Access &: Accessible Tourism for Everyone (18th June 2024)
Your fortnightly newsletter bringing you the why and how of accessibility in business.
Access & is your why- Focusing on accessibility and a trending topic/interesting industry/timely conversation.
It’s great to have a conversation, but I know you’re looking for something more…
Access & Actions is your how- Tasks, activities, conversation starters, stats to take to leadership and things you can implement the very same day.
The Untapped Advantage
Standing out…
As many people prepare for a summer of experiences and adventure, I’ve been thinking about how many experiences are shut off from the disability community due to inaccessibility, experiences they deserve to have too.
TV presenter, Sophie Morgan, recently went on the world’s first luxury, wheelchair-accessible safari, at Ximuwu Safari Lodge and Wheelchair Safari, who are totally showing the world how it’s done in hospitality and tourism.
In a reel with Wheel the World and Ximuwu Safari Lodge, Sophie said, '‘It’s all been designed so that everything is ramped and easy to get to. You never feel like you are the afterthought. You’re the forethought. So when you’re going somewhere to go and say, view the animals, you’re not having to go a different route to the others. Everyone goes in the same way, so there’s that integration, which is subtle but important.”
This is wonderful to see, but sadly inaccessible tourism and hospitality experiences are a much more common experience for disabled people, whether that’s being directed to access a building through the back by the bins, or inaccessible airline experiences, or just being ignored or overlooked in multiple ways.
‘Trying our best’ seems to be the general consensus, but this isn’t enough. Why should disabled people be treated like second-class citizens? It has to be woven into every part of the experience or service you’re offering so that disabled people and non-disabled people alike can have the same experience, whatever their needs are. Accessible tourism for everyone please!
Why does it matter?
1.3 billion people - about 16% of the global population - experience significant disability (World Health Organization).
2/3 of people with disabilities in developed economies are likely to have means to travel (Bowtell, 2015).
The total travel expenditure generated by those with a health impairment or travelling in a group where a member had a health impairment is estimated to be £14.6 billion annually (The Value of the Purple Pound, Visit Britain, 2023/2018).
The Heart Of It
Getting to the point…
Disability Pride Month is in July…. are you ready? It’s a celebration on its own, separate from Pride Month in June… so it’s not one or the other.
This month celebrates disability as an identity, culture and a source of pride.
In a world where many disabled people feel they need to hide their disabilities in the workplace due to fear of judgement, prejudice or discrimination, what are you planning this July to show them and future disabled employees, that your organisation is an inclusive environment that celebrates them and all they have to offer?
And what are you doing in the months after?
Quick Tips:
Pay disabled speakers/creators fairly for their time and skills.
Plan events well in advance.
Schedule multiple sessions for wider reach.
The Inner(vation) Circle
Hear from the voices shaping tomorrow, today.
When thinking about who to chat to about Disability Pride Month, and the challenges of celebrating a month of disabled pride, while also understanding the nuance that comes with ‘doing the work’ as an organisation and tokenistic celebration, there was one name that popped into my head- Kelly Gordon. Co Founder and CEO of With Not For, she is an entrepreneur who has worked across multiple industries utilising her lived experience as a wheelchair user to inform her work, lead and ultimately make change.
During her career Kelly has learnt a lot about herself as a Disabled professional in many male dominated industries, namely the Football industry, running a successful concierge business and managing Football players on a daily basis, and ultimately becoming CEO and co-owner of a professional Football Club in 2015.
Kelly has a Creative background, heading up the talent side of With Not For as co-founder and CEO using her lived experience of Disability as a catalyst for her work. Kelly is passionate about representation within the media and has been featured on many major channels and within numerous publications discussing anything ranging from entrepreneurship, disability and employment, all the way through to family, work life/balance, sexual wellness and sex education. Kelly’s and her content has been featured across many mainstream TV and print media channels.
What does disability pride month mean to you?
Disability Pride month is so important and means a lot to me to have a month that highlights and platforms the stories of Disabled people. Disability Pride month encourages brands and corporations to celebrate Disabled people, book them for speaking slots, engage them professionally and research their ideas and is a key way to ensure that brands, businesses and ultimately their output is balanced, nuanced and diverse. I do of course state (especially when we are working with brands) that they should be doing the work outside of awareness months and days to ensure that these activities continue throughout their whole annual strategy.
What do you wish companies knew when booking a speaker for disability pride month?
I wish that companies knew when engaging Disabled people, particularly around awareness days that Disabled people don’t work and share their lived experience for free or for exposure and that Disability doesn’t just look one way. It is also important not to engage with awareness days just to ‘box tick”, it’s vital that for portrayal and experiences to be authentic and that ideas are well researched WITH and not FOR the community. It is also really important to note that speaking sessions can look however you’d like them to! Whether you are a more creative business that loves panel talks or fireside chats or whether you’d prefer something more formal like interaction training or a workplace assessment, anything is possible.
Whats the best example you’ve seen of a company taking disability Pride seriously?
The sad thing is, for me, I can’t think of a stand out example. Disability Pride is still vastly under celebrated and under publicised and even a lot of huge brands and companies still do not take part. If you were to ask me what a perfect example could be it would be that a company would make a long term commitment to embracing Disability within their workplace, it doesn’t need to be difficult or expensive you can start by doing things like;
- Reviewing your internal policies
- Checking your building access or your meeting spaces
- Platforming Disabled employees
- Overhauling your external comms to make them more accessible
Not everything has to be a large PR activation or a visible campaign, however! It’s important to remember that when you are doing external activity to always engage the community at idea stage and work together to make a great project that is fully researched and representative.
You can follow Kelly on instagram and follow Kelly of LinkedIn, and check out With Not For here for all your talent, content and training needs.
Up To Date?
This month’s top need-to-know news.
Join me on 18th June at 1pm for an online lunch and learn about using Social Media for Advocacy, as part of Sounddelivery Media’s Festival of Learning. A two-week long series of online talks and panel discussions on amplifying the voices of people with lived experience, leveraging the media to get your message out there.
Disabled people were not directly mentioned once during the first major television event of the general election campaign, which lasted over 2 hours. Just a reminder: disabled people face many barriers before they’ve even got to the workplace. Being an inclusive employer who is able to fully support disabled people in the workplace (or attract top disabled talent in the first place) starts with building your understanding about the reality disabled people face.
See you soon for Access & Actions!
Rachael x
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