Experience of being a worker with a disability in the Colombian formal sector

TL;DR

This study explores the experiences of workers with disabilities in the Colombian formal sector, highlighting the challenges they face and their adaptation strategies.

Contribution

The study provides a qualitative understanding of how workers with disabilities adapt in the formal sector when reasonable accommodations are lacking.

Findings

Workers with disabilities face access limitations and task restrictions due to their conditions.

Companies often fail to commit to adapting spaces and processes for inclusion.

Workers develop personal strategies to integrate into the workplace and perform productively.

Abstract

In Colombia, 3 out of 10 WWDs have a formal employment contract. When workers are the ones required to adapt to the company, rather than the company adapting to them, barriers persist, limiting genuine inclusion.

To understand the experiences of WWDs employed in the formal sector of the economy through an employment contract.

A qualitative study with a phenomenological approach was conducted. Three men and two women participated: a man with a visual impairment and four individuals with motor disabilities, all formally employed in Cali, Colombia, and selected through purposive sampling. Data were collected through in-depth interviews, and the phenomenological analysis followed three phases: description, reduction, and interpretation. The lifeworld existentials of lived body, lived space, lived time, and lived human relations, as well as perceptions of working conditions, were categorized.

Workers reported access limitations and restrictions in work tasks due to their disabilities. Despite receiving support from their companies, a lack of commitment to adapting spaces and processes for inclusion was observed.

WWDs perceive reasonable accommodations as a desirable factor to facilitate adaptation. However, companies do not consistently implement such adaptations.

WWDs develop adaptation strategies, making a personal commitment to integrate into the workplace, often without specific accomodations from the company. Once integrated, they perform autonomously and productively, under conditions similar to those of their colleagues without disabilities.

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