The Job Finders

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October 2003

By C.A. Wolski

Finding a job can be a daunting task for anyone, but for people with disabilities, of whom—according to a Harris Poll—75% are unemployed, job searching can mean continuous disappointment and frustration. But in the Chicago area, one resource—Ability Links—has been created to help both job seekers with disabilities to find work, and employers to open their doors to this untapped vein of productive workers.

Founded in 2001 by the 120-bed Marianjoy Rehabilitation Hospital, Wheaton, Ill, Ability Links began with the long commitment of Kathleen Yosko, the hospital’s chief executive officer, to advocacy for people with disabilities. Prior to coming to Marianjoy, she headed a hospital in Chicago where she established an advocacy program for gunshot victims. Suburban Wheaton needed a different kind of program, and it was in the employment niche that Ability Links was born. “People who are work age and disabled have extremely high unemployment rates, and helping by advocating for them, so that they can return to work and take on a productive role, can make a huge difference in their quality of life,” says Ken Skord, MS, CRC, project manager of Ability Links. There is also a more fundamental reason for Marianjoy’s role in developing Ability Links. “We mend people and we fix them up and we send them outside—and outside isn’t so friendly,” says Cheryl Perez, information and referral counselor for Ability Links. “We [wanted] to do more for them on the outside.”

The mission of Ability Links is fourfold: to increase employment among people with disabilities; increase awareness of the value of hiring people with disabilities; provide support to businesses, employment services, and job seekers; and measure the impact the program is having.

The gateway to Ability Links is the program’s Web site, www.abilitylinks.org. The site allows job seekers to post their resumes, employers to post jobs, and service providers to share jobs and training opportunities. The program has raised $500,000 through a variety of private sources—foundations, grants, and businesses—in order to operate.

Though the Web site resembles non-niche sites such as Monster.com, the similarity stops at the surface, says Perez. “With Monster.com you don’t have any personal connection with them,” she says. “You apply for the job and that’s that. We try to match. If we see something [that fits], we let the person know.”

SEEKING A JOB

When a job seeker posts a resume on the site, they do not have to indicate what their particular disability is. Currently there are more than 200 resumes posted on the site. But Ability Links is more than just a job board. The program offers job seekers support via email, telephone, or in person. The program helps to match seekers to leads and refer them to employment programs.

Job seekers are directed to the site and the program in a variety of ways, says Skord. “We’re pretty established in the community through word of mouth and education events, we go to a lot of job fairs that target people with disabilities, and we work with the state vocational rehab system,” he says. “Individuals with disabilities hear about the Web site, so finding individuals has not been difficult. Another thing that is unique about our site is that it meets and will soon exceed accessibility standards.”

When dealing with Ability Links’ job seekers, Perez can bring personal experiences to bear. A paraplegic since her teens, she is able to share her struggles and successes as a job seeker—without the benefit of Ability Links—with her clients. “Having the disability helps because when I speak to the job seekers and give them pep talks, you’re getting it from somebody who has a disability,” she says. “And I went out and got all my jobs on my own, so I know about being on the side of interviewing people, and I know the side of being interviewed and not getting the job.”

The job seekers who have found jobs through Ability Links have been quite satisfied, Perez says. “We’ve had several people call us up…and [tell us] this is the best thing that has happened to them,” she says. But the toughest sell for Perez and Skord continues to be to employers, many of whom are leery about taking a chance on someone with a disability.

SEEKING EMPLOYERS

The employers in the Marianjoy database run the gamut from large to small. Companies are recruited to put jobs on the Web site through networking, word-of-mouth referrals, and databases listing progressive employers open to employing those with disabilities.

Perez takes the cause of employment directly to businesses, going to offices and visiting human resource officers and encouraging them to list jobs on the site. In addition, she is able to educate office personnel about the realities of employing someone with a disability. But instead of focusing on the fact that Ability Link’s job-seeker clients have disabilities, Perez emphasizes what makes these individuals good employees. “I’m selling the ability and not a sob story,” she says.

When Perez signs up potential employers, she encourages them to post every job they have available. She says, as with able-bodied applicants, disabled job seekers know what jobs they are and are not qualified for. Though there is a mechanism for employers to post job listings, if employers are unable to do this themselves, Ability Links will do it for them.

SHARING LEADS

One of the goals of Ability Links, says both Skord and Perez, was to avoid duplicating what the other service agencies in and around Chicago were doing for their clients. This was one of the reasons that Ability Links developed a strong Internet presence. “There are a good number of separate individual employment programs that serve specific constituencies of disabled individuals,” says Skord. “So we wanted to be, through the Internet and through all the education we do in the matching, this central point of contact that would make everything work better.”

This has made Ability Links as much a resource to other service agencies as it is to employers and job seekers. “We’re working together...if we can’t use the job lead, we share it,” says Perez. “We didn’t do that in the past.”

The service agencies also follow up with the job seekers once they have been employed by a business—helping to make sure that both employer and employee are happy and satisfied.

Marianjoy too has seen benefits from administering the program. “I think it enhances the image of the organization in the community,” says Skord.

In the 2 years since it was started, Ability Links is already showing signs of success. Since 2001, the program has had more than 100 clients referred to employers or a service, with at least 28 of those landing a job. Perez says that an unknown number of others have also gotten referrals and jobs through the job-sharing program on the Web site. Though, on the face of it, this seems a small number, Skord says the site and the program are having an impact.

The Web site will continue to be the centerpiece of the program, helped by a recent $40,000 grant to upgrade the site. Skord’s goal is for abilitylinks.org to become the niche board of choice for disabled job seekers, employers, and service agencies.

Though Ability Links is centered in Chicago, it is something that can easily translate to other cities, says Skord. “We think that as we establish ourselves in Chicago, the model can be replicated in other regions,” he says.

Perez sees proof that there is a need for programs like this all the time. “I get emails from Indiana, Wisconsin, New York, and Los Angeles,” she says. “[All of them] asking, ‘Do we have something like this around where I live?’”

C.A. Wolski is associate editor of Rehab Management.

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