Zoë Wundenberg | People with disabilities disadvantaged by misunderstandings around productivity

Furthermore, with Australia ranking 21st out of 29 OECD countries for labour force participation for people with a disability, it is unsurprising that research identifies employment prospects as one of the central causes for the elevated risk of poverty among people with a disability.

The Human Rights Commission has identified nine key barriers to employment for people with disability. These include health issues and disability-related limitations, but there is also a lack of available jobs, limited assistance in finding, securing and maintaining employment, experiences of discrimination in both the recruitment process and the workplace, low confidence levels in knowing what they have to offer a workplace, and skills gaps in negotiating reasonable adjustments in the workplace.

It's not just the disabled person experiencing barriers. Businesses of all sizes and sectors are often hampered by limited resources for making reasonable adjustments including roster flexibility and changes to the physical space, lacking knowledge regarding how to support workers with a disability, and difficulties in complying with complex compliance laws and regulations encompassing anti-discrimination, employment, WHS, workers compensation, insurances and more.

However, the biggest issue I have seen in the 17 years I've been working in career development, HR and recruitment has been misunderstanding.

I think it's important to frame this as "misunderstanding" and not "attitudes" because to claim "attitudes" towards hiring people with a disability are the issue assumes that there is knowledge informing that stance, when often it is a challenge of perspective: businesses misunderstand hiring a person with a disability to be a charity. And they've been "taught" to think that way because of productivity misconceptions.

The Supported Wage System (SWS) has been in place in Australia since 1994 and was developed in consultation with industrial authorities, employers, trade unions, disability peak bodies, government departments and employment agencies specialised in working with people with a disability. It utilises "independent assessors" to determine an eligible individual's productivity capacity against the performance standards of other employees undertaking the same work in the workplace. This assessment then informs the percentage of the wage attributed to the role under the award or enterprise agreement they will be paid.

For some people with a disability under this scheme, that pay is as low as $2.75/hour, with a minimum weekly pay of $95.

That wasn't a typo.

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I understand there are people with disability who cannot offer the same technical productivity levels as other workers, and that it seems unfair to the business to have to pay those "less productive" workers a full wage. I also acknowledge there is more value to working than the pay packet at the end of the week.

However, when I consider the role of employment barriers in connection to people with disability living in poverty, I cannot help but wonder if this program is actually contributing to the problem rather than providing a solution.

In particular, the connection between physical output and wage reduction is problematic. A person's contribution to the work environment is very difficult to quantify holistically, but limiting the assessment to looking at how long it takes a person to complete a workplace task fails to acknowledge the positive impact they can have on the productivity of those around them. Contributing to a positive workplace culture, providing friendship, support and confidence building, together with morale and motivation are all important parts of a person's capacity in the workplace and none of this is taken into account.

People with a disability often offer different benefits to the workplace than can be measured on a graph. I think that programs like the SWS are ultimately undervaluing people living with disability for what they have to offer a workplace.

If we are taught that time taken per task equals productivity, then we are forgetting that we are not robots and have value beyond the bottom line. When your time is not considered as valuable as the person's sitting next to you, this can create a far from positive work culture that affects everyone.