The One Percent Coalition

Honorary Chairmen:

 

The Honorable Bob Dole

 

The Honorable Bob Kerrey

 
 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


One Percent Coalition Highlights Resources Available to Employers Making Workforce Accommodations for their Employees with Cognitive Disabilities;  Cubical Environments Pose Difficulties

 

For Immediate Release

 

WASHINGTON, DC (August 15, 2006) – The One Percent Coalition today called attention to importance guidance offered to businesses employing workers with cognitive disabilities.  According to the Job Accommodation Network’s consultant, Suzanne Gosden Kitchen, M.A., ABD, “employees with cognitive impairments may experience a variety of difficulties when performing job duties in a cubicle environment.”

 

“Life in a Cube: Problems Experienced by Employees with Cognitive Impairments,” shares the challenges workers with cognitive disabilities face when confined to a cubical environment and its impact on their quality of work, conduct, and productivity.  Kitchen also concentrates on what employers can do to avoid difficulties, as well as available accommodations.

 

“The One Percent Coalition is committed to the achievable goal of helping at least one percent, or 94,000 of severely disabled Americans find competitive employment,” said John D. Kemp, spokesperson of the One Percent Coalition.  “But equally important is making sure that workers with disabilities can be productive once on the job, therefore it is crucial that employers understand the challenges so eloquently detailed by Ms. Kitchen in her article.”

 

Kitchen navigates through some of the challenges workers with cognitive disabilities encounter in cubical environments.  They include:

 

  1. Employees with cognitive impairments may experience disorganization in their cubicles.
  2. Employees with cognitive impairments may be easily distracted by auditory and visual stimuli.
  3. Employees with cognitive impairments may have difficulty managing time, due in part to everyday workplace distractions.
  4. Employees with cognitive impairments may have difficulty engaging in work-related communication in a cubicle environment.
  5. Employees with cognitive impairments can experience disorientation, which may result in not knowing where to find people, materials, or services in a cubicle environment.
  6. Employees with cognitive impairments may need to control the temperature in a cubicle environment.
  7. Privacy is an issue in a cubicle environment for all employees, including those employees with cognitive impairments (e.g., An employee might be self-conscious about using accommodations such as speech recognition software or screen reading software).

 

Summarized Kitchen, “After hearing a CNN news report projecting that one in eight American employees worked in a cube, I wondered how many of those employees had disabilities, particularly AD/HD or Specific Learning Disabilities. I wanted to address accommodation needs for those workers, many who could experience disorganization and distraction in a cubicle workspace. Since so many other workers with disabilities experience similar limitations, I decided to re-focus the topic to be applicable to any person with cognitive impairments who worked in a cubicle environment.”

 

It is Kitchen’s hope that employers in industries such as finance, customer services, sales, information technology, and public administration read this issue of Consultants’ Corner, then use the information provided to implement successful cubicle accommodations for employees with disabilities.

 

“We applaud JAN for their groundbreaking work on accommodations, especially as we work to increase employment opportunities for workers with disabilities,” stated Martha Larson, President of the Larson Consulting Group, a Tallahassee, Florida-based specializing in disability-related employment services.  “The federal legislation that we’re supporting S. 1570, the Employer Work Incentive Act for Individuals with Severe Disabilities, cannot succeed without employers also making a firm commitment to meet the accommodation needs of their workers with disabilities.”

 

The One Percent Coalition is committed to the achievable goal of helping at least one percent (94,000) of severely disabled Americans find competitive employment. Individuals with physical or mental impairments that limit one or more functional capabilities with respect to work are extremely disadvantaged in the world of competitive employment. With this understanding, the One Percent Coalition believes that government, business and the disability community can work together to achieve the modest, yet realistic, goal of improving their employment rate by at least one percent.

 

The Job Accommodation Network is a service of the Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) of the U.S. Department of Labor.  JAN's mission is to facilitate the employment and retention of workers with disabilities by providing employers, employment providers, people with disabilities, their family members and other interested parties with information on job accommodations, self-employment and small business opportunities and related subjects.

 

Kitchen’s article can be read online at http://www.jan.wvu.edu/corner/vol03iss06.htm.  Readers are welcome to send questions about cognitive impairments to gosden@jan.wvu.edu. Questions about other impairments or questions about the ADA can be sent to jan@jan.wvu.edu.  JAN can be reached toll-free at 1-800-526-7234 v/tty.

 

For more information about the One Percent Coalition, please contact John D. Kemp at (202) 466-6550 or John.Kemp@ppsv.com.

 

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