By Judith Thomas and Trevor Snow
In today’s economy, Job Developers and Career Counsellors need to be prepared to assist all job seekers, including those with disabilities. Due to the aging population and an increase in the number of persons with disabilities, we are encountering a different caliber of client than in previous years. Working for the Canadian Council on Rehabilitation and Work for the past few years has shown us a different type of clientele than we first encountered. In 2006, the vast majority of our caseload was seeking entry level positions. Our Workplace Essential Skills Partnership (WESP) employment program has greatly evolved since then to serve a very different demographic. We have very few youth and are serving mostly highly educated and very experienced people. Many of them have a gap in their employment to allow for a grieving process and acceptance of their new reality as a person with a disability.
Although WESP is familiar working with clients of this calibre, the numbers are notably increasing. With this economic climate, WESP is expecting to see even more highly qualified job seekers with disabilities in need of professional employment guidance.
As well as evolving many new and innovative workshop segments aimed at middle management level, we have had to drastically revamp our whole intake process. Topics of key interest to our clients, in addition to the usual employment ones, are disclosure, human rights, and accommodation needs. We also have equity employers come in to talk to our participants so that the latter hear “straight from the source.”
The WESP team also recognized the need to focus on employers looking to hire people directly into non-entry level roles. In doing so, WESP required to better understand the specific needs of these employers and ensure to meet or exceed them.