Bold Blind Beauty On A.I.R.
Bold Blind Beauty On A.I.R.
Empowering Employment: Breaking Barriers for the Blind Community
Episode title and number:
Empowering Employment: Breaking Barriers for the Blind Community 4-#9
Summary of the show:
In this episode of Bold Blind Beauty On A.I.R., hosts Stephanae McCoy, Dana Hinnant, Nasreen Bhutta, and Sylvia Stinson-Perez talk with guest Krystle Boateng about the barriers blind individuals face in the workforce. Krystle, founder of Inside Ability Books, shares her journey with sight loss and her mission for accessible children's literature.
They discuss the need for inclusive employment practices, common misconceptions about blindness, job challenges, and the role of assistive technology. Listeners will learn strategies to improve job opportunities for the blind community and understand the significance of Access, Inclusion, and Representation (A.I.R.) in creating equitable workplaces. Tune in for insights on promoting inclusivity.
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Bullet points of key topics & timestamps:
00:00 | Introduction to Bold Blind Beauty On A.I.R.
01:38 | Understanding AIR: Access, Inclusion, and Representation
02:23 | Meet Krystle Boateng: Advocate and Author
03:08 | Krystle's Sight Loss Journey and Inside Ability Books
04:31 | Challenges and Solutions in Employment for the Blind Community
09:53 | Misconceptions and Advocacy: Changing Perspectives
18:49 | The Role of Assistive Technology in Employment
21:01 | Preparing for Employment: Tips and Strategies
23:09 | Conclusion and Contact Information
Connect With Krystle Boatneg
Website: www.iabilitybooks.com
Instagram: @inside_ability_books
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- Join our Instagram community @BoldBlindBeauty
- Subscribe to our YouTube channel @BoldBlindBeauty
- Check out our website www.boldblindbeauty.com
Music Credit: "Ambient Uplifting Harmonic Happy" By Panda-x-music https://audiojungle.net/item/ambient-uplifting-harmonic-happy/46309958
Thanks for listening!❤️
EMPOWERING EMPLOYMENT: Breaking Barriers for the Blind Community
Introduction to Bold Blind Beauty On A.I.R.
Welcome back to another edition of Bold Blind Beauty On A.I.R. The show that's clearing the air for more A.I.R. Access, Inclusion, and Representation. My name is Stephanae McCoy and with me are my co hosts: I'm Dana Hinnant, I'm Nasreen Bhutta, and this is Sylvia Stinson-Perez.
Steph: Beyond the limitations of disability lie extraordinary opportunities for accessible and inclusive innovation. Don't be afraid to question the status quo and reimagine tools, products and spaces with universal access as the goal." ~Krystle Boateng.
October was a month filled with awareness campaigns, but one in particular deserves recognition year-round, National Disability Employment Awareness Month. This initiative highlights the importance of inclusive employment practices and the contributions of individuals with disabilities in the workplace.
Today, we will discuss employment within the blind community as we face significant challenges stemming from societal barriers, stereotypes, and misconceptions about blindness. At Bold Blind Beauty On A.I.R., we believe that transformation within these systemic barriers can be achieved through AIR Access, Inclusion, and Representation.
Understanding AIR: Access, Inclusion, and Representation
Before introducing this month's guest, I want to give a brief overview on the meaning of AIR. Access, Access is ensuring equal opportunities and accessibility in all areas of life. Inclusion is creating a society that embraces and values the contributions of blind individuals. And finally, Representation is enhancing visibility and accurate portrayals of blind people in media, Leadership and decision-making positions by focusing on these three pillars, we can drive meaningful change and create a more equitable world for individuals on the blindness spectrum.
Meet Krystle Boateng: Advocate and Author
Joining us today is Krystle Boateng, a founder of Inside Ability Books and author of Accessibility Children's Books. Krystle is a legally blind mother of two who transformed her personal experience with sight loss into a mission to create inclusive literature and inspire others through her creative writing and advocacy work.
Welcome to the show, Krystle.
Krystle: Thank you so much for having me, Stephanae. I am so happy to be here with you ladies.
Steph: And we are excited to dive into our discussion for today. So with that, I'm going to pass the mic to Nasreen.
Nasreen: Welcome, Krystle, it's great to have you here on our podcast. Can you please share your sight loss journey with us?
Krystle's Sight Loss Journey and Inside Ability Books
Krystle: Sure. Okay. In brief, at the age of 19, I did start to lose vision from idiopathic pan uveitis, which is basically an inflammatory eye condition. Due to complications of that condition, I lost central vision permanently.
So oftentimes, when I hear about people experiencing central vision loss, they have either macular degeneration or stargardt's. So my vision sort of manifests in a similar way in terms of the center of my vision being blurred out. I've had a long career path, using various accommodations to achieve the goals that I'm attempting.
