EcoNorth is proud to announce that we are now registered with the Disability Confident scheme with “Committed” (level 1) status.
What is the Disability Confident scheme ?
The scheme encourages employers to be more inclusive, taking actions to improve how we recruit, retain and develop disabled people.
There are three levels:
- Level 1 – Committed employer
- Level 2 – Employer
- Level 3 – Leader
Membership for a Disability Confident Committed employer lasts for up to 3 years and each level must be completed before moving on to the next one.
EcoNorth’s journey to scheme membership?
EcoNorth is a Gold Level Member of Constructionline, a procurement portal which connects buyers and suppliers of various services and product; our supplier membership requires us to provide standard pre-qualification data. One of the recent pre-qualification questions related to the Disability Confident scheme. This led to some research about the scheme and a review of our policies and procedures regarding disability. We conducted Disability Confident’s self-assessment and were deemed to meet the criteria for level 1 status.
The benefits of being ‘disability confident’
- People with disabilities make up a large proportion of the UK’s population so they open up a large pool of relatively untapped talent from which to recruit. EcoNorth currently employees a number of people with various different disabilities who undertake key roles within the business.
- People with disabilities can often face multiple barriers to finding employment. Overcoming these challenges can be a huge achievement and this is often reflected in the positive attitudes they bring to the workplace as a result. Their enthusiasm, high attendance rates and consistent punctuality can be infectious and can lead to improved morale and performance across EcoNorth’s team.
- Disabled employees can often demonstrate high levels of loyalty, leading to lower turnover rates and reduced recruitment costs, particularly where reasonable adjustments have been made to accommodation their needs, flexible working is available, and sickness and return to work processes are fair, all of which are offered by EcoNorth.
- Disabled employees help create a more diverse workforce by bringing their unique experiences and skills which are hugely valuable for innovation, productivity and team morale such as open to new approaches, agile thinking, diligence, resilience and ability to plan. This may enable EcoNorth to outperform our competitors. Additionally, colleagues will learn to overcome misconceptions about disability and be more compassionate and accepting of one another’s limitations, and may be motivated to elevate their own performance by seeing people with disabilities succeed in spite, or indeed because, of those disabilities.
- Joining and supporting the disability confident scheme demonstrates EcoNorth’s commitment to behaving in a socially responsible manner, in line with our Corporate Social Responsibility Policy. This can help build trust and genuine value throughout the communities in which we operate. Our actual and potential clients may also appreciate our efforts to be an inclusive employer as they may work with, and for, disabled people and/or those who value diversity.
- By employing people with disabilities, we can support them in leading fulfilling lives, achieving improved self-confidence and a sense of community.
What are EcoNorth’s next steps?
Although EcoNorth already has policies and procedures in place to support employees with disabilities, we hope to do more. We aim to develop a disability inclusive culture throughout all aspects of our company and to achieve “Disability Confident Employer” (level 2) status within the next three years.