International Day of Persons with Disabilities: Building a workplace that works for everyone

International Day of Persons with Disabilities reminds us that inclusion, accessibility, and equity need action to be successful. This year’s theme: Transformative solutions for inclusive development: the role of innovation in fueling an accessible and equitable world puts action front and center by calling for concrete solutions.

Luckily, the world of tech is all about solutions, and Oracle has never shied away from the world’s biggest challenges. So, what do fairer workplaces run with everyone’s needs in mind need to consider?

The UN has laid out some specific discussions we can all take part in:

Innovation for disability inclusive development in employment and reducing inequality where we discuss connections between employment and the skills required to access employment like assistive technologies.

We’re also being asked to consider innovations, practical tools and good practices to reduce inequalities in the public and private sectors while promoting diversity in the workplace.

Frustrating

In practice, this means partnerships with bodies like Disability:IN and a company-wide approach to recruitment that challenges hidden bias in hiring practices and beyond.

Senior Manager, Navin Gadidala, has a condition which causes brittle bones and means he can be prone to fractures. He recalls some frustrating interview experience early on in his career where his ability to perform even basic tasks was questioned.

“Getting a job was so difficult… People were always impressed with my skills and my knowledge, but they would ask me questions like: Will you be able to write? Will you be able to type? I always used to think: How can I pass my exams without writing? Why these questions?! Can I not type? I was asked the same questions everywhere!”

It’s been 12 years since Navin joined us and discovered a strong sense of belonging.

“It’s been a wonderful journey with Oracle. People like me can work very normally. The team makes it possible for people like me to come to the office every day and work just like anyone else.”

Empowering people

Many employers don’t realize that they’re missing this combination of respect and openness to flexible working arrangements. These are the workplaces that the UN are so eager to reach with this year’s message.

Acceptance starts with attitude for Sales Operations Manager, Maria Fernanda Pinto. “I’ve always had a career plan to work at a large multinational,” she explains. However, even with the right skills, she notes that “disability is an exclusion factor for some companies”. Something she’s not noticed at Oracle.

In 10 years with the company, she’s seen her career flourish to leadership level thanks to structured training, mentoring and perhaps most importantly, direct support from the Oracle Diverse Abilities Network (ODAN), and the wider diversity and inclusion team.

Partnerships

Meanwhile, Cosmo Trikes found himself approaching Oracle as an outsider in a different way. Intimidated by the qualifications for a role at Oracle, Cosmo had to be convinced by one of our recruiters that he was a perfect fit for one of our internships—he just needed to realize it.

“I told the recruiter I’d look into it, but I didn’t apply. I told him I wasn’t sure I would qualify, but he assured me I did and told me to apply, so I did. Before I knew it, I was starting as an Oracle intern.”

Cosmo was left paralyzed in a skiing accident in 2018, but it hasn’t slowed him down in his personal mission to grow into leadership. All he needed was a workplace that believed in him. Now, he’s taken on a full-time software engineerin

g role with us.

Cosmo found his way to Oracle through Disability:IN, a nonprofit dedicated to bridging the gap between business and disability inclusion and equality. It’s a partnership that continues to bring a richness of experience to the company, and thanks to Disability:IN’s links with the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), we’ve been able to benefit from their guidance to score a perfect 100 out of 100 score in the 2022 Disability Equality Index (DEI).

Elevating the conversation

Director of Diversity and Inclusion, David Ortiz believes our ability to innovate towards better solutions starts with diverse and inclusive points of view. Then, with some work, these get transformed into solutions that get hard results.

“We are taking intentional efforts to consistently leverage the insights from our employees to ensure our processes and products are inclusive of individuals with disabilities to include our real estate and facilities team, as well as our user experience design teams,” he says. “We’ve elevated the conversation around diversity to leverage it as a competitive advantage.”

It’s an approach that’s been at the root of our mission for as long as he can remember. Being an industry leader, Oracle is uniquely placed to influence accessibility issues in the rest of the tech sector. In fact, something as simple as etiquette, and getting a workforce to grips with it, has opened the floodgates to innovation.

Recognizing obstacles

Oracle Talent Acquisition’s Global Diversity Programs Lead, Melissa Nicholas sees this in action every day in the recruitment process and beyond.

Obstacles like a lack of understanding of what it means to be disabled, knowledge of how to support candidates and employees with disabilities, physical environment accessibility, lack of assistive technologies and ingrained stereotypes are factors to be constantly aware of.

She sees ERGs like ODAN and outside partnerships with programs like the Tourette’s Association, career events at Gallaudet University, and others as vital to keeping awareness in the spotlight.

Company-wide rollout of technology like Textio, for inclusive job descriptions, and Untapped, a sourcing tool drawing on diverse communities, go hand-in-hand with this.

An incredible opportunity

David adds: “When we started in this space, there was some discomfort. People were worried about doing or saying the wrong thing. We started with information such as disability etiquette and elevated the conversations around disability inclusion.”

“We also have an Accessibility Program Office reporting to the office of the Chief Corporate Architect, that is responsible for defining the corporate standards for accessibility and developing materials to train all employees so they can successfully create products that meet those standards.”

On the technical side, a company Oracle’s size can bake in top standards of accessibility into our huge range of products, uplifting vast segments of businesses to be more accessible. It’s an incredible opportunity to do good.

The road ahead

It’s been a long road, and it’s clear that measures like these have already been extremely successful, but what does the future hold? David believes that we need to be aware of those that may have been left out despite our best efforts.

“We need to get in the habit of asking who’s not at the table that needs to be at the table, particularly when decisions are being made. In some instances, perspectives are overlooked or inadvertently omitted because no one asked the question that needs to be asked. For disability inclusion, it’s a matter of accessibility and providing options, as well as ensuring you have an accommodation process in place to meet a variety of needs.”

This kind of thinking is made possible by putting accessibility first and leads to new innovations that reinforce progress. And it reminds us that inclusivity is a process that should never stand still—or it could risk taking a step backwards.

Experience Oracle’s fairer, more accessible culture from the inside. Explore our open roles today and come build the future of technology with us.