A leading expert on inclusive recruitment says companies failing to consider candidates with a disability are ignoring large parts of the marketplace, and risk being left behind by smarter competitors.
“If you have people with disabilities within your staff team, you will have a better internal understanding of how to market to, how to design products or services for people with disabilities in the community,” Ms Hatton told“That’s a huge market to be ignoring. And I think that that’s beginning to become more of a realisation to some, certainly some of the larger companies.
“The unemployment rate of Australians living with disability is more than double that of the national average. We need to close that gap,” she said.“We know that 88 per cent of employed working-age people with disability do not require any specific arrangements from their employer to work, so for businesses experiencing skills shortages and crying out for workers, there’s no better time than now to look to hire people living with disability.
Ms Hatton said disability equality was often forgotten in workplaces. She welcomed renewed attention from Ms Rishworth and said major employers including financial institutions and big four consulting firms were leading the way.