Its been nearly 4 years since my full time contract of employment was terminated on medical grounds. It was the all time lowest point of my life. I felt a failure, worthless, no longer part of society, unable to contribute to the ever increasing costs of keeping a home for my family. All those feelings came rushing back recently when I decided I would try to go back to work and start looking for paid employment. I have a lot of experience and transferrable skills. Also I haven't sat on my oversized behind doing nothing with my life. I am learning British Sign Language, I have spent nearly 7 years (4 of those intensively) raising awareness of invisible disabilities and illnesses especially arthritis. I've campaigned for inclusion and diversity. Volunteered for a charity doing media pieces and talking about my experience of living with a disability. I set up and run the Invisible Challenge page on Facebook which is nearly at 22k like/followers. Oh! and I'm a Beaver Scout Leader and the Deputy County Commissioner for Inclusion for the County I belong too so you would think apart from my professional career in which I was a Risk and Compliance Manager, trained as a teacher, and completed my Management Licence with the Bank I worked with I would have a wealth of experience and knowledge but apparently I don't . You see have a number of disabilities one is rheumatoid arthritis and it causes extreme pain, fatigue and mobility challenges. I'm also hard of hearing and wear bilateral hearing aids.
I spent time updating my CV and received help from a number of people, one is a friend and others actually work in HR departments for various large companies or are hiring managers themselves. I got great feedback and help in optimising my CV. 2 people gave feedback which stated that my experience is really impressive and it will be very attractive to future employers.
I looked around and saw a number of roles that I know I could excel at. Some roles even mean I could be actually making a difference in the world rather than being what people call a "scrounger" on disability benefits. I hate that word. Hells teeth! I would rather be working than having to go through the indignity, stress and downright horror that is a DWP assessment to prove my conditions and disability. Another friend messaged me privately as they knew I was hoping to find paid employment. They have experience in such things and advised me NOT to declare my disability until I was invited to interview. The reason being they will see me as a person and not the disability. If they withdraw the interview after finding out my disability they are liable under the Disabilities Discrimination Act / Equalities Act.
Now I was under the impression that disability shouldn't be a barrier in this day and age but how wrong and naïve am I? Being the honest upfront person I am I didn't heed this persons advice and I declared my disability on the 3 applications I submitted because these employers are supposedly signed up to the Governments Disability Confident Scheme which guarantee's a disabled person an interview if they meet "at least the minimum criteria" for the role. Now I must have been way off the mark because the feedback I was given in all cases, and one role I could do with my eyes shut, was I don't have enough experience. I spoke to two friends as needed a sounding board and they had copies of the job specs. One is disabled and would dearly love to work, is studying again and does countless voluntary work, just like me. The other is one of my oldest friends, has a doctorate and is an all round good egg. Both said that I met more than the minimum criteria. So really, is signing up to the Disability Confident Scheme worth the paper its written on? and that because I do high level voluntary work why on earth would anyone pay me as voluntary work doesn't seem to have the same level of respect as paid employment. They both said that I should take a step back from the volunteering.
Funnily enough I have had a number of offers offering voluntary roles since. So I have plenty of experience to do voluntary work, enabling change, managing teams, inclusion/diversity roles ie: not being paid but it seems if I declare my disability I am not worthy of having paid employment. Realistically if an employer has applications from a number of able bodied people and a disabled person who meets at least the minimum criteria, are they actually going to offer the disabled person an interview? In my experience and in talking to the wider disabled community the answer is No.
So all those feelings of inadequacy, not being worthy, not being part of society, not being able to contribute, and being a failure all came rushing back. Disabled people want to be part of society and we want to work. We are able to work IF someone gives us a chance instead of writing us off. There is the Access to Work Scheme to help with the costs, but you need to have a job first. Yes an employer may have to put adjustments in place to enable us to be within the workplace but there is help via access to work for the cost of these. However my experience is nothing out of the ordinary and many other disabled people have the same experiences in trying to return to work or get into the workplace. My decision now will be if I find another role I am interested in and I know I can do, will I declare my disability? It will be interesting to see if I get an interview IF I don't declare it.
https://www.gov.uk/looking-for-work-if-disabled
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