May 12, 2025 • 19 mins
We continued the conversation with Fiona from the Commonwealth Bank because she was so filled with valuable insights on disclosing your vision condition at work we couldn’t get them into one episode!
Let’s finish the conversation on disclosure to help you feel as confident as you can in the workplace.
Special guest speaker: Fiona Herron, Commonwealth Bank organisational development lead.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
S1 (00:05):
Hi and welcome to season two of the Vision Australia podcast,
The Career Path. Today we'll be continuing to look into
when and how to disclose your eye condition during the
job application process. Like last time, we'll cover different scenarios,
debunk common myths, and help you approach the hiring process
(00:27):
with confidence. I'm Sam Colley, your host and Vision Australia
Radio's community assistant for national programs. I'm thrilled to be
part of this series where we'll be helping people in
the blind and low vision community feel confident, capable and
ready to crush it in their careers. This episode will
(00:49):
be recorded, so feel free to hit pause, take a breather,
and come back to it whenever works for you. You
can find all the episodes by searching Vision Australia's The
Career Path on your go to podcast platform. Today I'm
excited to welcome back Fiona Herron, organizational development lead at
(01:12):
the Commonwealth Bank. Welcome back Fiona.
S2 (01:15):
Thanks, Sam. Thanks so much for having me back.
S1 (01:18):
Let's jump into what we were talking about last time around,
disclosing your vision condition at work. So to pick up
where we left off last time, we were chatting about those,
you know, experiences, emotions, feelings. And, you know, it's been
no doubt a bit of a whirlwind a year after
(01:39):
opening up about your vision loss. So how has it
affected your mental health and your overall comfort at work?
S2 (01:48):
Um, it's difficult to quantify just how much like anxiety
has left my body. Like I similar to what I
was saying before about values. Like I just feel so
much more in tune with the real me. That sounds
so faffy, but it's.
S1 (02:02):
So true, though.
S2 (02:03):
Kind of it is. And and just that freedom of
I'm in mean more control of the environments. I feel
so much more confident to ask for what I need.
And that is so empowering to go, okay, I know
what I need to ask for or how to get
myself in or out of a situation if it's not
working for me. Like that. Empowerment to do that has
just reduced a lot of anxiety. That was kind of
(02:26):
just underlying. And then would peak in certain situations because
there were so many unknowns, like how what's going to
come up in this meeting? How are they going to
present information? Am I going to be able to participate?
Are they going to call on me to read out loud?
And just going, if I know I can't do that,
or I need XYZ conditions to be able to do
the thing that we need to do. Like, I love
(02:48):
public speaking. I'll get up and present to a room,
but I'm not going to read slides that somebody else
gives me. I need time to prep and memorize my
notes and those sorts of things. So kind of realizing
that and making sure I'm clear with people I'm working with,
what conditions I need to participate and what barriers like
other things might put up for me, and really being
conscious about the language as well of not. There's tons
(03:10):
of stuff I can do, and I can get my
way to do anything that we need to. But again,
like these are the conditions or these are the barriers
and that kind of thing. I just feel so much
more confident and empowered to navigate that. I know I
have support, like I've got my Vision Australia coach, and
I've also connected with two wonderful people who have low
vision or have experience, low vision and are now blind
(03:33):
to kind of be a bit of that kind of
coach and advocate as well, and just have other people
who kind of understand the experience. It's there's plenty of
people that will want to support and talk to you,
but specifically people who understand that experience. There's nothing kind
of like that. So shout out to Vildana and and Carol.
Huge impact on my life and yeah, just being able
to talk about it or have a whinge about it
(03:55):
or whatever in that sort of space. It just keeps
the mental health and wellbeing really more steady, so I
can focus on what I, what I need to do.
S1 (04:03):
And how has connecting with other people with low vision
helped you to feel more supported and empowered.
S2 (04:10):
It's been phenomenal. Like I yeah, I just didn't realize, like,
how much all these other symptoms could relate to vision
loss and having low vision only like a year ago,
somebody mentioned to me, oh yeah, you must feel really
fatigued in the office. And I was like, I do.
