Take Our Corporate Challenge!
You’re invited to take United Spinal’s Corporate Challenge to deepen your disability awareness, particularly of the challenges faced by wheelchair users.
Inspired by the Americans with Disabilities Act, our Corporate Challenge will provide you and your colleagues with resources and disability awareness tools to help you achieve your business objectives.
Review the following six topics, visit the provided links, and complete the response form to receive a virtual Corporate Challenge medallion, acknowledging your commitment to disability awareness.
Take Our Corporate Challenge
1. Is my workplace accessible?
An accessible work environment specifically considers the needs of people with disabilities. This can include programs, services, products, technology and the built environment. Accessible workplace design benefits everyone, not just employees with disabilities. And full inclusion empowers people with disabilities to become valued employees. Join your corporate peers in surpassing basic compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act today.
Contact our Accessibility Services program for assistance ensuring your facility is accessible to all. We can help with plan reviews, site inspections and tailored architect/designer training.
2. Do my coworkers and I understand disability etiquette?
Sensitivity toward people with disabilities is not only the right thing to do—it also makes good business sense. Practicing disability etiquette and awareness exemplifies modern leadership and HR practices.
When supervisors and co-workers understand and practice disability etiquette, employees with disabilities are more comfortable and productive. To get started:
- Download our popular Disability Etiquette Guide and share the link with your colleagues
- Share our Disability Etiquette Top 10
- Review United Spinal’s Disability Style Guide for referencing people with disabilities authored by the editorial team of our membership publication, New Mobility. It will improve your marketing and external communications and enhance internal disability awareness.
United Spinal offers customized in-person and online Disability Etiquette training sessions at a reasonable cost for your company, organization, or institution.
3. How can my company actively recruit people with disabilities?
United Spinal’s Pathways to Employment provides wheelchair users with job opportunities, trained peer mentors, resources, and professional support to facilitate return to work. This includes benefits counseling to facilitate the transition to employment.
- Tips For Employers on Accommodating Job Seekers with Disabilities
- Pathways to Employment Program
- Gain outstanding insights from previous PTE webinars
Your corporation will benefit from unique access to this large talent pool of wheelchair users. Let’s work together to advance your disability hiring outcomes! Contact us to post employment opportunities for wheelchair users.
4. Is my company launching or improving its current disability-focused employee resource group?
United Spinal has access to over a million wheelchair users who participate in our programs and digital platforms. Through our extensive national networks, including members of our 40+ chapters, 100+ support groups, and 100+ rehabilitation and therapeutic partners, we provide valuable insight into employee resources that focus on serving people with disabilities.
United Spinal Resources for your Abilities ERG:
- Connect with a local United Spinal chapter to invite them for a lunch and learn
- Distribute, post, and share with your ERG stakeholders and fellow team members our free disability-focused publications
- Join United Spinal’s Free Membership to have every advantage for wellness and independence
- Use our virtual Resource Center to get personalized support on many issues impacting your colleagues living with disabilities
- Follow our membership publication New Mobility, a premier lifestyle magazine for wheelchair users
To learn more about our ERG resources and ways to engage with our community, contact Scott Lavery.
5. Are my company’s technology, products and services accessible to employees and customers with disabilities?
United Spinal’s Tech Access Initiative (TAI) involves the voice of people with disabilities in product design and innovation—as consumers and professionals. It is led by a first-of-its-kind Tech Access Group, comprised of high-level testers and influencers living with quadriplegia, paraplegia and other disabilities. TAG engages with R&D, UD, UX, and marketing leads, representing wheelchair users through surveying, product testing and focus group opportunities.
TAG provides input to develop use cases for emerging technologies like AI and advancing digital skills-building for consumers and patients with mobility impairments. The goal is Universal Design that benefits all of society.
To engage with the TAG, please contact AJ Assaadi, Vice President, Corporate Partnerships.
6. How can I learn more about the concerns of wheelchair users, people living with spinal cord injuries/disorders and others with disabilities?
Subscribe to United Spinal’s timely and informative newsletters:
- Our United Spinal newsletter shares exciting program developments and member stories.
- Advocacy & Policy’s newsletter provides a detailed, thorough analysis of issues affecting wheelchair users and all people with disabilities.
- Pathways to Employment’s newsletter showcases successfully employed wheelchair users and is a good place for your company to share job announcements.
- The Tech Access Initiative’s newsletter keeps you apprised of the excellent work done with our corporate partners in the Tech Access Council.
- New Mobility’s newsletter will update you on the latest products and interesting wheelchair users.
Follow United Spinal Association on our colorful and informative blog and social media platforms:
Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn
Instagram
Vimeo
Read our membership publication New Mobility Magazine
Award-winning lifestyle magazine New Mobility encourages the integration of active wheelchair users into mainstream society with articles on health, advocacy, travel, employment, relationships, recreation, media, products and more. Ninety percent of its writers live with disabilities, creating a vibrant culture of disability journalism, philosophy and advocacy article by article.
Attend Our Events
United Spinal hosts virtual and in-person events throughout the year. Visit our events page!
Visit our virtual Resource Center
United Spinal’s Spinal Cord Injury Resource Center provides valuable information for wheelchair users, their families and clinicians. The Resource Center can provide you and your colleagues with disabilities and those who serve as caregivers with one-on-one service and tailored resources to support a healthy and independent lifestyle.
