What needs to be done to encourage SME employers to feel confident in hiring people with disabilities?
Our latest research explored the recruitment behaviour and decisions of employers of small and medium-sized enterprises in the UK and how these might relate to the employment of disabled people.
A key element of the design in this research was to identify employment vacancies as they were advertised by employers, so that the exploration of recruitment decisions was in as close to real time as possible. In this way the interviews took place in a meaningful context and it limited any problems with recall that can occur in retrospective interview accounts.
The findings highlight:
• the factors influencing the recruitment decisions of SME employers
• their attitudes and experiences of employing disabled people
• their perceptions of the validity of arguments for employing disabled people.
The report concludes with a discussion of the policy implications which arise from the findings.