Why do I? And realizing like, headaches and fatigue can
really come from a lot of the strain of having
(04:33):
low vision, any type of vision loss and how much
double time you're working with your eyes and in your
brain to try to overcome things. And and you're navigating that,
and you're thinking about what you're doing and who you're
talking to, but where you walk like it's just the
mental load of that. I just had never had anyone
talk to me about that. That stuff doesn't come up
with the medical experts that I'd seen or anything. It
(04:56):
was very factual. This is the level of vision. I mean,
nobody even had said that is low vision and that's
a disability. I had to figure that out myself. But yeah,
just normalizing things has been huge and Realizing, oh, okay,
I really need to take time to rest my eyes
and the importance of that. And it pushed me to
(05:18):
do things for my mental health and go, yeah, that's
going to push me too far and call. It would
be really nice to be into that thing in person,
but I'm not going to be able to participate. So
finding my best environment and just yeah, realizing the flow
on impact of like, okay, yeah, that's a full day
of meetings. I'm going to need to start a little
bit later tomorrow and just have a bit more downtime
at night or, you know, all of those sorts of
(05:40):
things so that, yeah, the normalizing all of the life
stuff that has come from connecting with other people with
vision loss has been huge. And then also quite inspirational
to see where other people are at with their careers
and how they're functioning, and just experiencing that live of
how people with low vision and blindness are operating. I
haven't really been exposed to that from other people. So
(06:03):
then kind of taking a bit of inspiration of how,
you know, observing how they might encounter a conversation or
do what they need to do is like, oh, yeah,
I yeah, I could probably do that too. And that
sort of thing. Like, it's just like so many things
with disability you don't know til you know, right? And
so it's been huge to be able to. Yeah. Feel
really empowered and inspired.
S1 (06:24):
What do you wish more people understood about hidden disabilities
in the workplace?
S2 (06:29):
Honestly that it's not we're not always struggling. Often whether
we've adopted the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower program at Commbank. And
I often wear it more as a signal of like
pride about being part of the community and to bring
that invisible part of who I am to the visible.
Same way people might wear a rainbow brooch or things
like bringing to the forefront who you are, but it
(06:52):
doesn't mean I'm struggling or need help. And so I
think that's been interesting to work with other people on
and think about for myself as well. Is is like, yeah,
we're really resilient people and cracking on with things and yeah, we,
we know that it's hidden. I hear that a lot. Like,
oh gosh, you'd never know that you have vision loss.
I'm like, I know that's the plight of the hidden disability.
(07:13):
And that word disability obviously comes with that stigma. And
people think that then everything is a struggle and we
need to be sort of inherently pitied. Maybe. But it's like, no,
we're getting stuck on, we're enjoying life and we've got
pride in being part of the disability community. So it's
kind of that, that it's, you know, if people ask
for things, help them with it. But for the rest
(07:34):
of it, we're not struggling 24 hours a day.
S1 (07:37):
No. Certainly not. And, Faye, what are some common workplace
challenges for employees with low vision and what solutions have
helped you navigate them?
S2 (07:48):
Honestly, it's a bit of like it's just there's so
much lack of awareness of it as a phase of
vision loss. And so I spend a lot of that
time being like, no, I can't wear glasses. That's not
going to correct it. This is that spot of vision
loss that can't be corrected, but it's not legal blindness.
So like just trying to understand it. It's there's just
(08:08):
so little awareness about it. Even me with vision loss
I didn't know low vision was a thing for probably
ten years ago, so that can be frustrating sometimes, like
having that same conversation or just copying some of those
comments that people don't mean mean spiritedly, but that is
the solution for a lot of people like, oh, do
you need your glasses or that sort of thing? And sometimes, honestly,
(08:31):
I just pick my battles. I'm like, oh no, I
don't wear glasses. Or I just say, no, that's fine,
let's move on or whatever I need in the moment,
which is even that in itself, to not be tripped
up by that is helpful. So you know that, again,
that solution of doing a bit of the work for
myself to feel confident in navigating that has been helpful
and realizing like, yeah, people aren't out there trying to
(08:53):
make me feel bad, like just let it go sometimes,
or if I feel like it, like, oh yeah, I'll
take a moment to explain it. The Hidden Disability Sunflower
has been another really empowering thing for that because people
see the lanyard or I use the background at work,
I have it in my email signature. People then can
have that curiosity and ask about it. So I guess, yeah,
(09:13):
being more open about being in the disability community and
just saying really naturally and just sort of using it
quite conversationally. And if people want to ask questions, that's great.
And then more practically, in terms of like some of
the solutions of those challenges for low vision lighting and time.
So being able to adjust lighting is not always the case.
