How can we provide sustainable employment for ASD individuals?

Apologies longman, wolfbear and anyone else if I have offended anyone by making problems at work sound irrelevant if that is the case. I do in fact fully understand the significance.

I guess this is down to my personal need to break down, address and get some closure on one question at a time because I don't just get the parents perspective. I to have the Aspergers condition you see. 

I to have endured to say the least, an irratic, mixed employment experience peppered with periods of unemployment and study for 30 years. I have feared every breaktime and lunchtime in every place I have worked because of the prospect of social interaction etc etc. In one job I arrived one morning to find my desk had been removed from the office and placed outside in the corridor by my 'work mates' whilst the manager laughed and carried on working.

Yes I have experienced 'bad' stuff over the years and even recently this has occurred. Rest assured I do respect the experiences of others and regret that I have not been articulate enough to demonstrate this previously.

That said I would like to return to the general points you have made. I fully agree that work environments can be onerous and demoralizing thereby perpetuating a negative outlook and future failure. Therefore it is crucial that an ASD individuals early employment experience is positive, supportive and motivational.

Longman your points about problematic areas in the workplace are particularly relevant to my project although I do agree with Scorpion based on my own experiences and those of others that ASD individuals can and do operate in team situations and can manage others successfully when a professional environment exists.

I have successfully managed teams on a number of occasions. This really substantiates what I and others, yourself included, have posted previously. An ASD individual can potentially experience both failure and success in employment. The employment environment is crucial for the latter to occur.

Does the NAS autism accreditation scheme meet this requirement as regards to its partner employers? Any views please.

Thanks longman for your excellent literacy references which I intend to follow up and I value everyones input tremendously.

longman said:

The next thing is teamwork. People on the spectrum are not designed to flourish in teamwork situations. But I'm afraid the days of the boffin beavering away in a little room are far in the past. Most work environments are team environments. They have to be to bring to the table a sufficient range of experience, skill and knowledge for any single objective. We don't tend to have jobs now that one person can do all on their own.

I think this idea that we, on the spectrum, can't work in teams is a myth.

Where we certainly don't thrive is in the (neuro)typical, competetive, 'team' environment of many modern workplaces, where 'being a team-player' seems to involve 'politics' and 'back-stabbing'.

I have worked in teams in the IT industry (software development, to be precise), where there are a high number of people with (at the very least) autistic spectrum traits, and more often than not, teams operate more co-operatively, there's much less politics and backstabbing, and people work more as individual elements of a whole - often spending much time working 'by themselves' on assigned, or often chosen, tasks, and then coming together to get things done (rather than having endless pointless meetings).

As an addendum we need to mention this phenomenon known as the Disability Discrimination Act, and from the way it is treated in the workplace, how the Autism Act will also be regarded.

Lots of employers take on disabled staff perhaps more to give the impression of being open to different backgrounds than actually genuine. The engineering and computing sectors seem to be good at doing this, but in practice it is not as extensively practiced as might be revealed to the media.

But the less visible disabilities do not fair so well. Whatever legislation is in place, it is well nigh impossible to monitor discrimination if it is not implicit. Workers will obviously not openly discriminate. But if they don't want the misfit on theirr team there are plenty of subtle ways of bringing about constructive dismissal. The disabled person is forced to withdraw from the job either because their working conditions have become impossible or because they've complained but management and Human Rsources haven't been able to find any evidence.

Disability discrimination reform gives a nice warm feeling to poliiticians, but it has to be said we Brits wont work with someone if we don't like them. And there isn't really any meaningful legislation to prevent indirect discrimination or constructive dismissal. We are a sad bunch as a nation, and discrimination whether disability, race religion, sexuality or style of dress is rife.

In education, while an effort is being made to make education and learning accessible to all, conditions for disabled teaching and support staff haven't progressed at all. A survey done in FE and HE in Scotland a few years ago found many disabled teaching staff were being cruelly and vindictively bullied by colleagues because they were cripples or less than adequate, in full view of colleagues and management, with nothing being done.

Granted, spadger, you have a parent's perspective with two sons of transition age starting in the workplace. I was a bit worried though by your second paragraph. Lots of people have bad experiences of work (this country loses massive revenue owing to a faluire to make an effort to improve the working environment).

The bad experiences faced by many on the spectrum and explained by Wolfbear are really important if you propose to research getting people into work.

The attitude of people in a work environment to anyone "different" is shocking. But because unions tend to turn bullying and stress into something down to management, management goes on the defensive instead of tackling the issues that need to be tackled.

Because of the disadvantages faced by people on the spectrum, the work environment is particularly onerous and demoralising. It isn't simply about giving people on the spectrum opportunities, its about providing environments in which they can work.

