A milestone in Granby’s journey to being a Disability Confident business

Earlier this year, we signed up to the government’s Disability Confident employer scheme. This month (October), we’ve received our first certificate on the three-step journey to becoming a Disability Confident Leader.

Disability Confident was developed by employers and disabled people’s representatives. It’s rigorous but still accessible to all sizes of businesses. It’s encouraged us to think differently about disability in our workplace and improve how we recruit, retain and develop disabled people.

Managing Director Joanne Kimber said: “This process has opened up conversations we were already having. We’ve explored issues like understanding different kinds of disability and how we can support disabled people to fulfil their potential with opportunities at Granby.

“It also provided us with an opportunity to conduct a full review of our Social Value Wellbeing policy, to make sure it’s fit for purpose. I’m pleased to say it is, and dovetails nicely with our objectives on the Disability Confident scheme.”

A ‘Disability Committed’ business

Granby has achieved level 1 of the scheme so far – we’re officially Disability Confident Committed. This means we’ve agreed to the Disability Confident commitments, which are:

• inclusive and accessible recruitment
• communicating vacancies
• offering an interview to disabled people
• providing reasonable adjustments
• supporting existing employees

The scheme also asks, at level 1, that we identify at least one action we’ll take to make a difference for disabled people. The list includes activities like providing work experience, paid employment, an apprenticeship or job shadowing opportunity, among other things.

Joanne said: “We’re confident we can do all of these – we already do, in fact, under our Social Value equal opportunities policy. But we’re obviously keen for it to have more impact.

“We recognise that we need to work out how to engage with people who have a disability. We’re working on this right now, connecting with local organisations who represent the interests of disabled people. We’re hoping these connections will help to inform us on what we need to do for people who have particular needs.”

Next steps

When we’ve met the criteria for Level 1, there are two further levels for Granby to complete:

●       Level 2: Disability Confident Employer, where we self-assess Granby around two themes. These are ‘Getting the right people for your business’ and ‘Keeping and developing your people’.

●       Level 3: Disability Confident Leader, where our self-assessment is validated, as well as other actions like reporting on disability, mental health and wellbeing by referring to the Voluntary Reporting Framework.

Read more about Disability Confident and get involved – we think it’s an excellent scheme with benefits for everyone.