(09:36):
So like I sort of mentioned before, then thinking about
the time I spend in that lighting environment and just
sort of managing the types of rooms. So I work
in quite a large corporate office. We have all sorts
of different rooms, and so I've tried a few different
ones and I've been able to say, like, I really
struggle in the lighting in this particular room. So my
team know, like, well, let's not book that room when
we're meeting or if we have sometimes multiple planning days,
(10:00):
either taking a break away from bright lights or a
lot of straining to read things or what have you,
or joining remotely so I can much more control the
lighting where I am. And then there's a lot of
digital things that help that as well. So, you know,
having tech on my computer that can help. Being able
to change the lighting really quickly as well. Some of that.
So sort of lighting and time and thinking about the
(10:22):
impacts of that and kind of being conscious, going into
situations to overcome that. Yeah, that's been my experience.
S1 (10:29):
How can disclosing a vision condition highlight your adaptability and
strengths to potential employers?
S2 (10:36):
It's such a good question to think about. And I
talk a lot about this with peers and things as
well as part of like encouraging how important it is
for us to share our stories. You know, by the
mere fact of owning the narrative of how you're living
your life and your own acceptance of whatever condition you're disclosing. Obviously,
(10:57):
vision is the one we're talking about. So for me,
really making low vision part of who I am kind
of already starts to debunk. For people who don't have
much experience working with people with disability or, you know,
have some misperceptions of things just naturally showing people like, oh, great.
Like people just can thrive and live their life and
crush it at work, as you say. And you know,
(11:18):
just that part of owning it, I think is great. Like,
if you're not coming at it from a place of shame,
then it's really hard for other people to put that
shame on you. I've noticed for me that like as
I've become more comfortable with that, I feel like I,
I don't know, I'm more I'm more comfortable in myself
and my ideas come faster. And I've been getting a
(11:38):
lot of good feedback on that lately. So I think
it's also showing those around me that like there's nothing
holding me back from that. Still, it's not impacting my performance.
And I'm they know and seek out that I think
about things differently or have a unique perception. And and
I think that kind of goes hand in hand as well.
But that I think is I've always had a little
bit of that, but it's really unlocked in these last
(12:00):
few years, as I've really owned the story of living
with the vision condition. And then I also think in
those right circumstances where you can and want to be
a bit more vulnerable, talking about some of the things
that you navigate that are challenging, like you don't want
that to be all the stories all the time, because
that's really exhausting for you and can add to a
(12:20):
perception for other people that it's a negative thing. But,
you know, in those some situations, if people ask have
had some people be curious about what I can and
can't see or what's the cause of my low vision.
So talking a bit about that, or, you know, living
with the degenerative disease and sort of living with that,
I may eventually lose all my sight and I don't know.
And that uncertainty, like all of that goes to highlighting
(12:42):
my strength. And I feel really empowered that I can
talk about that quite openly. I used to get super
emotional the second I would even talk about it, because
I wasn't really accepting it in myself. So I think
it's a holistically, it helps you feel that for yourself,
and so inherently kind of just shares it out to
people as well. So there's lots of benefits obviously, in
my opinion.
S1 (13:02):
Certainly. And fee, what are some ways workplaces can become
more inclusive and supportive of employees with vision loss?
S2 (13:11):
Yeah, I think a pretty simple one is asking the question,
like for anyone at all times asking about adjustments and
following it up. You know, I think I don't know
about you, but I've been to a few events and
things where you get asked, like if you require any
adjustments and then like you don't know if that's being
met or you sort of turn up and it's an
(13:32):
unknown environment or they've done some of them, but not
all of them. And so, you know, ask the question
and follow up is really helpful for anyone coming in
with a need for an adjustment, whatever the cause of
that may be, specifically for vision loss. I think getting
information out there for us to find, like, I really
want to be independent. A lot of people I know
(13:54):
with vision loss like it, particularly because there's that spectrum
of sight. There's a lot that we can do and
don't need help with. But any time that the help
is like call XYZ or, you know, email this person,
there's that barrier to being independent. So as much as possible,
get the information out there that people can do what
they need to do and navigate what they need to
do themselves. And then of course, like if there's something
(14:17):
more or they want to have a conversation with somebody.
