Media & Disability

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Guide on media & disability

Recruiting Staff for Programme-Making Roles

Many jobs in the audio-visual industries, especially those in production, are filled through word of mouth. Unfortunately, this does not encourage equality of opportunity and fair employment. Clearly, if your company or the broadcaster for whom you are working becomes known as being disability-friendly it will help you to attract disabled applicants.

If you are serious about recruiting disabled people to work alongside non-disabled people there are a number of things you can do:

  • Don’t just rely on word of mouth recruitment. Recognise the effects of the casualised marketplace and expand the methods you use to advertise vacancies. Rely more on advertising in mainstream media and make it clear that you encourage applications from people with disabilities. You might also consider using the disability press if it exists in your country.
  • Review your recruitment processes to ensure they do not discriminate against disabled applicants. There is specific guidance on this in this section.
  • Beware of e-recruitment processes, which may exclude disabled people if the websites used are inaccessible or badly designed.
  • Conduct research with your Human Resources Manager into why disabled people may not be applying for jobs, and consider how you might better target disabled people in your advertising.
  • Set recruitment targets (for example, to employ one disabled film maker by next year).
  • Promote through on-screen or on-air announcements and through your websites that you are actively seeking disabled applicants and they are welcome to apply.
  • Offer application forms in alternative formats. Make it possible for disabled people to apply for jobs by making reasonable adjustments. This is in any case a European legal requirement but it is always safest to work to best practice regardless of the law.
  • Encourage all producers to consider disabled people for their production team, not just those making specialist disability programming. Ask other producers, including those with experience of working on disability output, for suggestions.
  • Identify organisations that might be able to help increase the supply of disabled applicants for jobs and send them details of all vacancies.
  • Get specialist advice on adapting your offices to be more accessible. This could benefit everyone.
  • Keep an eye out for talented disabled people in exactly the same way as you talent-spot for non-disabled people. Make a point of collecting names and details of such people and start a database.
  • Increase employment by nurturing a group of disabled people in the industry through training schemes, work experience placements and mentoring, so you have suitable candidates who could be considered.
  • Guarantee a job interview for all disabled applicants who meet the minimum criteria for the job (and to hire them on their merits). Some countries have quotas for employing disabled people and, where this is so, the law must be followed. However, bear in mind that quotas can limit the way disabled people are perceived. They may exclude some disabilities, and may also contribute to an old fashioned view of disabled people as needing charity or protection. Disabled people want to be employed on their merits and capablities. They don’t want special treatment; they want fair and equal treatment.
  • Be prepared to make adjustments if needed for new recruits. This might be something quite small (such as a modification to a work station or flexibility about working hours) or it might be something more major (such as a new piece of IT software or IT equipment, or a support worker such as a sign language interpreter.) One of the best ways of knowing what adjustments might be needed (and many disabled employees need nothing at all), is simply to ASK the employee what will be needed to help them do their job successfully. (See also additional information in the section Adjustments and Aids.)
  • Make adjustments to retain existing employees who may become disabled. Retaining valued staff is far more effective than having to recruit and train new people.
  • Consult existing disabled employees regularly to see how you can improve your services to disabled people – whether as viewers and listeners, employees or contributors.
  • Raise awareness and knowledge of disability across your organization at every level.
  • Check progress each year and plan for the future.

Recruitment Advertising

You can word job adverts in ways that are more likely to attract disabled applicants. For example, you can specify that you welcome disabled applicants. You might indicate on the advert that further information about the job is available in various alternative formats (for example, in large print, on tape, etc.) and that you accept applications in alternative formats too.

Send a copy of your advertisement to known disabled people to alert them to the fact that you are recruiting. Disabled people will usually read job adverts in the regular press, but you might also consider placing an advert in specialist disability press if your country has it, and on web-based job notice boards.

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