As someone who has followed several career paths in industry and education my progression has been in no sense easy. The big problem for me is fitting in. I don't think I do anything particularly to deserve it, but I am different. And you always get some colleagues who make it a mission to get rid of the odd ball. They can do it very subtly by undermining your confidence, moving you from one task to another, alleging you aren't up to the job, and complaining about how you relate to people. In my experience, when matters came to a head, none of my accusers could produce any concrete evidence, but nevertheless the disruption and anxiety caused by these disruptions, as they evolved, damaged my career.  You only have to watch "The Office" to see how adverse such environments can be for anyone considered nerdy or uptight.

The next thing is teamwork. People on the spectrum are not designed to flourish in teamwork situations. But I'm afraid the days of the boffin beavering away in a little room are far in the past. Most work environments are team environments. They have to be to bring to the table a sufficient range of experience, skill and knowledge for any single objective. We don't tend to have jobs now that one person can do all on their own.

Deputising is difficult if you cannot understand people and how they interface, so management is seldom an option. You can read about this in Johnson M (2005) Managing with Asperger Syndrome (Jessica Kingsley Publishers). This described management in a marketing and sales environment for someone with aspergers.

Working with people in a service sector can also be difficult. Poor eye contact, difficulties following what people are explaining, and sustaining attention are all factors.

I don't dispraise your efforts as a parent in exploring the world of work, not only to help your sons but to help others on the spectrum. However I would ask you to respect the experiences of people on the spectrum trying to survive in the world of work. Mostly for the mere crime of not being able to socially integrate many of us are prevented from putting our talents to work and earning enough to live on.

You need to read about other people's experiences first, to get a grasp of the problems.

Sorry to hear that you have had such negative experiences in employment Wolfbear. Alot of this negative experience can, as you rightly say be attributed to poor employer (and societies) attitudes that fail to consider what should be important i.e. social responsibility, in favour of greed.

Whilst these type of experiences do occur to people (I have first hand bad experiences myself), many people also have positive employment experiences.

Although you make many valid points about social injustice I think we digress from the original focus (assisting unemployed ASD individuals keen to find employment to do so) so I will move on.

Your opinion about the way to approach ASD employability is very interesting and I am inclined to agree unless further evidence comes to light. As you say the only real alternatives seem to be either an independant ASD environment developed specifically for creating ASD employment or, quote, "a responsive protection" framework applied within an external employment environment.

You are rightly concerned about the latter and this would have to include strigent safeguards to prevent abuse and exploitation taking place.

I think it may to useful to consider the pros and cons of both alternatives in more detail so any thoughts anybody?

Just to conclude, we are all aware there is no quick solution to this problem but progress is being made slowly but surely.

If the current system isn't fit for purpose we need to try and fix it.

If ASD individuals keen to have a rewarding career arn't being given the opportunities to do this we have to find a way of creating them.

Has anybody had any work experience with autism initiatives?

Any positive or negative work experiences you can share?

What made it positive and vice versa?

longman your viewpoint seems very similar to my own. I couldn't agree more that the considerations, needs and aspirations of the majority are key to any project that works towards facilitating a significant positive impact.

When I started my research a few days ago I was hoping to identify UK organisations that provided a range of different training and/ or employment opportunities to meet the diverse aptitudes and needs of different people with a view to coordinating something similar in my area.

To date I have only found the afore mentioned Danish organisation and similar operations that have been modelled on it either as a partner to it or as a clone (Spiritech in USA for example).

Your last statement clarifies two of the objectives of my research very well.

Many thanks for the useful literacy reference by the way. I shall try and get hold of that one for sure.

Might be worth reading some of the literature describing employment experiences.

For example Edmonds G and Beardon L (2008) Asperger Syndrome and Employment (Adults Speak out about Asperger Syndrome series Jessica Kingsley Publishers).

While the aims of this Danish company seem sincere, they are only looking for particular aptitudes that are marketable. Not all people on the spectrum are computer whizz kids - it does seem to figure a lot but its not an automatic gift. Some are more visual and artistic, some are musical, some good at languages, but there are no rules to this. Not everyone would want, let alone have aptitude for the kind of work this company is offering.

It is important to examine the constraints on finding employment as well as possible things people might be able to offer.

Hi,

sorry to bore you Scorpion, lol.

Seriously though apologies for that. I'm new to the community and not sure how it works technically so wasn't sure whether it was reaching the total audience when submitted in one particular section i.e. general chat, education etc. To be on the safe side I submitted to more than one section.

Thanks for clarifying that for me!

My objective was to reach as many people as possible to gather as much info as possible as part of my research into the ASD employability issue.

Thanks for your previous input which was very interesting.

Would welcome any further thoughts you have on the topic.

This is about the third time you've posted this, almost word-for-word, spadger.

I'm starting to consider reporting you for spamming.