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Leah Lobato

Business Relations Specialist, Utah State Office of Rehabilitation

“Tapping in to Talent: Best Practices in Hiring, Retaining, and Accommodating People with Disabilities“

In the next decade, several trends will greatly impact the workforce.  These trends will mean that employers need to re-examine many of their current human resource practices.  Consider the following:

  • More people will be working with a disability.  This trend will be due to a variety of factors: our aging population and workforce, our enhanced ability to detect an ddiagnose particular types of disabilities and the availability of better treatments enabling more people with disabilities to work.
  • More people will be working with hidden disabilities.  Our ability to detect and treat particular types of hidden disabilities means that more people with these disabilities will be engaged in the workforce.

Because of these trends, being able to engage talent is like to become a significant factor differentiating organizations who succeed and those who fail.

Many of the underlying ideas of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) are not just important for employee’s with disabilities, they are important for all employees.  Similarly, the human resource practices outlined in the employment guidelines of the ADA are not just about complying with the law, they are about creating organizational practices that will engage the talents of ALL employees.

Biography

Leah Lobato is a Business Relations Specialist for the Utah State Office of Rehabilitation (USOR).  The Business Relation Specialist position is a MIG Grant funded position housed within USOR.  The mission of this position is to help promote the employment and retention of individuals with disabilities in competitive employment. With this position she is responsible for networking and connecting with state, regional and national employers.  Leah coordinates with the The NET (National Employment Team), Department of Workforce Services (DWS, Utah’s DOL) and Work Ability Utah (Utah’s Medicaid Infrastructure Grant) on various projects supporting employment of individuals with disabilities.  She is responsible for coordinating bi-annual Employer Workshops on Employing and Retaining Individuals with Disabilities as well as the Work Ability Job Fairs in April and October.

Leah has worked with individuals with disabilities in varying areas of services.  She has worked with adolescents with mental health issues; she was also a coordinator for house affairs for disabled adults in independent living environments; she has also worked closely with the Department of Workforce of Services with the Choose To Work (CTW) project.  CTW is an innovative project provided as a partnership between USOR and DWS to promote the competitive employment of individuals with disabilities.