But what I found was that when I became a mom, I looked at, you know, in those same channels for large print children's books, and I couldn't find them. So that led me to starting Inside Ability Books. I create jumbo large-text children's books that come in two text contrast options. You can either have white background with black letters or the reverse contrast, which many people with print disabilities, benefit from, which is the black background with white letters.
Sylvia: That's really cool, Krystle. I wish some of those things had been available when I was a kid. This is Sylvia, and welcome. We know that historically employment for people with disabilities and especially people with vision impairment has been really a big challenge. You've worked at some different angles of employment assistance even from the front lines. What are some of those challenges that you've seen?
Challenges and Solutions in Employment for the Blind Community
Krystle: Sure. So to give a little bit about my background, I worked for many years in employment services in different nonprofits, assisting visually impaired and blind qualified candidates to find employment. I also work with an equal opportunity offices where I assisted, ADA Title I compliance, basically assisting when people needed reasonable accommodations. So that office received those requests, and then there's a process that, commences to find out what is the best fit.
In terms of the challenges that the visually impaired and blind community face, it's multiple, right? I always say that most people are not aware that there is even a spectrum of vision loss. They're also not aware of all of the various high and low-tech accommodations that are available to allow anyone across the spectrum of vision loss to be able to perform highly in a multitude of careers and industries. So I think this gap in understanding, makes way to unconscious bias, discrimination, and things of that nature.
When I worked as an empowerment coach and I assisted people preparing for an interview, I would always let them know that words have power and you are entering a situation where you're going to have to educate the interviewers for the most part on how it is that you perform in your position. And so you never want to use words like I have difficulties with or I have vision problems. You always want to start with your qualifications, "I have X credential, X amount of years experience, I specialize in this."
Then you want to speak about the tools and technology that you utilize to be able to perform in the position. So if you are a screen reader software user, you'll speak to the fact that you use a screen reading software that's compatible with most, commercially sold, let's say accounting management software, if you're, let's say going for an accounting position. Or if you use magnification, you can speak to the fact that you use magnification on the computer. And then go further into your soft skills and all of the functions, that you are adept at within that particular field.
Disclosure can be difficult and sometimes if you seem unsure of your abilities, then the employer becomes unsure of your abilities. I always want to let people know that when you go into an interview, you are the prize. And your job is there to market yourself as the prize and letting them know all the great things that they will get from you as a candidate versus sometimes we walk in with an energy of, please don't discriminate against me, please choose me and that energy is felt. So I'll leave it there because I know I can definitely go on, but certainly, there are a lot of aspects to the challenges we face.
Sylvia: I love that, Krystle. "You are the prize," everyone. We are the prize. And it's so true is that the more comfortable we are with ourselves, the more comfortable we make those people around us. And truly every day we have to advocate for ourselves in every situation we're in and getting comfortable doing that is so important. So, thanks, Dana.
Dana: Thank you, Sylvia. Krystle, how can companies make hiring processes more accessible and inclusive for blind applicants?
Krystle: Well, from my experience, I think a lot of companies are taking steps in the right direction. I remember there was a time where there were only the paper applications that when you went in for the interview, you'd be handing that paper. And if you're unable to fill that out, then you'd hopefully had like a family member or someone with you to fill it out. But now a lot of these things are online, they're digital. They might have a station, at the location for you to have a seat and fill out paperwork. Windows magnification is, available on most computers. They can provide it to you in an accessible PDF in advance if screen reading is what you require. So I think as best as you can to be honest and open upfront about the accommodations that you'll need. I think most employers are stepping up and definitely giving that in advance.
Certainly, I think that training of hiring staff is always a good thing. Getting them comfortable and familiar with the Job Accommodation Network website that goes through a long, exhaustive list of all of the various accommodations that are available to people with all different types of disabilities. Getting that information, in there before a candidate even walks in allows for the candidate not to necessarily have to do too much explaining about their accommodations and really just focus on their, accomplishments and their qualifications.
Steph: That's excellent, Krystle. Thank you so much. I think this is a nice segue to my question, what are some of the misconceptions that employers have about hiring blind employees? And how do you think that we can address them?
Misconceptions and Advocacy: Changing Perspectives
Krystle: Sure, there are a lot of misconceptions about disabilities. In general, and one thing that I always say when I'm sort of in interviews and I'm talking about advocacy and the ways in which people who do not have a visual impairment can better support the visually impaired community, I always use the acronym SIGHT.
S for speak, if you see someone with a visual impairment, we are people first. Look to have that human connection. Invite us to the social gathering, and then just request from us or ask us what our access needs are. Because we are also not all living the same experience with vision loss, our needs It might be very different. So have that question and find out.
I is inclusion. Always lead to first consider us as a candidate, consider us as the customer, and then look to find out what are those accommodation needs. How best can you, lower barriers for that community?
