Awards
- Diversity@Work 2010 Employment and Inclusion Awards
Recently, ADDE was involved in the judging of the Diversity@Work 2010 Employment and Inclusion Awards: People with a Disability. This award recognises excellence in initiatives or programs related to the employment and inclusion of people with a disability. Peter Rickards, ADDE president, was a judge on the panel and stated how happy he was to once again have the opportunity to judge the nominations. “The awards are an excellent way for companies and organisations to showcase their employment practices which lead to an increase in the employment of people with disability in Australia. There were many worthy nominations but we had the unenviable task of having to choose one.” The following are the winners and commendations from the 2010 Awards Dinner held on 14 October 2010:
- Award Winner - Employment and Inclusion of People with a Disability - Small/Medium Enterprise (SME), (<1000 staff): Psychiatric Rehabilitation Australia
- Commendation - Employment and Inclusion of People with a Disability - SME: Lyndoch Hill
- Commendation - Employment and Inclusion of People with a Disability - SME: Australian Retailers Association Retail Institute
- Award Winner - Employment and Inclusion of People with a Disability - Large Organisation, (>1000 staff): Ageing Disability and Home Care (ADHC)
- Commendation - Employment and Inclusion of People with a Disability - Large Organisation: Best and Less - Pacific Fair
Winner, SME, Psychiatric Rehabilitation Australia (PRA), was an admirable winner due to a number of outstanding employment practices which have lead to this not for profit organisation showing an impressive measurable outcome of 25% of their workforce being people with disability. PRA’s great strength lies in the fact that it does not pigeon-hole people with disability into doing menial or repetitive jobs, which can lead to many of them soon realising that there is little hope of either advancement or opportunities to make a contribution at a policy and organisational level. The organisation embraces the participation of their consumer group in its workforce. Many of the 60 employees with disability work in specialist professional positions including Executives, Vocational Trainers, Team Leaders, Coordinators, Advocates, Support Workers to name just a few. Peter Rickards said: “Employing this level of staff who have lived experience of mental illness and who started off their involvement as consumers of PRA services, is worthy of the winning award”.
PRA have an attitude of not distinguishing between consumers of their services and the staff which has lead to another noteworthy result for the organisation – an increase in numbers of people coming to PRA to use their services and an increase every year in the number of consumers who are now staff. Democracy in the workforce has many benefits!
Winner, Large Organisation, Aging, Disability and Home Care (ADHC), have a commitment to ensuring older people, people with disability and their carers are valued, lead independent lives and have the opportunity to participate fully in community life. To achieve this, the domestic Services Manager, has established a domestic pool of staff, who trained as service Support Officers to work on a casual basis. Staff conditions include being offered at least 2 shifts per week covering 15 hours. The result is 15 people with disability have trained through the on-the-job program and are now employed. This result in 8 months is notable and as an organisation which serves people with disability it makes sense that they should ‘practice what they preach’.
ADDE commissioned research into the employment of people with disability in the Victorian disability sector titled “Leading From the Front?” (http://adde.org.au/events_survey08.html ). The research showed that this was not happening in the majority of disability organisations. PRA and ADHC are both organisations in the disability sector and both are showing that they can “Lead from the Front” in employing people with disability. ADDE recommends that other organisations look at their own employment practices to see if they can create measurable targets and ‘put their money where their mouth is’ to show that they too can offer best practice disability employment.
Left to right: Peter Rickards, ADDE President; Li Cunxin, Mao’s Last Dancer, keynote speaker at the awards; Kathy Leitch, ADDE Development Officer at the Diversity @ Work Awards night, 21/10/10
Left to right: Kathy Leitch, ADDE Development Officer; Graeme Innes, Disability Discrimination Commissioner and Race Discrimination Commissioner of the Australian Human Rights Commission; Peter Rickards, ADDE President at the Diversity @ Work Awards night, 21/10/10
Our mission is to increase employment opportunities for
people with disabilities and from diverse backgrounds
in Australia. For those of you who are not aware we were
officially formed on September 7, 2005 at Victorian Council
of Social Services (VCOSS).
ADDE promotes pro-active employment
policies and practices for disadvantaged groups including
people with disabilities, mature age workers, people from
culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds as well
as indigenous people. People who fall into more than one
of these categories are recognised as being even more
disadvantaged. Therefore, we see a greater need for a
change of attitude and awareness.