*3.7. Theme 7: Hiring Practices That Invite People with Disability*

The literature included in this theme reported on the importance of hiring practices that invite job seekers with disability to apply for jobs including organizational strategies to ensure the hiring process is accessible, organizational policies that support the employment of people with disability, and the broader study of organizational culture to build a culture of respect towards candidates and employees with disability. In our review, we identified six relevant articles in the construction sector, although the employment outcomes

for those workers and their subsequent career trajectory is not reported. These papers included Loosemore et al.'s [8] case study of social procurement in Australia highlighted the importance of project-based intermediaries to bypass traditional recruitment processes which exclude people with disability being recruited into construction. Two other papers recommended changes in hiring practices to assist employers comply with the employment discrimination and accommodation provisions of the ADA when that US law was introduced [46,48]. Maroto and Pettinicchio's [65] chapter concluded that employer attitudes to hiring people with disability in the UK are improved when employers themselves have worked with a person with disability, and that it is a responsibility of the construction sector to support people with disability in pathways to employment (as well as supporting them when employed including career development opportunity). Clarke and Gribling [12] identified that existing recruitment practices in the construction sector in the UK were a major barrier to more inclusive recruitment of people in the community, from diverse backgrounds including people with disability. Ians et al.'s [57] survey of the top 100 UK contractors identified their lack of organisational policies and strategies of construction contractors to support people with disability through the hiring process, or provide evidence those contractors were complying with their employer obligations under the then UK Disability Discrimination Act 1995.

Overall, our analysis shows that while there is an established body of knowledge pointing to the role of organizational culture, strategies for inviting people with disability to apply for work and tools used to build and retain a diverse workforce (budget allocation, co-worker training and CEO commitment and leadership on diversity, etc.) [56,65,66], there has been little or no equivalent sector-specific research exploring how construction sector culture, organizational structures or other factors (job design, workforce planning, the managers or relationships that control the hiring process, recognition of jobs in technical and/or management roles, and allocation of jobs or even government policy, etc.) may be exclusionary, create work disincentives and contribute to current low levels of employment of people with disability [67].

There has also been little or no construction research studying hiring strategies and practices deployed for increasing the employment of people with disability in ways that can be made equitable whilst considering career access points, quality of work and career progression from the employee's perspective. Furthermore, while construction researchers have explored the employment barriers facing people with disability in construction, there is a clear contrast with the considerable research having been undertaken in other fields investigating strategies to navigate and reduce the barriers experienced by people with disability in gaining employment [30,65,68,69]. Another related gap in research which has received little attention in construction is the reporting of the effectiveness of these strategies in achieving improved employment outcomes for people with disability.

Connections have been made between technological advancement in the construction sector, and an increase in accessibility of construction workplaces and activities [17]. This opportunity to take advantage of technological and work changes has not yet been fully explored—one example being off-site construction. There is evidence within the literature that employers and agencies do not believe people with disability are suited for many construction professions [70]. There is also evidence of ableist practices within the sector that perceive people with disability as a homogenous group rather than a heterogenous group. An example of this is that the work environment for construction workers is often cited as a reason that all people with disability are less likely to be considered for work in the sector [25,43]. While there has been a considerable body of research into the benefits of offsite construction such as [71] there is a timely opportunity to address the gap in research of how off-site construction can support more inclusive employment, by better recognizing the diversity of disability and providing more-accessible work environments that can integrate assistive technology into construction work practice.

There is also a gap in construction research regarding disclosure, both from the perspective of people with disability and employers. Studies have identified that employees

are reluctant to disclose any form of disability because of stigmas surrounding this and that employers are uncomfortable asking about an applicant's disability in the employment process making it hard to assess whether the person can do the job [30]. Employers seem to be uncertain about communicating necessary inherent requirement of jobs at the beginning of the application process and their right to ask all applicants how they would be able to perform the role.

Finally, the role of cross-sector collaboration, project-based intermediaries and organizational champions is also worthy of further investigation, especially within the context of emerging social procurement policies which mandate the employment of people with disability as part of project contractual requirements [8,51]. Such intermediaries are designed to encourage employment of people with disability within established supply chains. However, since the goals of social procurement is also to encourage supply chain diversity [72], the role of minority disability business and social enterprises merits particular attention in increasing employment of people with disability indirectly within the industry. Recent work on self-employment and entrepreneurship of people with disability, identified opportunity for the construction industry to draw on the skill and ability base of allied technical, professional and management businesses [73]. Questions revolve around whether they represent a sustainable long-term solution to diversity in construction or whether the focus should be on incumbent supply chains [74]. One of the differentiating characteristics of construction is its project-based production environment and the way that organizational champions and intermediaries can facilitate collaboration with specialist organizations which support people with disability could make a significant contribute to knowledge in this nascent field of research and practice.

