Veterans with Disabilities
Studies Showing the Benefits of Hiring People with Disabilities
- Employers who had made accommodations for employees with disabilities reported multiple benefits as a result, including that the accommodation: allowed the company to retain a qualified employee; eliminated the costs of training a new employee; and increased the worker's productivity (Hendricks, Batiste and Hirsh, 2005.)
- Employees with disabilities consistently have nearly 85 percent one-year employment retention rates (U.S. Department of Education, 2003).
- Replacing employees is expensive, not only in tangible costs (e.g., advertising, screening, interviewing, training) but also in organizational knowledge that is lost, reports Employer Assistance & Recruiting Network (EARN). Human resource experts (Griffeth and Hom, 2001) estimate the cost of a single turnover ranges from 93-200% of the employee´s annual salary. Employers have found their employees with disabilities to be a loyal workforce, reducing turnover.
- High Turnover Antidote: Hire Employees with Disabilities states that among the most effective solutions to high turnover is hiring and retaining qualified employees with disabilities.
- After an 18-month initiative resulting in the hiring of 170 people with disabilities, Kathy Egan, President of Hire Potential, discovered that "These workers were more committed and were retained on average 50 percent longer than ´traditional´ workers, and our clients were more pleased with the quality of their work and kept them on longer."
- Marriott´s "Pathways to Independence" program shows a 6% turnover among Pathways participants (employees with disabilities), versus 52% overall workforce turnover between 1999 and 2003.
- Employees with disabilities at Pizza Hut have retention rates from four to five times higher than that of non-disabled workers, saving over $8 million through reduced turnover.
- Frank Coombs, owner of a IHOP Restaurant, discovered employees with disabilities are loyal, long-term workers in an industry where high employee turnover is the norm. Training each new employee costs IHOP about $1000, according to Coombs.
- International House of Pancakes franchisee finds operational savings by hiring people with disabilities.