G is give, which is basically give of your time, give of your money, to volunteering at organizations where you can interface with people with those disabilities and hear those unique human experiences. And just by exposing yourself, it normalizes that experience and therefore every time you interface with someone from that community in a more professional setting, you feel more comfortable and able to have a broader conversation with them beyond just their disability.
H is help. Help is not always needed, but an offer is always appreciated, right? So, learn the etiquettes of a sighted guide. Oftentimes you'll see people sort of pushing and pulling people who have visual impairment because they're well intended but they really don't understand that a help is not always needed and b you have to ask how a person prefers to receive assistance. Knowing the generally accepted etiquette in terms of offering your elbow for someone to take your elbow and then you can guide them to you know whatever space you're taking them to place your hand on the back of the chair. So they can then place their hand on the chair, be as verbal as possible. We're making a right, we're making a left, we're coming up to stairs, that sort of thing. Just educating yourself and acknowledging that the visually impaired exist in this world and you will be interacting with them at some point.
And the last is T. Tell a friend to tell a friend because whenever you do interact with someone from our community, be an ally, extend what you've learned to your broader networks so that, more and more, exposure can be there. We may not have representation to the best that it can be at this time. But I think in this day and age, still sort of the questions about the visually impaired and what we're able to do. There are some employers who don't even know that people with no usable vision at all can use the computer independently. If you disclose having partial blindness, there's the skepticism. There's, well, how many fingers am I holding up? Or you don't look blind. There's still all of those misconceptions that I think are, are easily, quashed if, just more conversations are had.
Because I honestly think the visually impaired and blind community is a lot larger than what's being reported, especially when some of the leading causes of blindness are, glaucoma associated with hypertension, diabetic retinopathy, trauma. I just don't think that we have enough of a unified voice for people to really understand, the size of our community as well as the size of of the allies who support our community.
Steph: Krystle, I'm like, speechless. I'm saying this all the time about the numbers and about the reason why I believe that the numbers are incorrect. And there are more people on the blindness spectrum than we know. I think a lot of it has to do with the societal stigmas associated with blindness. I speak to a lot of people who would rather people think that they're drunk or, something else as opposed to not being able to see well. I do love this acronym SIGHT. And as you were talking, I was ferociously writing so that I can include that in our show notes. So, thank you so much for that.
Sylvia: So Krystle, keeping with the, you know, we do have to be advocates for ourselves as well. And, I think that's so true. And we were just talking about how many people that we know who are visually impaired. I meet people every day, every day. And I know probably there's a lot of people who go, well, I really don't know any people who are blind or I only know like two people. I think I know hundreds. And it's because, I think when you meet people and you talk to people and you can get them to acknowledge, hey, yes, I have RP or I have whatever and get them discussing how that challenges their life, but the possibilities that are still there, is it really fun and cool?
So we all know some amazing success stories. Well, I think we're like five success stories right here. What, are a couple of your favorite success stories about employment, of people who, are blind or low vision?
Krystle: Sure. I guess a few come to mind, I've actually met a few, completely blind programmers at Google. There's actually, I believe it's the National or American Association of Blind Lawyers. In my work in job development and employment coaching, I would often look for these professionals to be mentors to my candidates, be mentors to the college students that would come through our Young Adults program.
APH now runs the career connect, and years ago I would use that database to try to find an email professional to connect with clients that I was working with. And so I think the visually impaired and blind, we are out there, but we're just not waving a flag. We're just living life. So, unfortunately, when you think of representation, it usually has to do with media. If we're not on the TV screens, then, we don't exist because those of us in real life are just living life. I mean, if I wasn't marketing a children's book where I was on, media outlets talking about my product, and talking about low vision awareness, then I would be, a success story just living my life and no one would know about me.
Sylvia: You're right people are just living their lives. And I think that's a thing that is sometimes shocking to people is that there are people just like all of us who are blind or low vision, who are literally just carrying on with life. Owning homes, going to work every day, going to school, cleaning their house, and all the things that are just part of life.
Krystle: Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think, Steph you and I had spoken about this previously, how, you know, I always speak about the spectrum of vision loss because I live in a broader community, and a lot of times there's sort of a rallying cry around the word, blind, and not everyone in the spectrum of vision loss, identifies with that. Because then there's, sort of a different response that we get from the mainstream when we use that word. Because it's like, well, are you blind if you can still see this or you can still see that, right?
And so, oftentimes if you fall in that, that middle area where you're not fully sighted and you're not completely blind, you can start to feel like you don't have a voice or you don't have a say, and it's easier to just pass, right? Because then you don't want to be looked at as though you're milking something that's maybe quote unquote, not that bad because you're not on the other end of the spectrum. But then I think it just starts to, to muffle our voice. And I think if we all stood together in solidarity across the, the spectrum of vision loss, and championed our access needs across the spectrum of vision loss, people would really start to hear us.
