Supporting Entrepreneurs with Disabilities

by Cary Griffin

Traditionally, people with the most significant disabilities have been overlooked as candidates for self-employment. Indeed, even today, most entrepreneurship activity is not directed toward individuals with severe developmental or psychiatric disabilities. We are beginning to learn, however, that support systems, similar in concept to those utilized by the best supported employment practitioners, can help many people operate their own businesses, limited partnerships, and/or businesses within businesses. The key is the support that provides the entrepreneur a chance to compete in the open market.

The myriad of supports necessary for a small business owner typically includes:

The same needs are evident for individuals with disabilities, but sometimes the manner in which they are accessed is different.

For instance, a typical entrepreneur has a credit history that a bank officer can review in structuring a start-up or expansion loan. In many cases, small business hopefuls with disabilities have little credit available and few savings due to long-term reliance on Social Security. Support from rehabilitation personnel may be necessary to access Vocational Rehabilitation resources, determine useful assistive and/or universal technology, apply for local "high risk" loan funds, or to develop a Plan for Achieving Self-Support (PASS) through Social Security in order to self-finance.

Not all business owners understand accounting or investment strategies, so they buy those supports or hire others who do have those skills to work with them. Not all entrepreneurs have tremendous physical stamina either, and may rely on co-workers or limited hours of operation to offset fatigue. Think support, not deficits; circumvent problems instead of trying to solve them. Rethink the situation and redefine employment based on the person's dreams and desires. For many people, 10 hours of work a week doing what they love and being their own boss is much more enjoyable and rewarding than 30 hours on someone else's production line. Magazines today are full of stories of small business owners who took huge cuts in salary to follow their lives' ambitions.

Existing personnel—who are paid to help individuals with disabilities find success in the realm of employment—will need new skills, and new staff may need specific personality traits to best serve their customers. Effective staff need many of the traits required of entrepreneurs in order to identify and facilitate supports required by an entrepreneur with significant disabilities. Small business now accounts for more than 50% of the jobs in the United States, so personnel developing jobs and small business ventures need to share the spirit and enthusiasm for entrepreneurship. Lately, the national Vocational Rehabilitation system has increased attention to small business development and now helps start more than 5,000 enterprises annually.

The Community Rehabilitation Programs (CRPs) need to study this national phenomenon and gear-up through staff development, by re-engineering consumer services, by hiring new personnel with entrpreneurial instincts, and by becoming more closely aligned with the Small Business Assistance Centers, microloan programs, Chambers of Commerce, business incubators, and local entrepreneurs.

The Hagberg Consulting Group recently completed a ten-year study of 400 entrepreneurs. The data collected provides insight into areas of support that may need facilitation for business owners with disabilities and for personnel who assist in designing and guaranteeing supports.

Dominant personality characteristics of entrepreneurs studied by Hagberg that may be advantageous in rehabilitation personnel who serve entrepreneurs with disabilities include being:

Creating a place for such individuals in our organizations may scare more conservative and traditional rehabilitation managers. But, the market is changing. More and more individuals with disabilities are expressing the desire to self-direct their careers. Hiring staff who are entrepreneurial in nature will challenge organizations with frozen corporate cultures, but it just may be the thing that prepares Community Rehabilitation Programs for the turbulent consumer-directed next millennium.

Cary Griffin is the Director of Training at the Rural Institute. His new book on leadership in community rehabilitation programs, Working Better, Working Smarter, is available from Training Resource Network Publishing (904-823-9800) or www.trninc.com