How to provide inclusive internships for disabled people

Internships are brilliant way to create opportunities for new talent and add value to your organisation. Read on to find out why and how to provide inclusive internships for disabled people.

Barriers to employment for disabled people

There are many barriers that disabled people face when seeking employment. Broadly speaking, these can be broken down into three factors:

Environmental barriers

These are barriers such as inaccessible workplace or training facilities and equipment, inaccessible transport systems and remote training grounds, and inaccessible communications (by employers and service providers).

Institutional barriers

These include a lack of inclusive training opportunities, lack of awareness and knowledge of employers and service providers on disability, a lack of inclusive employment and team/sport selection practices, and lack of adequate healthcare (private or public).

Attitudinal barriers

Discrimination against people with disabilities, including unconscious bias and assumptions about the cost of reasonable adjustments, specifically sporting equipment and/or people with disabilities’ capabilities.

Below we will explore how an internship can help.

What is an internship?

An internship is often described as an opportunity for a young person to gain some experience in the workplace. This can be while they are at school (often called ‘work experience), during university (more often referred to as ‘work placement’), or after they have finished education and are joining the labour market.

It is important to remember that while most internships are for short-term, entry level jobs, employers must recognise the value of internships and who they appeal to as adult interns also exist, and with a rising trend of people in their thirties deciding to quit their current role to pursue a new career, it’s extremely important to consider the opportunity (and pay!) any internship programmes you are thinking of developing or improving, provide.

Considering that 16.0 million people in the UK have a disability, is a certainty that you need a robust, inclusive and accessible internship programme.

What is a supported internship?

A supported internship is an internship specifically designed to support people aged 16-24 with a learning disability to transition from education into work and gain financial independence.

What are the benefits of providing internship opportunities

Simply put, it’s a good thing to do, and why shouldn’t you include disabled people in your workplace?

Looking at it in more detail, there are a couple of reasons that make internships a strategic inclusive recruitment strategy that makes sense:

• Internships provide an opportunity for people to gain experience, learn and make mistakes – internships are about preparing and equipping individuals to join a professional setting so they can flourish. Business benefit: Reduced onboarding times.
• Internships help someone new make a smooth transition into a workplace, new department or team, and ideally a permanent role when hired. Business benefit: Greater talent pool and reduced recruitment costs. 
• Internships are designed to balance experience with potential – matching an intern with the right mentor not only creates a rewarding relationship, but it also helps attrition levels as supported, valued colleagues stay with an organisation longer. In fact, interns are “32% more likely to be retained than new hires who lack internship experience”. Business benefit: Retained knowledge, experience and talent, and sustained workforce growth.  

Importantly, an internship provides an individual with the paid employment, financial independence and is key to:

• Building confidence and self-esteem
• Increasing health and wellbeing
• Gaining friendships and a social life