Disability Awareness

Advance Personnel assists people who have disability to obtain and maintain employment. Primarily, we assist people who are able to achieve award wage employment with support. Our goal is to assist the employee to become as independent in their job as possible and maintain productive employment. We provide services to people who have an intellectual, learning, physical or sensory disability.

Advance Personnel can provide disability awareness guidance for any staff who work with people with disability. We can also provide information, training and advice about various types of disability.

Information Sessions

Advance Personnel have been assisting workers to obtain and maintain employment since 1989. Over this period many varied situations have been experienced. This has resulted in a number of strategies being developed to assist workers, co-workers and the employers. The most cohesive workplaces are those in which co-workers and management work well together to create a positive work environment.

Overview of Content

• Discussion about the common categories of support required for a person who has a disability to maintain employment.
  - task support,
  - communication assistance, and
  - suitable emotional responses (appropriate workplace behaviour)
• What a workplace can do to enhance inclusion and independence of an employee with a disability
• Ways to create a positive work environment
• Resources to gain further information

Format

• Informal - discussion based, information sharing
• Approximately one hour in total - including questions and answers
• General: not aimed at discussing an individual but the strategies that may assist the relationships between co-workers.
  Due to privacy guidelines it is important not to discuss an individual within a group context. If workshop participants require specific strategies to assist them whilst working with someone in particular, they are requested to either speak to one of us at the end of the session or refer to their team leader or supervisor for a copy of some written material which may assist (including contact details for Advance Personnel).
• Most of the material discussed is based around useful strategies for any workplace made up of different people.

Information required prior to the session

• employer expectations and desired outcome
• brief description of the intended audience
• overview of the current workplace procedures (induction, grievance, HR)
• specific industry or disability focus - if appropriate

Contact Advance Personnel's Employment Consultant currently providing support in your workplace or Advance Personnel directly.