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Should we create this service - need your input!
elizabethk
Posts: 21Member Courageous
I'm doing a bit of research for a new venture and I was hoping some lovely people can spare a couple of minutes to answer a few questions:
Please click here: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/P7Y5H9P
------------------------------------------------------------------------------Hello 👋! Just to introduce myself, I'm Beth, a 25 year old with the body of a 75 year old. I've just arrived back from Harvard uni after a difficult year away from home at a disappointingly inaccessible university. I’m currently working with The Princes Trust, on an idea I developed at Harvard, to create a social enterprise for people with disabilities to find or continue work despite their personal circumstances.
I believe that just because an individual may be unable to work in a conventional workplace, they do not lose their skillset, determination or desire to contribute and earn money. Therefore, I am developing this platform with other like-minded people that will connect individuals who feel able to work with different types of employment.However, I need to prove that (or even if) there is actually a demand for this service as corporations often have certain misconceptions about employing people with disabilities. I find it difficult to get out and about to do research in person because of my disability, so would truly appreciate anyone who could take the time to fill in this survey. Please spare a few moments to complete my survey: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/P7Y5H9P
Thank you so so much.
Replies
The survey doesn’t work on an old crummy iPad I’m using, let me enlighten you to the reality of my experience, Disabled people are treated as a commodity to generate revenue while ensuring that the person stays exactly where they are.
If the “Client” has complex needs and low funding organisations like NAS will bin them, you only need to read these message boards.
Your pitch sounds like “Workfare” and while I have never experienced this, I know enough who were bullied for profit with Workfare and overheard “Charity Workfare Calls with almost religious Devotion to manipulation”
So as self employed and basically unemployable- I see nothing new, nothing enabling here and if it goes ahead the “organisation” will be enriched and the disabled will be churned out fodder/ collateral damage.
I completely understand your concern and it’s something that I’m aware of. However I think you may have slightly misunderstood what the organisation is trying to do.
As I mentioned in the description, it will be a platform for those who feel able to work but aimed at helping those for whom working in a conventional workplace is difficult. (For example, somebody who is housebound due to their physical needs but is a qualified professional individual. Somebody who has a moderate pain condition and can work but can have flares without warning. Somebody who can’t work but does craft in their spare time and wants to sell this craft online. etc)
The reason it will be integrated with able-bodied people is because I believe that when given the right environment, disabled people have the same if not greater capabilities and they don’t need to be separate. I’m fed up of “disabled” being given a (sometimes) patronising add-on to normal services because normal services aren't accessible and think there needs to be a culture change around the way health, disability and work intersect. If accessibility is built into the platform then this doesn’t need to be the case. The individual can value their skillset and set their own rates of pay and they can have flexibility that builds in the fact sometimes my health lets me work and sometimes I can’t.
I completely understand your cynicism and I share similar frustrations. That’s exactly why I’m doing what I’m doing. That’s a key thing that’s motivating me to ask how we can do it differently and to make sure that this way of doing it differently is at the centre of the social enterprise I’m trying to build. It is why I want it to be different to all other employment platforms and be a social venture, partnering with disability charities and Access to Work, offering training in employable skills and helping employers connect with Occupational Health and answered easily so that there’s less barriers for them to employing someone with a disability.
Scope
@elizabethk
Sorry to hear it didn't work out at Harvard but Good luck and best wishes in your venture.
Ok so if I have got wrong end of the stick hows it funded and performance related funding targets.
You see I'd love to see a genuine confidence boosting and skills boosting for better life outcomes, however I have seen charities hungry for DWP funds make phone calls and threaten stopping benefits if person didn't answer at agreed time or talk to them.
I have personally had to tell a charity that harassed a friend to back off as they had panic attacks over it.
I'm listening and waiting to hear economic model.
I have considered working for myself of becoming a disability consultant or speaker but I havent the capital available to fall back on if I didnt succeed and also I wouldnt be able to cope with the stress of having to re reapply for benefits, I believe there is a huge untapped and largely forgotten workforce lanquishing on benefits in this country