We want to promote inclusion of people with disabilities in corporate boardrooms.
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Disability hiring and talent retention platform Inclusively’s latest offering is focused on addressing one of the most complex and long-standing issues impacting workplace diversity, equity and inclusion practices relating to candidates and employees with disabilities.
This has primarily to do with ensuring disability inclusion is rightfully recognised as a leadership-driven business priority, rather than confined within the confines of HR departments with little to no visibility in the boardroom, as has often been the case in the past.
St. Louis-based Inclusivly was founded in 2020 primarily as a recruiting platform that matches job seekers with positions with full transparency about both workplace disability accommodations and what employers can provide, avoiding the need for awkward and sometimes bias-inducing disclosures later in the hiring process. Last summer, the company launched its Retain platform, which deploys a similar artificial intelligence-based matching algorithm to help existing employees learn more about and request disability accommodations, so-called “success enablers.”
Inclusively’s answer to the fundamental disconnect between the operational and C-suite levels of HR is its new Leadership Board, which launched in January. The Inclusively Leadership Board is an invitation-only consortium of HR leaders, led by the Chief Human Resources Officer, that aims to harness collective intelligence and data insights through bespoke learning resources, webinars and in-person networking events, the first of which took place earlier this month.
ILB will anchor disability inclusion in the context of C-level leadership, allowing executives to share insights on important topics such as leveraging proprietary data, DEI trends, and adopting new technologies. Topics of discussion will include best practices for employee retention and accommodations, as well as how to navigate the rough waters of AI recruiting tools that can bring significant efficiencies and unwanted bias to the hiring process in equal measure.
Beyond HR silos
Inclusivly boasts clients such as Delta, Lyft, Accenture and New York Life, and closed a $13 million Series A round last November. The company’s COO and co-founder Sarah Bernard is quick to admit that ILB isn’t about reinventing the wheel, but rather about bridging the gaps and connecting the dots between elements of corporate culture that can often be too fragmented.
“After we launched Inclusively, we realized that a lot of the end users of our product aren’t executives who can look at the overall issue of DEI and disability inclusion. They might be responsible for one part of it, like accommodations or talent acquisition,” Bernard explains.
“What was missing was a connection point to figure out how this all fits into the bigger picture in rapidly changing workforce dynamics. Until now, disability inclusion in the enterprise has been very siloed. We thought if we could expand on this, we could help build a more modern framework that could help solve some of the big issues businesses face today.”
Business Fundamentals
John Singel is vice president of talent acquisition at Lyft and a member of the Inclusively Leadership Board. Singel agrees that prioritizing disability inclusion at companies requires broadening perspectives.
“These initiatives aren’t just HR initiatives. They’re business initiatives,” Singel explains.
“That’s the core idea we’re here to support and drive. It needs to come from the leadership level, but in the past there’s been a disconnect because executives have only been focused on financial performance and the latest product shipment results.”
Singel also appreciates the opportunities for learning and collaboration that the ILB provides.
“A big part of this effort is learning from and educating each other. I think creating a safe place to talk about best practices, learnings, failures and successes ultimately breaks down those silos. What I like about working for a company like Lyft, which has such an influential brand, is that we have the opportunity to influence not only our own internal efforts, but the efforts of other companies as well. We have a seat at the table with the ILB, so we can talk to other companies and learn from them.”
Make no mistake, there are long-term and significant negative trends regarding the employment of people with disabilities in business that need to be seriously addressed: According to the Center for Disability Research, the employment rate for people with disabilities is 30-40%, compared to 70% for people without disabilities.
But this isn’t just a static picture, and as Benard suggested, the modern, changing landscape is layered on top of this, making corporate DEI more complex and nuanced than ever before.
Elaborating further, Bernard said, “First there was the pandemic and everyone adapted to remote work. Now people are coming back to the office and want to bring a lot of the things they’re used to with them.”
She continues, “By 2030, millennials and Gen Z will make up two-thirds of the workforce. They grew up in an education system that was sensitive to learning disabilities and mental illnesses, and they’re demanding the same in the workplace. They’re also generations that grew up with personalization at their fingertips. So when you talk to employers, you need to explain that this is not going to go away. The demand for flexibility, personalization and accommodations is going to continue, and employers will need a much better, more scalable framework to meet them.”
Given this potentially volatile and rapidly changing environment, opportunities for learning, networking and dialogue that reach all the way to the top of an organisation are undoubtedly a unique value proposition.