Book an Appointment
First Disability Confidence Day Switzerland
Last week, I attended the first Swiss Disability Confidence Day in Zurich. The day aimed to promote inclusivity and awareness regarding disability in the workplace. The event was happening at Google’s Accessibility Discovery Center (ADC) in Zurich, a community space where people with and without disabilities can explore accessible technology together and develop inclusive products.
This event brought together industry leaders, advocates, and individuals with disabilities to discuss best practices for fostering an inclusive work environment.
My highlights of the day were:
- The Workshop: “How to Convince Management to Embrace Inclusion for People with Disabilities” – Thanks to the great corporate speakers Jason Netos, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Leader, Takeda and Callie Parker, Vice President, Cardiovascular & Specialty Solutions Group EMEA, Johnson & Johnson, who shared practical strategies to persuade company leadership to adopt a path of inclusion for people with disabilities and the challenges related to data collection and utilization. These practices can not just be applied to increase inclusion in the workforce but also in the supply chain! Wolfgang Kowatsch, CEO My Ability provided great insights into My Ability, a social enterprise that does incredibly great work for an equitable and barrier-free society and connects people with disabilities to corporates. The workshop was greatly moderated by Jenni Zeller, Business Network Managerin at My Ability.
- Patrick Schilling‘s passionate keynote, Patrick is Generative AI Partnerships & Google Zurich Accessibility Discovery Center Lead – his keynote included accepting and embracing disabilities but also questions like ‘Why are there stairs if they don’t work for everyone?’ and ‘If not us, who will drive this agenda forward?’
- IKEA & Novartis who were sharing their experience from working with talents from the The myAbility Talent® program in Switzerland but also from talents which were on the program who talked about what it meant to them to have been on the Talent program. The myAbility Talent® program connects students, PhD candidates, and people with advanced vocational qualifications, who have disabilities or chronic conditions, with well-known companies.
- The Networking Opportunities – the event provided a great platform and enough time for networking among participants, allowing for the exchange of ideas and experiences related to disability inclusion. The personal interaction is, as always, as valuable and impactful for such an event as the knowledge sharing sessions.
A great thank you to;
Christine Antlanger-Winter, CEO Google Switzerland, for hosting this important event but also sharing her valuable insights on how Google is embracing people with disabilities in the workplace. Also to Roman Iselin, Vice President EMEA Regional Supply Chain MedTech, Co-Chair Swiss Leadership Team, Johnson & Johnson, Manuel Meister, Managing Director, Inclusion & Diversity Lead Accenture Switzerland and Bairbre Hickie, General Manager Takeda Switzerland, who provided their insights from their companies in the Business Forum panel discussion.
Thanks also to Matthias Leicht-Miranda, Deputy Head of the Federal Bureau for the Equality of Persons with Disabilities (EBGB) gave us an understanding on the discussions on a government level and Louisa Riess, PostDoctoral Researcher on Inclusion at CDI-HSG who presented an overview of the latest studies from the Competence Center for Diversity & Inclusion from University of St. Gallen.
My resolution of this event – with approximately 20% of the Swiss population with a visible or non-visible disability, not including 1/5 of the population in the workforce or in business has huge impact on the economy. So diversity and inclusion is still not only a moral imperative but also a strategic advantage.
