Type of Project: Funded project Joint project Model project
Leading by example! Strengthening Inclusion in Work with Role Models

Company practice and research show that positive experiences with severely disabled employees motivate companies and their agents to employ more people with disabilities and to create the necessary inclusive framework conditions. People with severe disabilities who take on a leadership role in the company and are open about their disability can be encouraging and supportive for their colleagues and for applicants with severe disabilities and become role models. If managers with disabilities in the company are effective as role models, this can help to increase the proportion of severely disabled people, create a more inclusive organizational climate and improve the overall employment situation of severely disabled people in the long term. Role models have an effect on the individual level of severely disabled employees and applicants as well as on the team and organizational level. The aim of the project is to develop a scientific framework and a toolbox to identify and strengthen managers with disabilities as role models for workplace inclusion and to implement strategies tailored to the specific company so that the role models can be effective at the individual, team and organizational level. Based on research and a multi-perspective data collection from relevant agents (severely disabled employees and applicants, managers with disabilities, company agents), a scientific framework model "Role Models for workplace inclusion" will be developed. Linked to this scientific framework model, a toolbox for the identification and strengthening of role models and for the development and implementation of a role model strategy in companies will be compiled in a participatory process. These will then be implemented as models in five companies during a test phase and further developed on the basis of the results of scientific monitoring. The scientific framework model and the toolbox will then be published in an easily accessible and sustainable place (e.g. also at REHADAT) and, during the implementation and sustainability phase, will be made available to internal and external multipliers (e.g. employers' associations, social partners, etc.). Employer associations, inclusion officers, inclusion and integration offices, single points of contact for employers according to § 185a SGB IX, EUTB, associations and organizations of people with disabilities, diversity and inclusion officers, representatives of severely disabled persons) in webinar workshops. Based on the scientific monitoring of the implementation, implementation and dissemination aids for the use of the tools by the various groups of actors are developed and optimized. The central principles of the project are that the tools are developed in a participatory manner with scientific support, so that both the company perspective and the perspectives of severely disabled managers and employees or applicants are taken into account. In addition, existing internal and external structures as well as previous work by the applicants will be used and strengthened during implementation.