What is the #myworkstory campaign?
On Friday 1 December 2017, Independent Living in Scotland, part of Inclusion Scotland, is launching#myworkstory, a social media campaign to encourage disabled people to get talking about being themselves at work.
The campaign marks International Day of Disabled People 2017 on 3December 2017, and will use the experiences shared to tell the Scottish Government what steps employers can take to make it easier for disabled people to be themselves at work and to ask for and get the adjustments they need to be as effective in their job as possible.
The evidence will also inform the Annual Disabled People’s Summit on 16 January 2018 in Edinburgh on the subject of “Employer-ability” – the things employers can do to attact, retain and promote disabled people. The summit is part of a series of events on the Scottish Government Disability Delivery Plan commitment to halve the disability employment gap.
We want to prompt an online conversation about safe openness at work and what this means for employers and employees and what happens for disabled people when it is not possible.
Why have this type of conversation?
The Scottish Government is committed to halving the disability employment gap. This is warmly welcomed but work to reduce the gap will have greater impact if we improve the experience of disabled people needing to discuss impairments and workplace adjustments with employers.
What kind of difference do we want? – yes, we want more disabled people to get jobs if they are able and want to work but we also want disabled people to have better experiences at work.
Essentially we want people to tell their story about being a disabled person at work, what helps them to be themselves and what gets in the way.
To give you an idea we’ve included a story below that Susanna has shared with us:
'I’ve had a mental health problem since my early twenties. For years I was worried about being open about it on job application forms, in interviews or with colleagues at work. I didn’t want people to think I wasn’t up to the job, that I couldn’t handle stressful situations or that they couldn’t trust my judgement. It’s taken me almost 20 years to be open about it at work and to identify as a disabled person. I’ve had some mixed experiences, in one job I felt that my line manager was really uncomfortable talking about it, I was never offered any adjustments even though some flexibility with work hours would have been really beneficial and I hated asking for time off to go to medical appointments, but by in large being open has actually helped my mental health and made me feel more comfortable at work. Employers need to understand that it can be a very emotionally charged experience to share information about impairments, it’s not just ticking a box or asking for an adjustment, you really have to trust that it’s not going to affect your relationships at work and how people view your performance.’
What we already know
In 2014 Kate Nash Associates carried out some research with 55 employers and over 2511 disabled employees to look at information sharing[1].
They found:
-60% of disabled people who had not shared information about their impairments were worried about repercussionseither now or in the future. Those in the public sector were more worried than those in the private sector.
-Employers saw information sharing as transactional but employees saw it as emotional and personal.
-1 in 5 disabled people sought external advice about whether to share information suggesting that significant numbers of disabled people are worried about sharing information about their impairment at work.
-Disabled people often looked for clues or indicators as to how inclusive or supportive their work environment was before they shared information suggesting that inclusion is not simply about workplace adjustments but how organisations value and celebrate difference.
-73% of employers formally monitored how many disabled employees they had but 34% stated they still did not know how many disabled employees they employed.
The labour force survey suggests that disabled people in Scotland make up 11.7% of the public sector workforce and 11% of the private sector workforce – yet employers consistently report lower figures than the national average. T
There are significant numbers of disabled people who do not share information about their impairment at work.
This may lead employers to think that they employ low numbers of disabled people and that there is no need for a high quality adjustment process or a plan to target appropriate pay, progression and reward strategies at disabled employees. Also that there is little need for a focus on retention and career development for disabled employees.
Employers may have inaccurate assumptions that disabled people cannot or do not want to work in their sector or that there is little need to have an efficient and transparent system for making workplace adjustments. They may also fear that low numbers or lack of data will become public and cause reputational damage.
What we want to know
We want to move beyond questions about increasing rates of ‘declaration’ and ‘disclosure’, which are singularly uninviting concepts for disabled people towards hearing disabled people’s stories of telling their employer about impairments and asking for adjustments, or of not telling them and not asking for any adjustments and why.
We will be talking about positive and more difficult experiences of monitoring, sharing information about impairments, and seeking and getting workplace adjustments.
We want to use #myworkstory to make suggestions for tangible steps employers can take to make it easier for disabled people to be themselves at work and to ask for and get the adjustments they need to be as effective at work as possible.
People can take part by:
-Telling their own work story on their Twitter, Instagram and Facebook accounts from Friday 1st of December 2017 using the hashtag #myworkstory. Inclusion Scotland will repost stories and information on our accounts.
-We don’t need specific details about workplaces or colleagues – we want to make sure people keep themselves safe.
-If people want to share their story anonymously they can e-mail Rhona at
For more information:
To discuss the campaign please contact Susie Fitton at or 07910 373778.
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[1] Kate Nash Associates (2014) Secrets & Big News: Enabling people to be themselves at work