Disability and Reasonable Adjustments – Staff

What are workplace adjustments?

Also referred to as 'reasonable adjustments', a workplace adjustment is a modification to a work process, practice, procedure or setting that enables a person with disability to perform their job in a way that minimises the impact of barriers they face at work. The particular circumstances of each person need to be considered. Adjustments make the workplace more inclusive by removing barriers.

Adjustments can be administrative, environmental or procedural and could include:

• adjustments to work premises, equipment or facilities
• adjustments to work related communications including making available information in an accessible format
• adjustments to work methods
• adjustments to work arrangements, including in relation to hours of work and use of leave entitlements
• adjustments to methods used for testing, assessment or selection, including in recruitment processes
• adjustments to work related rules or other adjustments to enable a person to comply with rules as they exist
• providing training to co-workers or supervisors.

Under the Disability Discrimination Act 1992 (Cth) and the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 (Vic) the department is obligated to make workplace adjustments to accommodate an individual’s disability, unless that adjustment would result in unjustifiable hardship.

Workplace adjustments allow a person to:

• have equal opportunity in recruitment processes, promotion and ongoing development
• perform the inherent or essential requirements of their job safely in the workplace
• experience equitable terms and conditions of employment
• maximise productivity.

The rights of people with disability are upheld and protected by the Equal Opportunity Act 2010 (Vic). Refer to Legal protections for further information on the legal context.

What is 'reasonable' when making workplace adjustments?

A workplace adjustment is considered reasonable unless it causes 'unjustifiable hardship' to the employer or organisation. Limitations on the obligation to provide reasonable adjustments include:

• adjustments which impose an unjustifiable hardship on the employer, for example financial cost, an amendment to the physical building that is not possible due to council or other restrictions
• changing the inherent requirements of the job (or maintaining a job that would otherwise be altered or abolished)
• assigning performance of some inherent requirements of the job to another staff member
• adjustment that would disadvantage other staff members
• creating a new or different job
• promotion or transfer to a different job.

Some examples of reasonable workplace adjustments across the employee lifecycle include:

• offer flexibility in the recruitment process and be prepared to modify or waive some aspects of the recruitment process if there are alternative ways to obtain the required information
• be flexible in the presentation of selection criteria, for instance written versus spoken, and/or provide information in alternative formats such as in electronic format for a candidate with low vision
• accommodate requests for a support person to attend an interview
• allowing a person with disability to have flexibility in their working hours, such as working part-time or starting and finishing later, or working remotely from alternate office settings
• redistributing minor duties (i.e. not inherent requirements of a job) that a person with disability finds difficult to do
• office furniture and equipment such as height-adjustable desks, ergonomic computer hardware
• adaptive software and technologies including speech recognition software for people with vision impairment, an amplified phone for a person with hearing impairment, or a digital recorder for someone who finds it difficult to take written notes due to physical impairment
• providing additional training, mentoring, supervision and support
• providing an Auslan interpreter or live captioning at meetings for a staff member with a hearing impairment
• providing agendas in electronic formats for people who find it difficult to manipulate pages.

Requests for workplace adjustments can be made by any person at any time in a recruitment process, or whilst employed with the department. Refer to Implementing workplace adjustments for further information.