I've been there as well as like, I don't know
what I need, so I do want to talk to
somebody that's there as well. But I find there's a
lot of unintentional barriers put up about, oh, just contact
this person to ask for this thing where like, you
could cut that step down a level and just let
the person do it themselves directly. And so the more
(14:38):
broadly as well, talking as an employer and talking in
the workplace about accessibility, there's so many tools built into
the way where we work that will help make you
make products more accessible. It's just not a lot of
people know about it. So sort of building that into
work processes and requirements. We work a lot in the
(14:58):
Microsoft Suite. There's tons of accessibility tools and ways to
check accessibility straight in there in your word document or
whatever you're doing. It's just not really known about or
talking about. So as we build in certain templates going, okay, well,
next time this is getting published, we've got to make
sure that it meets the accessibility requirements. We do that
externally obviously with things like wcaG requirements Internally, a lot
(15:21):
of companies struggle with that because it's not as clear
regulations or that type of thing. So I think for
the internal workplace perspective, just talking about it and letting
people know about tools, helping people learn how to make
things accessible, that's been a big journey for me. I
just will kind of pester anyone I see like, oh,
this bit's not accessible, or do you have this option
or that kind of thing? And that can be frustrating
(15:43):
for me sometimes as well. But it really helps because
people are so curious to learn and be like, oh,
I didn't know that existed. And so that is half
the problem, I think, is not knowing it exists. So
talking about it more openly, I think really sets everybody
up for success there of creating those environments for anyone.
It's not sort of like, oh, we can fix it
for this individual person if they ask you just kind
(16:04):
of build it inherently to be accessible. So flipping that,
I think more companies are getting a lot better with that.
But yeah, that's my hope that we'll get a bit
better at that.
S1 (16:13):
What advice would you give to someone who is a
little bit hesitant to disclose their vision loss at work?
They might have a bit of anxiety of a few concerns.
They might think, oh, oh, what are they going to
think of me? Was it going to, you know, impact
my role? There's, you know, a few trepidations. What sort
of words would you have for those people?
S2 (16:35):
Um, firstly, it's really normal to feel trepidatious and anxious
about it, but find one person that you feel like
you can talk to. Find me on LinkedIn. I'll talk
to you about it. I think it's so important to
just have people who might understand or can encourage you
to go for it, but you know, you're also not
(16:56):
obliged to. So I think you've got to think about
what life you want to live like. If you're not
in a role that's going to have any impact, or
if your vision is steady and might improve like it
depends where you're at. I have moderate low vision. I
have a degenerative condition. I know it's going to get
worse over my life, so I'm trying to set up
as much as I can now so that that is
less of a hurdle. When it starts. It already has
(17:17):
started to get worse. I'm setting my future self up
for success, so I think that helped me of like, again,
like I'm not feeling authentic to who I am. And
so if you want that like use that nerves then
to go, okay, but I'm doing this for my future self. Hell,
you're probably even doing it for other people. Like the
amount of feedback I've had of people sharing things with
me because I've been open. That also really helps me
(17:40):
because I think, like, okay, this is going to help
other people in some kind of way. And it kind
of pushes me along because it doesn't feel like so
much like I'm doing it just for myself. I don't
know if that works for everybody, but sometimes that thought of,
you know, this is going to be great for other
people or this was going to help people or something,
like just trying to kind of get yourself out of
your own head a little bit. You might never know
(18:01):
the impact that you have on other people, but it
really does for me. Just push me to go, well, yeah,
I wouldn't want anyone else to experience this. So if
I can go through the tricky bit, maybe next time
that person I'm asking here's this same thing, they'll be like,
oh yeah, I remember I helped me with that. So
let me take a bit of a different approach that
time and just finding that one thing, having a bit
(18:22):
of courage to go like, okay, I'll just try that
one thing, see how it goes. And then what next?
So you just kind of got to take it one
step at a time. I'm not a very patient person,
so I've tried to go. I go like, oh, do
everything all at once. But I can tell you from
experience that's not a very sustainable way to approach it.
So yeah, finding that way to just tackle one thing
at a time and then it's really wonderful to be like,
(18:43):
for me to be able to look back in the
last year of how much has shifted is pretty great.
So I think give it a crack.
S1 (18:49):
A huge thank you to Fiona for joining us today.
What an open and honest session filled with really valuable tips.
We hope you've walked away with a better understanding on
disclosure and how to make the right decisions for yourself.
The career path has been funded by the Department of
Social Services. Fiona, thank you so much for coming back
(19:13):
and having a chat with us today. It was great
to catch up with you for part two and get
some more valuable insights. So thank you again.
S3 (19:22):
Thank you so much for having me, Sam. Absolutely. My pleasure.
