Retention Projects

Retention Pathway Support Project

The Retention Pathway Support Project aims to work closely with employers to improve job retention for disabled employees, provide information and support on employing disabled people and to ensure that the solutions provided are sustainable and practical for employers to put into place.

Data from the DWP, Work, Health and Disability green paper: data pack (2018), highlights that disabled individuals in employment were more likely to fall out of work than non-disabled individuals. Additionally, the Scottish Government labour market flows analysis confirms that in 2018, disabled people were almost twice as likely to move out of work compared to non-disabled people.

We’ve identified that there are two main issues that exemplify the need for this project:

1. Too few employers are currently encouraging disabled people into their workplace due to lack of knowledge concerning the available support during the employment journey, fear of managing issues poorly and the subsequent impact of this and mistaken views about disabled employees. Some employers don’t feel adequately prepared to take the first steps on the retention pathway.
2. Where disabled people have been employed in organisations, successful retention is significantly more likely when the organisation has a disability or support focus at its core and is therefore considered “specialist” in some way. This supports our understanding that employing disabled people is not perceived as being a mainstream element of being an employer and is too often “left to the experts”.

We aim to develop this as a fully costed project that will be offered to employers through the Centre of Excellence from Spring 2022. More details on the employers we are working with and the staff delivering the project will be added here soon.