Research Projects
Pilot Project on Customized Employment: Louisville, Kentucky
The NTAR Leadership Center is currently one of several partners participating in a unique initiative that seeks to meet the needs of local Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) member employers by bringing together a coalition of businesses, local service providers, national consultants, and job seekers with specific skills who want to work. Funding for this effort is being provided by the Louisville, KY Society for Human Resource Management (LSHRM), the Kentucky Association of Supported Employment Providers (ASPE)/Network on Employment, and the NTAR Leadership Center (through a grant from the U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Disability Employment Policy).
Key activities of this effort include:
Local partnerships between Louisville area employers and local service providers. Local employers will be recruited to partner with a local service provider agency that offers employment supports to job seekers with disabilities. The partnership will involve assigning a manager to provide feedback to a local provider agency on strategies and tools used to contact local employers and to meet specific workplace needs. This feedback might include determining essential selling points of customized employment, developing phone scripts and letters of self-referral, participating in mock interviews with job developers, and participating in a needs analysis to be conducted in a business or workplace. The duration of this partnership is expected to be five months, beginning in February 2009 and ending in June 2009. This partnership is not expressly designed to result in employment but, rather, is focused on training and preparing both employers and human service agencies to work together more effectively. Expected recruitment goal is up to 20 or more provider agencies and an equal number of local employers who are members of LSHRM.
Information sharing and exchange. Recruited employers will be asked to participate in at least one presentation on customized employment from a representative of a local provider agency on behalf of a job seeker with a disability who wants to work in a company. The provider agency will have engaged in extensive activity prior to the contact including discovery of the job seeker’s conditions for successful employment, their interests in terms of types of work wanted, and their unique contributions that are to be offered to potential employers. The provider agency will have also facilitated a planning meeting to target both the unique talents of the job seeker and local employers who are felt to be a match. The initial presentation will last approximately 30 minutes. If both the employer and job seeker are interested, subsequent negotiations will be held in an effort to customize a job description that meets the needs of both the employer and job seeker. The goal is that all LSHRM members will agree to participate in at least one presentation. While there is no obligation to hire as part of the agreement, the outcome of this activity is to develop as many customized jobs with LSHRM members as possible.
Implementation of the customized employment model. The pilot will look to recruit four or five targeted employers to implement an in-house version of customized employment and to recruit at least one job seeker with a disability from individuals in the Louisville area. This aspect of the initiative will include extensive support to the employer from the national consultants who are participating in this project. Participating employers will be assisted to conduct an internal needs analysis that looks at aspects of jobs that need to get done but are not getting done as well as needed. A comprehensive needs list, approved by the employer, will then comprise a customized job posting that will be sent to participating service providers. Employers will be assisted to select at least one job seeker for a customized position in their company. The dimensions of the customized job descriptions will be a negotiated result of the employer’s needs and the job seeker’s conditions for successful employment, their interests and unique skills, and contributions.
Moving Adults with Disabilities into Employment: An Overview of Promising Demand-Driven Workforce Practices and Strategies
The NTAR Leadership Center is currently conducting national research on trends and promising practices in moving adults with disabilities to employment. The central goals of the research will be to identify promising approaches to addressing this public policy issue at the state, regional, and municipal level; and to identify areas that are currently undertaking dedicated demand-driven initiatives and strategies designed to enable more adults with disabilities to obtain competitive employment.
The methodology for the study will include:
- A review of national literature in moving adults with developmental, physical, and mental disabilities that outline leading-edge governance, organization, and practices, with particular focus on state, regional, and municipal demand-driven practices that are improving prospects for employment within the context of state, regional and local economic growth, economic development, and workforce development strategies.
- Telephone interviews with experts at national organizations, associations, academic institutions, federal agencies, and national non-profits who are knowledgeable about demand-side disability and employment programs, practices, policies, and "to-work" strategies. Efforts will be made to solicit the identification of promising demand-driven practices from across every level of the workforce development, economic development, and disability employment systems.
- Telephone and on-site structured interviews with key informants in localities selected for in-depth analysis.
Promising practices will be sought in one or more of the following categories:
Meet the labor force needs of employers - innovative practices that deliver results for businesses and employers by helping employers solve their particular workforce problems through the hiring and retention of adults with disabilities.
Meet the skill needs of adults with disabilities - innovative practices that focus on the skill development of adults with disabilities into jobs in demand in the local/regional/state economy, that create formal career paths for incumbent workers with disabilities, that raise awareness about career opportunities in specific industries or regions, and that develop curricula and training to address identified skill shortages.
Support and strengthen partnerships, leadership development, and governance - organizational innovations that promote partnerships and deepen relationships with employers and/or industry organizations, engage business and economic development leaders in their initiative activities, and build new areas for collaboration tied to existing or emerging state/local economic development and growth strategies.
Support and nurture business development and entrepreneurship - innovative practices that support the formation and growth of disability-owned businesses, including business incubation, business/entrepreneurship support and preparation, and the stimulation of practices that promote disability-owned businesses as key vendors or suppliers of larger firms.
The goal of the study is to identify, document, and widely disseminate success stories and promising demand-driven practices that are operating throughout the United States, and that offer to provide greater employment opportunities to adults with disabilities into jobs in demand in the labor market.
Principal Investigators:
Robert Nicholas, Ph.D.
Senior Visiting Fellow for Disability and Employment Research
John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development
Email: rnich@rci.rutgers.edu
Ronnie Kauder
Senior Practitioner in Residence
John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development
Email: kauder@rci.rutgers.edu
Carl Van Horn, Ph.D.
Professor and Director
John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development
Email: vanhorn@rci.rutgers.edu