Hi and welcome to season two of the Vision Australia podcast,
The Career Path. Today we'll be continuing to look into
when and how to disclose your eye condition during the
job application process. Like last time, we'll cover different scenarios,
debunk common myths, and help you approach the hiring process
(00:27):
with confidence. I'm Sam Colley, your host and Vision Australia
Radio's community assistant for national programs. I'm thrilled to be
part of this series where we'll be helping people in
the blind and low vision community feel confident, capable and
ready to crush it in their careers. This episode will
(00:49):
be recorded, so feel free to hit pause, take a breather,
and come back to it whenever works for you. You
can find all the episodes by searching Vision Australia's The
Career Path on your go to podcast platform. Today I'm
excited to welcome back Fiona Herron, organizational development lead at
(01:12):
the Commonwealth Bank. Welcome back Fiona.
S2 (01:15):
Thanks, Sam. Thanks so much for having me back.
S1 (01:18):
Let's jump into what we were talking about last time around,
disclosing your vision condition at work. So to pick up
where we left off last time, we were chatting about those,
you know, experiences, emotions, feelings. And, you know, it's been
no doubt a bit of a whirlwind a year after
(01:39):
opening up about your vision loss. So how has it
affected your mental health and your overall comfort at work?
S2 (01:48):
Um, it's difficult to quantify just how much like anxiety
has left my body. Like I similar to what I
was saying before about values. Like I just feel so
much more in tune with the real me. That sounds
so faffy, but it's.
S1 (02:02):
So true, though.
S2 (02:03):
Kind of it is. And and just that freedom of
I'm in mean more control of the environments. I feel
so much more confident to ask for what I need.
And that is so empowering to go, okay, I know
what I need to ask for or how to get
myself in or out of a situation if it's not
working for me. Like that. Empowerment to do that has
just reduced a lot of anxiety. That was kind of
(02:26):
just underlying. And then would peak in certain situations because
there were so many unknowns, like how what's going to
come up in this meeting? How are they going to
present information? Am I going to be able to participate?
Are they going to call on me to read out loud?
And just going, if I know I can't do that,
or I need XYZ conditions to be able to do
the thing that we need to do. Like, I love
(02:48):
public speaking. I'll get up and present to a room,
but I'm not going to read slides that somebody else
gives me. I need time to prep and memorize my
notes and those sorts of things. So kind of realizing
that and making sure I'm clear with people I'm working with,
what conditions I need to participate and what barriers like
other things might put up for me, and really being
conscious about the language as well of not. There's tons
(03:10):
of stuff I can do, and I can get my
way to do anything that we need to. But again,
like these are the conditions or these are the barriers
and that kind of thing. I just feel so much
more confident and empowered to navigate that. I know I
have support, like I've got my Vision Australia coach, and
I've also connected with two wonderful people who have low
vision or have experience, low vision and are now blind
(03:33):
to kind of be a bit of that kind of
coach and advocate as well, and just have other people
who kind of understand the experience. It's there's plenty of
people that will want to support and talk to you,
but specifically people who understand that experience. There's nothing kind
of like that. So shout out to Vildana and and Carol.
Huge impact on my life and yeah, just being able
to talk about it or have a whinge about it
(03:55):
or whatever in that sort of space. It just keeps
the mental health and wellbeing really more steady, so I
can focus on what I, what I need to do.
S1 (04:03):
And how has connecting with other people with low vision
helped you to feel more supported and empowered.
S2 (04:10):
It's been phenomenal. Like I yeah, I just didn't realize, like,
how much all these other symptoms could relate to vision
loss and having low vision only like a year ago,
somebody mentioned to me, oh yeah, you must feel really
fatigued in the office. And I was like, I do.