Steph: I, agree with you and I use that all the time, the terminology that blindness is a spectrum or we're on the spectrum of blindness. I think it makes people feel a little more empowered as well because it's, it's more inclusive, even though we understand that people who are totally blind, are only 15 percent of the blind community, there is that gray area where people don't understand the greater majority that are on the spectrum.
Krystle: Right. And they are 100 percent of the representation in media.
Steph: Yes.
Sylvia: Mhm.
Steph: Dana.
The Role of Assistive Technology in Employment
Dana: What role does assistive technology play in enabling blind people to perform effectively in various jobs?
Krystle: Oh, it's huge. It's our access key. I think, at any stage of vision loss, if you are entering the workforce for the first time or re entering after experiencing vision loss, you have to first get your tools.
You have to be adept at whatever it is that you need. If you're, if you're not aware of what you need, you can get evaluations through different nonprofits. You can, like I said before, check out the job accommodation network. And you definitely want to learn your tools, whether it be, Dragon, Speech whether it be ZoomText or the magnification on Windows or if it's JAWS or if you need to learn to be a touch typist. If it's large print keyboards if it's just the adaptive tools that are available to us through Maxi-Aids and various outlets. If it's a desktop CCTV, if it's a portable CCTV, whatever it is, you want to know that like the back of your hands.
I would tell when I, my clients when I was working with them and, being an empowerment coach, you want to step into these tools in a casual way. If you are recently have lost vision, you want to get into texting with family and friends. You want to get into emailing with family and friends. You want to use that word document to write letters. Do things that are less pressurized and more casual so that you spend more time doing it and your speed catches up. Your ability catches up so that you really do feel confident when you go into that interview and you're not sort of harboring anxieties around meeting production standards.
Nasreen: You know, Krystle that is, a really solid advice. Technology and tools go hand in hand and like you said, just casually get into them, use them, and get comfortable with them because that's really, really important. And the different types of tools that we all need with our various disabilities on that spectrum is really important, for our day to day.
Preparing for Employment: Tips and Strategies
And so therefore, you know, tools and technology are just one of the aspects, but how can job seekers best prepare themselves and showcase their skills to potential employers aside from just technology?
Krystle: Sure. I say all the time that it definitely comes into your confidence level. As I, you know, sort of mentioned a bit earlier, it's practicing, practicing that two-minute pitch before you go into the interview. Practicing how you're going to answer certain follow-up questions. Practicing how you're going to slip in that disability disclosure if you choose to disclose, in interview in a casual, by the way, insert. You want to make sure that you are watching the trends in terms of how resumes are being put together. Now, you want to make sure that you are getting the up-to-date skills and credentials that are needed for the industry that you're going after.
If you have access to, internships, you want to employ those while you're a student. If you are using LinkedIn, you want to make sure that your LinkedIn profile is up to standard with current trends. And you want to be reaching out to professionals in the field that you're trying to break into for informational interviews.
A lot of times people are open to just, text chatting or phone chatting, or if you're in the same city, getting lunch, and speaking to someone who just wants to know what it's like on the other side in the company. Learning about the corporate culture, learning about their particular career trajectory, right?
Looking up those job titles, right? In one of these online job boards, such as Indeed, etc. Cetera, ZipRecruiter, and then going straight to the requirements, well, what are the requirements that I need? And I'm making sure that I'm tailoring my education track to those things. Are there certain certifications that will allow a person to stand out?
Again, back to LinkedIn. If, you're searching people with a certain title, look at their credentials. Do they have certifications? Do they have a master's degree? You wanna be tooling yourself, to be a competitor. Because ultimately, it is a competitive job market, and the best thing you can do is compete.
Conclusion and Contact Information
Steph: Krystle, this has been a really great conversation. And gosh, I'm so sorry, we don't have enough time to go a little bit deeper. I think we're gonna have to have you come back. What I would like to do now is just to ask, how can our audience reach out to you? How can they connect with you?
Krystle: Sure, please, please do. You can actually check out my collection of Jumbo Large Text Children's Books at my website www.iabilitybooks.com. That is the letter i and it's books plural. So I'll say that one more time. www.iabilitybooks.com. And I do have all of my contact information there on the website.
Steph: That is wonderful. Well, thank you so much again for spending time with us and we will be looking forward to when you come back.
Krystle: One additional piece. Feel free to follow my Instagram at inside underscore ability underscore books inside_ability_books.
Thanks for tuning in to Bold Blind Beauty On A.I.R. today. We hope this episode has left you inspired and empowered. Remember, our journey continues beyond this podcast. Don't miss out on future episodes. Hit that subscribe button and stay up to date on all of our latest discussions. Also, join our vibrant community on Instagram for behind-the-scenes content, stories, and doses of motivation.
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