February 17, 2009
A group of Providers and counselors came together at HATS agency in order to brainstorm and share ideas on how to get and keep jobs in the current tough economy
Below are some highlights from this training so that you can share with staff at your agency or review for use in the future.
We opened the discussion with the question of “What can we do?”
Open discussion resulted in the following ideas and applications that agencies have already implemented and found to be successful.
Use Preventive measures example:
Salvage the job they currently have even with reduction in hours or possible duty changes.
Keep on Payroll!!
Negotiate hours and schedule
Cross training for other positions or within current position
Keep contacts with employers even after your person in no longer employed. Consistently follow up and ask about future possibilities.
Reconnect with managers who may have left the business but are working somewhere else. New job development site.
Make sure you get those letters of recommendation to help in replacing
If it was a temporary layoff keep reconnect every two weeks to keep your individual fresh with the employer.
Sell the individual who already has a lot of good work experience and stress the added benefits they will bring to the job.
Taking the individual with you when you make site visits and contacts
Know the realities of your area the dynamics of the rural vs. metro areas.
If you have success with something like Cold Calling use it stay with what you are comfortable with and have confidence.
Be realistic about expectations around pay.
Watch your attitude!!
Work with your individuals attitude as well and use all your resources i.e.: counselors, COS, parents, peers to redefine those expectations
What is the motivation around work revisit this now that there is more at stake.
The group then switched over to discussing Creative Solutions
What we know….
Review your basic strategies
Folks can work despite age
We have to have clear goals to work within potential
Expect more time to carve out jobs and situations that are best for individual and employer.
Pay attention to your attitude during job search
Use the tools of customized employment
Don’t ever oversell and under deliver!!
Employer resistance happens when we don’t let them tell us what they already know and what they need from us.
Educate there is fear in the unknown!!
LISTEN and LEARN
Use your resources like Fact Sheets to dispel myths and concerns
Get the employer to help develop testimonials for future employers
Sharing of new strategies
Try visiting work sites on paydays…the days when they are happier and more receptive to a visit or meeting.
Revisit those old contacts and update contact list with new numbers etc.
Always end contact on very positive note
Turn a no into a yes!!
Keep revisiting those places where there is a lot of turnover.
Use new language and avoid social service jargon.
Look at the infrastructure
Support each other and remain positive!!
The training was wrapped up with going around the room to ask what new idea you will be leaving with today.
We had four comments to continue to make those contacts and develop relationships.
Quit blaming the economy and someone else.
Look at expectations and strive for more participation and involvement
Add value to your employment services-respond to employers needs
Timing is everything so know you area and the business
If you don’t take risk and do nothing then nothing will change or happen
Accept that change happens and embrace it!!
Be pragmatic/ salvage even those one hour jobs.
Have a new fresh look and it will result in a new attitude.
DON’T BECOME COMPLACENT!!
Wow…. this was a great session and thanks everyone for your input.
Keep up the great work and most of all the great attitudes!!
Monday, February 23, 2009
TIE THAT BINDS
Volume 13, Issue 5
Number 149
March 2009
Circulation 698
Attitude is the Real Disability
Let’s Go Surfing
It is springtime, nature is rejuvenated, the economy is rejuvenated and job developers are rejuvenated. In California and Hawaii, everyone looks to the ocean for surfing. In Tennessee, we look to the internet to do our surfing.
For online job searches visit these sites.
Go to http://www.flipdog.com/. You type in a zip code and jobs in the area (or close by) appear.
For jobs at UPS visit http://www.upsjobs.com/.
Another job search based on zip code is http://www.indeed.com/.
At http://www.earnworks.com/ you will visit America’s choice for quality workers.
If you have a disability specific question, you can visit these sites.
A catalogue of disabilities and services are at http://www.jan.wvu.edu/.
American Foundation for the Blind is at http://www.afb.org/.
An internet community for people seeking resources is at
www.kcvanderbilt.edu/tnpathfinder/pathfindertext.html
So you are preparing to go to work, you may want the latest information on job seeking.
Go to www.spot.pcc.edu/~rjacobs/career/index.htm. for information on Career and Employment Guides.
The latest information on disabilities is found at http://www.disabilityscoop.com/.
If you are interested in the President Obama’s plans for the disability community look at these flyers.
www.whitehouse.gov/agenda/disabilities.
And Disability Scoop provides this info www.disabilityscoop.com/2009/01/21/autism-obama/1792/.
The World Is Flat
If you subscribe to the Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation or are a member of TNAPSE and receive the on-line version as a membership benefit, you had the opportunity to read an article on global vision. This article, How Globalization is Changing Our Workforce by Dedra Hafner and Laura Owens, expands on the Thomas Friedman’s The World Is Flat.
The initial concept is that there is a shift in global vision employment models. Technology and transportation access has forced businesses to go where there are highly skilled and technology savvy people, who are eager to work for much lower wages. So businesses once outsourced manufacturing jobs, but look now. Jobs that can be digitized are being outsourced to the smartest, cheapest and most productive workers and the product is available to multiple markets instantly.
So what happens to people with disabilities? New technology produces new industries and new employment opportunities. Look at what we have now that didn’t exist 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 50 and even 100 years ago. My grandparents were born when transportation was the horse and buggy, mass communication was the telegraph and nightly entertainment was a live theater show or a board game in the family parlor. American industry and economy will continue to evolve and re-invent itself.
People with disabilities can look at E-commerce and on-line auctions, computer resale, green technology, E-consignment, computer graphics, web site development, video production and on-line grocers and store pickers. Being creative and having the tenacity have been the hallmarks of rehabilitation professionals. We need to re-think how we work with employers to increase profits and decrease costs. What is being outsourced and how can we keep them in-house?
