Reasonable adjustments

Disabled people may face barriers in the workplace, which can put them at a disadvantage in comparison to people without disabilities. We have a legal obligation to make ‘reasonable adjustments’ to remove any barriers disabled employees may be facing. For example, where an employee has a visual impairment that makes typing difficult, a reasonable adjustment may be to provide speech recognition software, which enables the employee to use their voice to create and edit documents or emails.

Other examples of reasonable adjustments include:

• Making adjustments to premises
• Assigning a disabled person to a different work location
• Acquiring or modifying equipment
• Altering a disabled person’s working hours
• Providing training for a disabled person
• Modifying instructions or manuals
• Redeploying a disabled person to fill an existing vacancy (Switch2)

Any adjustments should be agreed with the employee and recorded in the Tailored Adjustment Agreement.

If you require any additional guidance on reasonable adjustments, you should contact your Resource Diversity Liaison Officer.