Our first day of training at Manchester Deaf Centre (ESF funding - see post from 10th December) reminded us of the additional barriers that deaf / hard of hearing people face when trying to get into the job market. Many employers and agencies now carry out part of their recruitment and selection process by telephone interview making this step virtually impossible for deaf applicants. There was understandably a lot of resentment and anger about this within the group.
A large part of what we do at Result CIC is to support people to see things in a different way and to find individual solutions to their barriers. By the end of the day we glimpsed a realisation that focusing on what doesn't work, doesn't work!
What is much more powerful is to accept the barriers and move on - find novel ways to move forwards. Looking forward to many breakthroughs during the individual coaching sessions and further training days over the next three months.