your efforts to be inclusive, you

22 may want to intentionally screen in applicants who

23 identify as having a disability. This is a chance to

24 easily increase the diversity within your selection

25 process and provide an opportunity for people who are

1 traditionally under-represented. Again, if they don’t

2 have the skills, or the person is not a good match,

3 they can then be screened out.

4 Disclosure. You may not know if the candidate

5 identifies as having a disability, is from a different

6 group, unless you encourage and provide opportunities

7 for disclosure. While you can’t ask the person if

8 they have a disability, you can ask them to let you

9 know if they require any accommodations or ask what

10 adjustments, if any, would be required for that

11 candidate to do their best work.

12 Examples would be a stand-up desk if the person

13 has back pain or a quiet work space to enable

14 concentration, check-lists for people who have diverse

15 abilities, or early start times to accommodate any

16 regular medical appointments. But these opportunities

17 can come up at any stage, really, either the referring

18 partner organization, at hiring events, in the

19 application process. All of those areas any time in

20 the employment relationship disclosure can occur.

21 Also consider different types of interviews;

22 right? We know about telephone interviews. We’re

23 doing a lot more virtual ones. At least our team has

24 been lately. In-person interviews. But one area you

25 might not be as familiar with is a working interview

1 or work trial. And we’ll talk about that in a couple

2 of minutes.

3 A tip for you in terms of adjusting your

4 interviews. It could be holding the interview in a

5 quiet space, if the person gets overwhelmed by noise,

6 or wheelchair accessible if the applicant uses a

7 wheelchair for mobility. Understanding those

8 communication options for people who are deaf or hard

9 of hearing.

10 Shifting to non-behaviour-based questions for

11 people with autism, or having a job coach present to

12 support candidates with diverse cognitive abilities.

13 The reason why we’re suggesting — I don’t know

14 how many organizations are currently using — within

15 small business — are currently using behaviour-based

16 questions. Chances are, you are. Certainly medium

17 and larger employers have long used behaviour-based

18 questions. The reason why these are so tricky for

19 people with diverse cognitive abilities is there’s so

20 many options in the range the way the questions are

21 asked, and people can get lost in all of that verbiage

22 in the way the questions are asked.

23 I spoke to you about working trials and working

24 interviews. A really great approach, very effective

25 at determining whether a candidate can learn or do

1 task-oriented jobs, especially useful for people with

2 diverse cognitive abilities, people who are nonverbal,

3 for example, or people whose anxiety gets in the way

4 of communicating well in a structured interview is

5 show-do review. So the candidate is shown how to do a

6 task, for example, data entry or filing or recycling,

7 has an opportunity to do the task after being shown

8 how to do it, and then strengths are reviewed on how

9 well the candidate performed. It’s very effective

10 interview style, and if you have not used it before, I

11 encourage you to work with some of the local service

12 organizations to help facilitate that in your company.

13 Yeah, personality assessments, also some

14 organizations use psychometric testing. Those tests

15 can be very tricky for people, again, with diverse

16 cognitive abilities, especially some folks with

17 autism, very detail oriented, can get stuck in the

18 question of “do I strongly agree?” “Do I agree?” “Do

19 I somewhat agree?” Like, really that whole process of

20 asking those types of questions, a person does not do

21 well; it’s not a reflection of their personality. I

22 would rely more on an interview to assess that.

23 And then finally just a couple of final points

24 here. In your job offer, so offers of employment, if

25 an accommodation or workplace adjustment has been

1 identified during the interview process, you can

2 include this in the Letter of Offer. So, for example,

3 you know, “Our company is committed to accommodating

4 the needs of employees with diversabilities to ensure

5 these are in place to begin work. Here is what we

6 have put in place,” and then actively offer, “if

7 there’s anything else that you need, as you start the

8 job, let us know.” Then that way you’re putting that

9 active offer out there.

