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I began working for BIT in the fall of 2018. Brand new to Denver, I was still trying to learn the ropes of a larger metro area than I had ever lived in before. My fiancé who was working full time on a BIT contract, learned that Mike was looking for some administrative help and someone to organize the candidate process. I am totally blind, I like working with people, and I had just left a position in Human Resources to move to Denver. The role sounded perfect for me. I went through my very own set of candidate interviews with Ethan Twisdale over the phone. He asked the same questions I ask candidates today; “What makes you most productive at work?” “Tell me about a time you may have had an unsuccessful working relationship.” “How did you handle it?” It had been three years since I sat through an interview, and I was nervous! Coming directly from an HR position definitely helped me feel more confident in my answers. Like our candidates today, I went through the same waiting period while a decision was made. Would I be a good fit for BIT? Apparently, they thought so!

Things haven’t been boring. In my first month on the job, I gave a screen reader demo to a room full of developers, spoke on a panel at Google Boulder, and took on accessibility testing work for a BIT client. The next year never slowed down. I participated in a group accessibility audit, lead a round table discussion at a conference on inclusion and stood on a stage in San Francisco for a twenty-minute presentation on Salesforce at Dreamforce19.

One of the things I explicitly said to Mike when I first started at BIT was that I didn’t do public speaking, sales, or leadership. I didn’t have a tech background, and I didn’t really want to learn coding. I was happy being comfortable and not having to deal with any more challenges. Today, I’m teaching myself HTML, and I have to stop myself from jumping up to join Mike in his Art of Blinders presentations!

When I’m not taking on new challenges, I like to read. Books have always been the other half of my life’s story. I also enjoy audio gaming, cooking in my Instant Pot, and learning all the best near-by restaurants. I love animals except for the buzzing kind (I’ll take a spider over a bumble bee any day)! One of my favorite Colorado activities is white water rafting. One of my least favorite activities is indoor skydiving (Sorry Mike, that was one new challenge I didn’t embrace)!

When opportunity presents itself, you have the choice to say yes or no. When Mike asked me to audit a mobile system I’d never used, I said yes. When he asked me to overhaul the candidate process and create standardization, I said yes. I never knew one year could teach me so much about myself!

A company is nothing without the people that comprise it. That is why FirstBank fills its ranks with intelligent individuals with strong moral compasses, and prides itself in hiring and training a diverse employee population. This is at the center of the bank’s “people-first” mentality.

Contrary to this philosophy is the inaccurate belief that employing individuals with a disability can present unwanted and unnecessary hurdles that aren’t worth the effort. We’re here to tell you that it’s simply not the case.

Last March, FirstBank had an open position for an IT Business Analyst. The Blind Institute of Technology (BIT) approached us with an excellent candidate for consideration.

Read the full article to find out how FirstBank tackled the onboarding process, what they thought of working with BIT, and the value they’ve gained from hiring an individual with a disability!

by Cala Estes, Director of Candidate Services, BIT

Last week, Mike Hess and I set off for San Francisco to attend Dreamforce19, a Salesforce conference bringing together 170000 members of the Salesforce community. From the moment BIT was asked to speak at this incredible event, we started working on our presentation: “Best Practices for Empowering Employees with Disabilities Using Salesforce.”

Even before my time at BIT, I was a Salesforce user. We utilize Salesforce to support our business operations, so I’m immersed in Salesforce on a daily basis. On top of that, I’ve started studying to become a Salesforce administrator, and have taken on some admin roles for BIT as I prepare to sit for my certification exam. When BIT was asked to speak about Salesforce, Mike asked if I would take the stage for BIT to represent an employee who has been empowered by this cloud-based CRM platform.

I had twenty minutes to deliver the message of accessibility and inclusion. Twenty minutes flies when you’re up on stage before a room of people, and I had a lot to say. I spoke about how Salesforce has been designed with accessibility in mind right from the start. Companies don’t need to do anything special to their Salesforce instance; it just works. I can just log in and do my job without having to worry about whether or not I’m going to be able to read some critical piece of data. Having the same level playing field as everyone else is an empowering feeling.

I’m not just a Salesforce user though, I’m becoming an admin. The study materials to get me there, and the admin console itself have been designed with accessibility in mind. I spoke about the BIT Academy’s Salesforce admin certification preparation course which is finishing up next month. Standing on stage with my cane balanced in the crook of one arm, I felt a powerful sense of pride when I told the audience that we have five people, plus myself who made it to the end of the course. I smiled as I told them that all of us are women with some level of vision impairment.

