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Supporting managers and building their capability
MAC objective 6: Reduced complexity, cost and risk for managers employing people with disability
APS agencies should ensure that managers in their organisations have the knowledge, skills and support they need to recruit and manage people from the diverse Australian community that the APS serves, including people with disability.
What can we do?
1. Provide managers with access to information and expertise
Many managers are concerned that employing people with disability is complex, time consuming and expensive. To address these concerns, agencies should ensure that managers have ready access to a source of information and expertise, such as the material in this toolkit, within the agency and/or ready access to external sources of information and assistance.
The Department of Employment and Workplace Relations has created a website and information line called Jobaccess,95 which is designed to be a ‘one-stop shop’ for all matters relating to the employment of people with disability. Although the information it contains is not specifically targeted towards the APS, it contains a wealth of useful information for APS agencies, including information on different types of disability, information about various employer incentive schemes, including the Supported Wage System, and the Workplace Adjustment Tool, a searchable database of modification and adjustment ideas that includes information about suppliers and products in Australia.
2. Consider disability specialist positions
A strategy adopted by some agencies with a better record of employing people with disability is to appoint a disability coordinator and/or case managers to manage the needs of staff with disability. In large agencies a position of this nature can focus on the employment of people with disability and staff returning to work after illness or injury. In smaller agencies the role may need to be combined with other responsibilities. The position can also act as a point of specialist advice and assistance for people who manage employees with disability.
Centrelink employs a National Disability Coordinator who provides consultative advice to managers and employees in relation to the employment of people with disability.
3. Consider centralised funding for adaptive technology
When the cost of reasonable adjustments is funded from the budgets of individual work areas managers can find themselves having to balance the needs of people with disability in their teams against the need to fund other business requirements.
Agencies could consider centralising funds to make reasonable adjustments to the workplace and provide adaptive technology for employees with disability attending learning and development activities.
Agencies are also encouraged to ensure that adaptive technology and other portable reasonable adjustments made for employees with disability are transferable within the agency and, to the greatest extent possible, transferable to other APS agencies.
4. Educate staff about mental health in the workplace
Studies suggest that a significant proportion of adult Australians will experience some type of mental illness every year. However, many managers are unaware of how to identify symptoms of mental illness and how to assist their staff and colleagues who are affected. Managers need to be better informed and equipped to appropriately and effectively manage mental illness, depression and related disorders in the workplace. Experience suggests that early identification and treatment will reduce the negative impacts of mental illness on both the employee and the workplace.
Reducing the stigma of mental illness or depression is also critical because attitudes play a key role in achieving behavioural change and broader acceptance, resulting in higher retention rates of employees with these disorders.
Agencies should consider providing training and awareness programmes for managers and other APS employees on mental illness, depression or related disorders through organisations such as beyondblue and the Mental Health Council of Australia.
A number of APS agencies are already using the beyondblue National Depression in the Workplace Program,96 including Comcare, Centrelink, the Australian Taxation Office, The Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, the Department of Health and Ageing and the Department of Veterans’ Affairs.
The Department of Employment and Workplace Relations and the Mental Health Council of Australia have jointly developed the Mental Health First Aid in the Workplace e-learning course.97 The course, which is available on CD, is adapted from a twelve-hour face-to-face training course. More information on the full course is available from Mental Health First Aid.98
Employee Assistance Programmes and/or expert case managers within an organisation can also contribute to increased awareness and knowledge among managers.
5. Network with other employers
Overseas experience suggests organisations participating in a support network of employers achieve positive outcomes in improving employment opportunities for people with disability. In Australia, APS agencies can access the combined experience of more than 66 Australian organisations through the Australian Employers’ Network on Disability,99 managed by Employers Making a Difference Inc.
Current members of the Australian Employers’ Network on Disability include the Department of Defence, the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations, the Department of Families, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs, the Department of Health and Ageing, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, the Australian Taxation Office, the Royal Australian Mint and Questacon.
95 http://www.jobaccess.gov.au/JOAC/Home/
96 http://www.beyondblue.org.au/index.aspx?link_id=4.66
97 http://www.jobaccess.gov.au/JOAC/News/MentalHealthFirstAidinthe.htm