Why do I? And realizing like, headaches and fatigue can
really come from a lot of the strain of having
(04:33):
low vision, any type of vision loss and how much
double time you're working with your eyes and in your
brain to try to overcome things. And and you're navigating that,
and you're thinking about what you're doing and who you're
talking to, but where you walk like it's just the
mental load of that. I just had never had anyone
talk to me about that. That stuff doesn't come up
with the medical experts that I'd seen or anything. It
(04:56):
was very factual. This is the level of vision. I mean,
nobody even had said that is low vision and that's
a disability. I had to figure that out myself. But yeah,
just normalizing things has been huge and Realizing, oh, okay,
I really need to take time to rest my eyes
and the importance of that. And it pushed me to
(05:18):
do things for my mental health and go, yeah, that's
going to push me too far and call. It would
be really nice to be into that thing in person,
but I'm not going to be able to participate. So
finding my best environment and just yeah, realizing the flow
on impact of like, okay, yeah, that's a full day
of meetings. I'm going to need to start a little
bit later tomorrow and just have a bit more downtime
at night or, you know, all of those sorts of
(05:40):
things so that, yeah, the normalizing all of the life
stuff that has come from connecting with other people with
vision loss has been huge. And then also quite inspirational
to see where other people are at with their careers
and how they're functioning, and just experiencing that live of
how people with low vision and blindness are operating. I
haven't really been exposed to that from other people. So
(06:03):
then kind of taking a bit of inspiration of how,
you know, observing how they might encounter a conversation or
do what they need to do is like, oh, yeah,
I yeah, I could probably do that too. And that
sort of thing. Like, it's just like so many things
with disability you don't know til you know, right? And
so it's been huge to be able to. Yeah. Feel
really empowered and inspired.
S1 (06:24):
What do you wish more people understood about hidden disabilities
in the workplace?
S2 (06:29):
Honestly that it's not we're not always struggling. Often whether
we've adopted the Hidden Disabilities Sunflower program at Commbank. And
I often wear it more as a signal of like
pride about being part of the community and to bring
that invisible part of who I am to the visible.
Same way people might wear a rainbow brooch or things
like bringing to the forefront who you are, but it
(06:52):
doesn't mean I'm struggling or need help. And so I
think that's been interesting to work with other people on
and think about for myself as well. Is is like, yeah,
we're really resilient people and cracking on with things and yeah, we,
we know that it's hidden. I hear that a lot. Like,
oh gosh, you'd never know that you have vision loss.
I'm like, I know that's the plight of the hidden disability.
(07:13):
And that word disability obviously comes with that stigma. And
people think that then everything is a struggle and we
need to be sort of inherently pitied. Maybe. But it's like, no,
we're getting stuck on, we're enjoying life and we've got
pride in being part of the disability community. So it's
kind of that, that it's, you know, if people ask
for things, help them with it. But for the rest
(07:34):
of it, we're not struggling 24 hours a day.
S1 (07:37):
No. Certainly not. And, Faye, what are some common workplace
challenges for employees with low vision and what solutions have
helped you navigate them?
S2 (07:48):
Honestly, it's a bit of like it's just there's so
much lack of awareness of it as a phase of
vision loss. And so I spend a lot of that
time being like, no, I can't wear glasses. That's not
going to correct it. This is that spot of vision
loss that can't be corrected, but it's not legal blindness.
So like just trying to understand it. It's there's just
(08:08):
so little awareness about it. Even me with vision loss
I didn't know low vision was a thing for probably
ten years ago, so that can be frustrating sometimes, like
having that same conversation or just copying some of those
comments that people don't mean mean spiritedly, but that is
the solution for a lot of people like, oh, do
you need your glasses or that sort of thing? And sometimes, honestly,
(08:31):
I just pick my battles. I'm like, oh no, I
don't wear glasses. Or I just say, no, that's fine,
let's move on or whatever I need in the moment,
which is even that in itself, to not be tripped
up by that is helpful. So you know that, again,
that solution of doing a bit of the work for
myself to feel confident in navigating that has been helpful
and realizing like, yeah, people aren't out there trying to
(08:53):
make me feel bad, like just let it go sometimes,
or if I feel like it, like, oh yeah, I'll
take a moment to explain it. The Hidden Disability Sunflower
has been another really empowering thing for that because people
see the lanyard or I use the background at work,
I have it in my email signature. People then can
have that curiosity and ask about it. So I guess, yeah,
(09:13):
being more open about being in the disability community and
just saying really naturally and just sort of using it
quite conversationally. And if people want to ask questions, that's great.
And then more practically, in terms of like some of
the solutions of those challenges for low vision lighting and time.
So being able to adjust lighting is not always the case.
(09:36):
So like I sort of mentioned before, then thinking about
the time I spend in that lighting environment and just
sort of managing the types of rooms. So I work
in quite a large corporate office. We have all sorts
of different rooms, and so I've tried a few different
ones and I've been able to say, like, I really
struggle in the lighting in this particular room. So my
team know, like, well, let's not book that room when
we're meeting or if we have sometimes multiple planning days,
(10:00):
either taking a break away from bright lights or a
lot of straining to read things or what have you,
or joining remotely so I can much more control the
lighting where I am. And then there's a lot of
digital things that help that as well. So, you know,
having tech on my computer that can help. Being able
to change the lighting really quickly as well. Some of that.