Let Us Know You Took Our Corporate Challenge
Please complete this quick form to log your participation!
Show Off Your Accessible and Inclusive Workplace
Position Your Company as an Accessibility Leader
Send us a photo or short video showing your company’s inclusion and accessibility for people with mobility disabilities so others can follow your lead!
Congratulations to the following companies for completing the ADA Corporate Challenge:
180 Medical
AbbVie
Accessibility.com
Allsup
American Physical Therapy Association
Anchor Medical
Biogen
BraunAbility
Byram Healthcare
Cheelcare
Chevron
The Coca-Cola Company
Cruise LLC
Cure Medical
Dominion Energy
Giraffe Bottle
Hodges Partnership
Invacare
ITS America
Latin America for All
Kakana
Ki Mobility
Microsoft
(2)
Mobility Support Solutions
ModularHose
National Seating & Mobility
NMEDA
(5)
Neuralink Corp
The No White Flags Project
Numotion
Partners for Automated Vehicle Education (PAVE)
Path Consultants
Pride Mobility / Quantum Rehab
Raytheon
Rollx Vans
Smith+Nephew
SPR
Stalwart COM LLC
Strowmatt Rehabilitation Services, Inc.
Sunrise Medical
Tidal Construction Group
Vantage Mobility
Waymo
How is your company addressing disability access and inclusion?
“As an accessibility company, all of our locations are ADA compliant and accessible. As a part of new hire on-boarding, all NSM employees are assigned etiquette and sensitivity training, focused on serving disabled/mobility challenged clients and their families. We seek a diverse employee population and make every effort to make accommodations to encourage hiring of disabled employees. We have a diversity committee supported by advisory groups and ensure that disabled employees have a voice to express ideas and opportunities.”
–Ann Mahaffey, VP Human Resources, National Seating & Mobility
"Dominion Energy believes it is essential to provide a safe and welcoming environment for everyone who connects with the company—both inside and outside of the organization—and to recognize, value, celebrate and embrace our differences. Dominion Energy’s commitment to continuing to build a truly diverse and inclusive culture led to the formation of our DiverseAbility ERG, whose mission is to connect, engage, support and empower disabled employees. The ERG also focuses on employees who are caregivers to the disabled and encourages leaders to create a culture of belonging. The company's commitment to accessibility is evidenced through our proactive Facilities and IT planning processes. "
—Morenike Miles, Vice President Sustainability and Compliance, Dominion Energy
“180 Medical was founded by Todd Brown after his spinal cord injury, and that legacy he began over 20 years ago continues to shape our commitment to inclusion. We proudly employ individuals with disabilities, including those with invisible conditions, and foster belonging through our Disability Employee Resource Group (ERG). The ERG offers support, advocacy, and education across the company. Our mission is to create a workplace and a supportive customer experience where all people feel seen, valued, and empowered.”
–Jessica Jared, Sr. Marketing Specialist, 180 Medical
“Accessibility.com was founded with the mission to become a catalyst for equal access to the physical and digital worlds. Each day, a diverse group of professionals and advocates work toward our vision of an accessible world by helping individuals and business understand and act on their accessibility opportunities and obligations. We're committed to equal opportunity internally and externally."
–Casey Naiduk, Head of Content and Experience, Accessibility.com
"Our entire mission is centered around disability access. Our goal is to promote awareness of adaptive transportation solutions available to persons with disabilities, their families and their caregivers. Through the use of mobility equipment, Our members are able to transform the lives of those living with disabilities and grant each of their clients added independence and the ability to get behind the wheel of their own wheelchair accessible vehicle."
–Trevor Jennings, Director of Partner Relations, National Mobility Equipment Dealers Association/NMEDA
“D&I is an inseparable part of who we are and what we do.."
–Evelio Goderich, VP Sales & Marketing, Cheelcare
"Invacare is a global leader in manufacturing home medical device and is dedicated to putting the patient at the center of everything we do. We are passionate about providing clinical solutions for post-acute care, rehab, homecare, and respiratory markets to promote our Corporate Vision—Making Life’s Experiences Possible™."
–Sandy Habecker, Training & Marketing Specialist, Invacare
"Our services are provided for people with disabilities, their families and friends. We are on a continous work to improve accessiblity in all of our tours."
–Juan Francisco Maranon, Sales Coordinator, Latin America for All
"Our company culture and facility are set up to serve people with disabilities. We have focused on both accessibility and safety protocols to provide a place where everyone feels welcome."
–Scott Andrews, Director Sales and Marketing, Rollx Vans
"Improving access for people with disabilities was a priority when we designed our new national headquarters, which will open in January 2021. It informed decisions on everything from office furniture (all desks can be electronically raised and lowered) to flooring (we avoided materials that would be challenging for people in wheelchairs or with balance problems).
APTA has also developed a staff diversity, equity, and inclusion team to support our progress, and in 2021 we will be hiring a vice president of DEI, who will sit on our leadership team.
APTA is committed to promoting equal employment for all persons in its employment and hiring policies and procedures. These are some examples of what APTA is doing to address disability access and inclusion. "
—Jason Bellamy, EVP, Strategic Communications, American Physical Therapy Association