10 And finally broadening references. This is

11 especially important for people who have not been in

12 the workforce recently or at all, is considering to

13 broaden those references. Typically we look for

14 previous employment references, but they might just

15 not be there. It could a supervisor from a volunteer

16 job, an employment program manager, a job coach, an

17 instructor, somebody who is able to provide some

18 relevant, valuable information on the person’s

19 strengths and ability to do that job.

20 So as we mentioned earlier that we had a chance

21 to speak with a number of people who benefitted from

22 inclusive hiring, supportive hiring initiative as part

23 of the development of the business-to-business guide.

24 So we asked a number of people who faced barriers to

25 employment: Having a job, what does that mean with

1 you? I just wanted to share some of that with you.

2 [Displaying the comments]…

3 It’s really to remind us to never underestimate

4 the power of having a job, that sense of purpose and

5 worth, aside from the financial benefits that having a

6 job provides purpose and meaning in connection to

7 others. And these are just some of the words that

8 people shared with us, and we wanted to share that

9 with you.

10 So at this stage I’m going to turn it this back

11 over to my colleague, Kristen, and we’re happy to take

12 your questions.

13 KRISTIN BOWER: Great, thanks, Jamie. Yeah, I just wanted

14 to really underline what you just said, that

15 employment is much more than having a job. Something

16 that I have said frequently, and I believe this to be

17 true, is that employment is social and financial

18 inclusion. People don’t just work to earn a pay

19 cheque, they work because of social networks, they

20 work to have a sense of connection and belonging, and

21 that they’re contributing to something. So really

22 employing people from diverse areas and levels of

23 ability helps us to build stronger communities. And I

24 think that’s a really important thing for us to all

25 work towards.

1 Now I do want to acknowledge it’s 11:31, and I

2 know we did start a few minutes later than the

3 original start time, so certainly Jamie and Trish and

4 I are available to stay on and answer any questions

5 that you may want to pose for the next few minutes.

6 And certainly we’re available off-line as well, and I

7 know that Trish has been posting things in the chat

8 box as well around resources.

9 So if there’s any questions, we would love to

10 hear them and answer them for you.

11 TRISH KELLY: Might we suggest to say a quick good-bye,

12 and thank you to those that may need to be moving on

13 to the next part of their agenda, and then we’ll stick

14 around to answer any questions that haven’t been in

15 the chat box yet. But I wanted to say thank you so

16 much, Jamie and Kristen, for sharing your knowledge,

17 and for allowing the Presidents Group to host the

18 Untapped Talent Guide Book on our website. You will

19 be able to download a copy of the slides from today,

20 but you also have access to that very comprehensive

21 guide that much of this content was drawn from.

22 And I want to say thank you to everyone that did

23 make it to this call today. I know that this has been

24 an incredibly difficult week for many people in the

25 organizations, and many of you as business owners, and

1 on top of the pandemic, which was part of the reason

2 that we brought this webinar together, there has been

3 even more that has come up that is competing for your

4 attention, and I really want to say thank you for your

5 demonstration of your inclusion by being here with us

6 today. And if you want more support in terms of doing

7 this work, we shared the Presidents Group website:

8 Accessibleemployers.ca. There is a lot of

9 information, an entire resource out there to join our

10 community of accessible employers, and become part of

11 the community of others that are taking this work on

12 as well.

13 So thank you so much to everyone. And there was

14 one question that came up in the chat, which I know

15 that Micaela from the Presidents Group did put one

16 answer together, but I wonder if maybe Kristen or

17 Jamie, you might want to tackle it as well from your

18 very tenured perspectives. I don’t know I can see it

19 right now on my screen, but it was a question around

20 given what’s been going on with the amount of

21 antiblack racism in the States and how that’s

22 affecting our media consumption and our work places,

23 do you have any commentary around the intersection of

24 how we deal with inclusion, accessibility, and racism

25 in the workplace. Is that something that you would be

1 able to give any comments on when you’re recruiting,

2 especially I think the question was around getting

3 started as a — with your hiring practises and from

4 that lens.