Self Awareness
From the mental health side of job developing, there is a maxim that job seekers need to be self aware. What is the nature of the job seekers symptoms and what would be appropriate employment? Just because a person has active symptoms doe not mean the individual is “unable to work.”
People with thought disorders may have difficulty in processing and interpreting information. They could be challenged by distractibility, impaired judgment, delusion, hallucination and the inability to express emotion. There may be some learning difficulties.
If a person has a mood disorder, the mood swings would cause variability in work performance. In the periods of stability they may have no difficulty in learning or working.
Try to think of ways to describe symptoms that reference common experience. Instead of saying “I hear voices”, substitute “distracted.” Turn the perceived liability into an asset by identifying the positive. Describe skills that counterbalance the symptom. Finally there is practice, prepare and pre-empt the employers concerns.
There Ain’t No Rules Around Here!
We’re Trying To Accomplish Something!
-Thomas Edison
Contact
Mike Sass
531 Henley Street
Suite 520
Knoxville, TN 37902
865-594-6720 Ext 1150
Fax: 865-594-6535
Email: mikesass@utk.edu
http://www.cde.tennessee.edu/.
The University of Tennessee is an EEO/AA/Title VI/Title IX/ Section 504/ADA/ADEA institution in the provision of its education and employment programs and services. This publication is sponsored in part by contract # ED-09-25258-00 from the TN Division of Rehabilitation Services to The University of Tennessee. Conclusions and opinions in this newsletter do not necessarily reflect those of the TN DRS or the University.
Volume 13, Issue 5
Number 149
March 2009
Circulation 698
Attitude is the Real Disability
Let’s Go Surfing
It is springtime, nature is rejuvenated, the economy is rejuvenated and job developers are rejuvenated. In California and Hawaii, everyone looks to the ocean for surfing. In Tennessee, we look to the internet to do our surfing.
For online job searches visit these sites.
Go to http://www.flipdog.com/. You type in a zip code and jobs in the area (or close by) appear.
For jobs at UPS visit http://www.upsjobs.com/.
Another job search based on zip code is http://www.indeed.com/.
At http://www.earnworks.com/ you will visit America’s choice for quality workers.
If you have a disability specific question, you can visit these sites.
A catalogue of disabilities and services are at http://www.jan.wvu.edu/.
American Foundation for the Blind is at http://www.afb.org/.
An internet community for people seeking resources is at
www.kcvanderbilt.edu/tnpathfinder/pathfindertext.html
So you are preparing to go to work, you may want the latest information on job seeking.
Go to www.spot.pcc.edu/~rjacobs/career/index.htm. for information on Career and Employment Guides.
The latest information on disabilities is found at http://www.disabilityscoop.com/.
If you are interested in the President Obama’s plans for the disability community look at these flyers.
www.whitehouse.gov/agenda/disabilities.
And Disability Scoop provides this info www.disabilityscoop.com/2009/01/21/autism-obama/1792/.
The World Is Flat
If you subscribe to the Journal of Vocational Rehabilitation or are a member of TNAPSE and receive the on-line version as a membership benefit, you had the opportunity to read an article on global vision. This article, How Globalization is Changing Our Workforce by Dedra Hafner and Laura Owens, expands on the Thomas Friedman’s The World Is Flat.
The initial concept is that there is a shift in global vision employment models. Technology and transportation access has forced businesses to go where there are highly skilled and technology savvy people, who are eager to work for much lower wages. So businesses once outsourced manufacturing jobs, but look now. Jobs that can be digitized are being outsourced to the smartest, cheapest and most productive workers and the product is available to multiple markets instantly.
So what happens to people with disabilities? New technology produces new industries and new employment opportunities. Look at what we have now that didn’t exist 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 50 and even 100 years ago. My grandparents were born when transportation was the horse and buggy, mass communication was the telegraph and nightly entertainment was a live theater show or a board game in the family parlor. American industry and economy will continue to evolve and re-invent itself.
People with disabilities can look at E-commerce and on-line auctions, computer resale, green technology, E-consignment, computer graphics, web site development, video production and on-line grocers and store pickers. Being creative and having the tenacity have been the hallmarks of rehabilitation professionals. We need to re-think how we work with employers to increase profits and decrease costs. What is being outsourced and how can we keep them in-house?
Self Awareness
From the mental health side of job developing, there is a maxim that job seekers need to be self aware. What is the nature of the job seekers symptoms and what would be appropriate employment? Just because a person has active symptoms doe not mean the individual is “unable to work.”
People with thought disorders may have difficulty in processing and interpreting information. They could be challenged by distractibility, impaired judgment, delusion, hallucination and the inability to express emotion. There may be some learning difficulties.
If a person has a mood disorder, the mood swings would cause variability in work performance. In the periods of stability they may have no difficulty in learning or working.
Try to think of ways to describe symptoms that reference common experience. Instead of saying “I hear voices”, substitute “distracted.” Turn the perceived liability into an asset by identifying the positive. Describe skills that counterbalance the symptom. Finally there is practice, prepare and pre-empt the employers concerns.
There Ain’t No Rules Around Here!
We’re Trying To Accomplish Something!
-Thomas Edison
Contact
Mike Sass
531 Henley Street
Suite 520
Knoxville, TN 37902
865-594-6720 Ext 1150
Fax: 865-594-6535
Email: mikesass@utk.edu
http://www.cde.tennessee.edu/.
The University of Tennessee is an EEO/AA/Title VI/Title IX/ Section 504/ADA/ADEA institution in the provision of its education and employment programs and services. This publication is sponsored in part by contract # ED-09-25258-00 from the TN Division of Rehabilitation Services to The University of Tennessee. Conclusions and opinions in this newsletter do not necessarily reflect those of the TN DRS or the University.
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