Leadership
Learn how leaders can act as champions to make workplaces more inclusive.
Featured Resources
Albert Kim, Accessibility Consultant, Trainer, and Founder of Accessibility Next Gen, discusses the challenges workers with invisible disabilities face and shares his own lived experience. He gives tips for employers who want to make sure their organizations are inviting and inclusive for people whether or not they wish to disclose their disability.
As organizations accelerate their digital transformations, they can use XR to engage employees in new ways. XR technologies enable businesses to attract and hire more diverse talent pools. These technologies also have proven benefits that include improved job training and enhanced collaboration.
One of PEAT’s primary goals is to help employers understand how to ensure their information and communications technology (ICT) infrastructure is accessible to all employees—and to help them understand the strong business case for doing so.
Employers should exercise strong caution when using automated surveillance tools. They should develop best practices that limit surveillance through intentional centralized governance procedures that prioritize inclusion for people with disabilities and other underrepresented groups.
Latest Resources
Surveillance and Remote Work
Some employers report using surveillance tools because they fear that remote work lowers productivity. However, research consistently shows the opposite is true. The International Workplace Group found that 85% of businesses reported that offering remote options made their businesses more productive—with 67% estimating that it improved productivity by at least one-fifth.
Federal and State Efforts to Address Surveillance Issues
Concerns about workplace surveillance are rising across federal and state governments.
Key Takeaways for Employers
Employers should exercise strong caution when using automated surveillance tools. They should develop best practices that limit surveillance through intentional centralized governance procedures that prioritize inclusion for people with disabilities and other underrepresented groups. Aside from legal compliance concerns, automated workplace surveillance could result in harmful organizational cultures and other undesirable outcomes.
How Surveillance Tools Risk Discrimination
People with disabilities and chronic health conditions are less likely to be employed due to systemic barriers, including workplace discrimination. They are also particularly vulnerable to the harms of automated surveillance, which can exacerbate barriers. When it comes to automated decision-making, research shows that data science predictions are often completely wrong for outlier groups like people with disabilities.
Automated Surveillance Can Create Barriers for Workers with Disabilities
Employers are adopting new surveillance technologies to monitor and rank how employees move and behave on the job. However, this trend may create barriers for workers with disabilities and other underrepresented groups, undermining Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Accessibility (DEIA) goals. Surveillance technologies can result in negative workplace cultures and even cause legal issues for the employers who use them.
What are Surveillance Technologies?
In the workplace context, surveillance technologies are tools that monitor employees at work, including by automatically tracking employee productivity, attentiveness, movement, and other metrics. Employers might use this information to make decisions about task management, advancement, and even termination.