#### **4. Conclusions**

The aim of this paper was to address the lack of social innovation research in construction relating the employment of people with a disability in the industry. The objective was to identify knowledge gaps in comparison to mainstream disability employment research and to clarify concepts to inform future research in this important yet under-explored area. Such research is important in informing social innovation practice, considering that the construction industry is experiencing severe skills shortages combined with a lack of diversity within the workforce population.

Our scoping review of the limited and fragmented academic evidence relating to the inclusion of people with disability in the construction industry workforce shows that it remains a relatively under-explored and under-theorized field and has identified significant gaps between research in construction disability employment compared with research in the broader field of mainstream disability employment. Overall, our analysis shows that while there is some research in construction relating to barriers to employment and stigmas surround people with disability, there is far less research relating to the enablers which can overcome these barriers. While there has been some research into accommodations which need to be made for employing people with a disability (especially around technological developments such as off-site prefabrication), there is a paucity of research in construction on relationship-building and cross-sector collaboration with support agencies, the role of social procurement and social enterprises and disability organizations in supporting disability employment, the provision of information to support employers to reduce ingrained stigmas and insights in to how to reduce biases and inequalities in highly traditional construction recruitment practices. In order to support social innovation in this area, construction research needs to balance its current emphasis on barriers (seeing people with disability as a risk) with equivalent research on solutions (seeing people with disability as an opportunity in a constrained labor market and because of their ability).

It has also become evident from our review that none of the extant research explores the employment cycle or addresses the project-based, itinerant and casual nature of construction employment and its impact on the quality work for people with disability. Therefore, further research is also needed to understand the informal factors influencing inclusive

employment strategies and the identification of barriers within the workplace culture itself. It is clear from our review that despite the implementation of numerous 'formal' laws and regulations relating to inclusive employment for people with disability, there are numerous under-researched 'informal' and unwritten industry norms and practices which can potentially undermine the intent of these policies. This highlights the potentially valuable role of New Institutional Theory, employed successfully in construction gender studies and social procurement [11,14] in better understanding the interactions between formal and informal norms and practices in the construction industry which can undermine the intent of formal policies to employ people with disability. The results also reflect on the additional responsibility of the construction sector to engage with inclusive employment strategies given the high level of disabling injuries experienced by the construction workforce internationally.

The scoping review also identifies a methodological gap in the research reviewed by highlighting the need for more construction research designs to include people with disability as prioritized research participants as well as research investigators and to adopt phenomenological and interpretive approaches which respect the lived experiences of people with a disability seeking work in the construction industry. While the value of a phenomenological methodology has recently been acknowledged by in the area of housing design for neurodiversity [75], such research is rare in the field of construction, which has a long tradition of positivist research methodologies which tend to subjugate research participants. The lack of longitudinal research including success stories in construction employment and long-term employment outcomes in the construction industry are also methodological gaps for future construction researchers to address. The important role of these success stories is emphasized by Lundberg [76].

If the sector hopes to innovate in finding new employment pathways into construction for people with disability, it is critical that research investigates the perspectives of people with disability currently employed in the sector, and the large numbers of people who have been disabled as a result of working in the sector and who are working or no longer able to work in the sector. Understanding the how people with disability perceive the sector from the inside will help build successful recruitment strategies for people from the outside.

In conclusion, given the extent of the research gaps identified we recommend that there are twelve fundamental research questions that should be prioritized in finding innovative new pathways for people with a disability into construction, and thereby move this nascent field of social innovation research forward:


**Author Contributions:** Conceptualization, S.B., P.C., M.L., S.D. and S.S.; methodology, S.B., P.C., M.L., S.D. and S.S.; validation, S.B., P.C., M.L., S.D. and S.S.; formal analysis, S.B., P.C., M.L. and S.D.; investigation, S.B. and P.C.; resources, S.B., P.C., M.L., S.D. and S.S.; data curation, S.B., P.C., M.L., S.D. and S.S.; writing—original draft preparation, S.B., P.C., M.L. and S.D.; writing—review and editing, S.B., P.C., M.L. and S.D.; project administration S.S.; funding acquisition, S.B., P.C., M.L., S.D. and S.S. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

**Funding:** This research was funded by a University of Technology Social Impact seed grant.

**Data Availability Statement:** Not applicable.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The authors declare no conflict of interest.

#### **References**