This is an inspiring and amazing accomplishment, but as I told the room, I want to move beyond the inspiration and beyond the theory of hiring people with disabilities. It’s easy to be inspired, but we need to turn that feeling into action. After the presentation, a woman approached me with her story. She is a business analyst who is losing her vision. She said it was so powerful to see a blind woman up on-stage talking tech and admin roles. Multiple people approached Mike and myself to ask about accessibility testing. “Hire from the community you’re testing for,” I told them. One person asked me how to attract more talented professionals with disabilities. I advised them to make their internal technology accessible and advertise their efforts. Let people know that your company cares about making sure their internal products are designed with everyone in mind.

It’s all down to accessible design. I told Dreamforce that accessibility means ensuring that everyone can participate. When everyone has a chance to make it to the table, your team becomes more dynamic and agile with a wider range of problem-solving techniques and perspectives on tap. My aim was to broaden horizons and get companies to realize the value of accessibility. When something like Salesforce comes out of the gate designed with inclusivity in mind, people like me and our BIT Academy graduates have the same chance as everyone else to be successful.

By Kristy Schenderlein

Today, we observe Blind Americans Equality Day, also known as White Cane Safety Day. Congress, in 1964,  set aside October 15 to observe the achievements of people who are Blind or visually impaired (BVI) and to call attention to the importance of the tool and symbol of blindness. It was President Obama in 2011 who changed the name to Blind Americans Equality Day.

Just as the Liberty Bell is a sound of freedom for the United States, the tapping of a cane is the sound of independence for the blind. This simple innovation from the 1920’s allows blind and visually impaired individuals the opportunity to move and travel safely and independently to work, school and around the community.

Not unlike the rest of the world, technology has changed the lives of BVI people everywhere. Many BVI use assistive tech to perform productively in their daily lives and in business. In tribute to the White Cane, hear is a look at a few pieces of clever technology that assists the blind community to be successful in the workplace and their everyday lives.

1. Screen Reading Software – Screen readers such as JAWS and NVDA allow blind and visually impaired users to quickly and efficiently navigate through the computer and perform the same tasks as their sighted peers. In many cases, screen readers have even made a BVI more efficient. Take for example, reading a corporate memo. Average reading speeds for adults is around 200-250 words per minute, while experienced screen reader users will set the reading speed to 300 or more. Many operating systems are building screen readers directly into their systems like Microsoft Narrator and Google ChromeVox. Other programs can be downloaded for free or purchased for download.
2. Smart Phones – Screen readers now exist on all Apple and Android phones. VoiceOver (Apple) and TalkBack (Android) are built directly into smart phones and can be installed with one click. This technology allows users to use their phones just as their sighted peers can. Simple swipe and tap movements can be used to read and write texts, use apps to conduct business and even use the phone for what it was designed for – to stream music, videos and games! While sighted colleagues are battling traffic, with the use of their smart phones, BVI can continue to be productive, while commuting on mass transit or in a ride share!
3. Refreshable Braille Displays – A braille display is a device that can be used on its own or hooked up to a computer. Once downloaded to the display, a document can be read and edited on the braille display, which produces lines of braille using electro-mechanical pins. You can even take notes, type documents or read books and magazines on your display. Braille displays are small and portable so when creativity strikes, a BVI can take a note down anywhere!
4. Seeing AI App – Seeing AI is a free app from Microsoft that harnesses the power of AI to describe the world to the Blind and visually impaired. The app uses AI and the phone’s camera to describe objects, people and text. A user can quickly capture a document, and have it read back to them or use the short text feature to immediately read snippets of information, like the address on a piece of mail. Seeing AI helps people with visual impairments complete everyday tasks in the office, at home and in the community.

Technology like these and the white cane have allowed the blind and visually impaired to fully participate in society. Unfortunately, however, an estimated 80% of the blind and visually impaired are unemployed or underemployed (US Bureau of Labor Statistics) in large part due to a lack of understanding on how BVI can perform the essential functions of a job productively. In observance of the day, take the time to educate someone or to gain some education from a BVI. Ask a colleague or friend what technology they use to get the job done. Or, instead of shushing a child asking about the white cane or guide dog that just went by, feed that curiosity with information. It makes the world a more inclusive place when we can take the time to learn about one another.