So sort of lighting and time and thinking about the
(10:22):
impacts of that and kind of being conscious, going into
situations to overcome that. Yeah, that's been my experience.
S1 (10:29):
How can disclosing a vision condition highlight your adaptability and
strengths to potential employers?
S2 (10:36):
It's such a good question to think about. And I
talk a lot about this with peers and things as
well as part of like encouraging how important it is
for us to share our stories. You know, by the
mere fact of owning the narrative of how you're living
your life and your own acceptance of whatever condition you're disclosing. Obviously,
(10:57):
vision is the one we're talking about. So for me,
really making low vision part of who I am kind
of already starts to debunk. For people who don't have
much experience working with people with disability or, you know,
have some misperceptions of things just naturally showing people like, oh, great.
Like people just can thrive and live their life and
crush it at work, as you say. And you know,
(11:18):
just that part of owning it, I think is great. Like,
if you're not coming at it from a place of shame,
then it's really hard for other people to put that
shame on you. I've noticed for me that like as
I've become more comfortable with that, I feel like I,
I don't know, I'm more I'm more comfortable in myself
and my ideas come faster. And I've been getting a
(11:38):
lot of good feedback on that lately. So I think
it's also showing those around me that like there's nothing
holding me back from that. Still, it's not impacting my performance.
And I'm they know and seek out that I think
about things differently or have a unique perception. And and
I think that kind of goes hand in hand as well.
But that I think is I've always had a little
bit of that, but it's really unlocked in these last
(12:00):
few years, as I've really owned the story of living
with the vision condition. And then I also think in
those right circumstances where you can and want to be
a bit more vulnerable, talking about some of the things
that you navigate that are challenging, like you don't want
that to be all the stories all the time, because
that's really exhausting for you and can add to a
(12:20):
perception for other people that it's a negative thing. But,
you know, in those some situations, if people ask have
had some people be curious about what I can and
can't see or what's the cause of my low vision.
So talking a bit about that, or, you know, living
with the degenerative disease and sort of living with that,
I may eventually lose all my sight and I don't know.
And that uncertainty, like all of that goes to highlighting
(12:42):
my strength. And I feel really empowered that I can
talk about that quite openly. I used to get super
emotional the second I would even talk about it, because
I wasn't really accepting it in myself. So I think
it's a holistically, it helps you feel that for yourself,
and so inherently kind of just shares it out to
people as well. So there's lots of benefits obviously, in
my opinion.
S1 (13:02):
Certainly. And fee, what are some ways workplaces can become
more inclusive and supportive of employees with vision loss?
S2 (13:11):
Yeah, I think a pretty simple one is asking the question,
like for anyone at all times asking about adjustments and
following it up. You know, I think I don't know
about you, but I've been to a few events and
things where you get asked, like if you require any
adjustments and then like you don't know if that's being
met or you sort of turn up and it's an
(13:32):
unknown environment or they've done some of them, but not
all of them. And so, you know, ask the question
and follow up is really helpful for anyone coming in
with a need for an adjustment, whatever the cause of
that may be, specifically for vision loss. I think getting
information out there for us to find, like, I really
want to be independent. A lot of people I know
(13:54):
with vision loss like it, particularly because there's that spectrum
of sight. There's a lot that we can do and
don't need help with. But any time that the help
is like call XYZ or, you know, email this person,
there's that barrier to being independent. So as much as possible,
get the information out there that people can do what
they need to do and navigate what they need to
do themselves. And then of course, like if there's something
(14:17):
more or they want to have a conversation with somebody.
I've been there as well as like, I don't know
what I need, so I do want to talk to
somebody that's there as well. But I find there's a
lot of unintentional barriers put up about, oh, just contact
this person to ask for this thing where like, you
could cut that step down a level and just let
the person do it themselves directly. And so the more
(14:38):
broadly as well, talking as an employer and talking in
the workplace about accessibility, there's so many tools built into
the way where we work that will help make you
make products more accessible. It's just not a lot of
people know about it. So sort of building that into
work processes and requirements. We work a lot in the
(14:58):
Microsoft Suite. There's tons of accessibility tools and ways to
check accessibility straight in there in your word document or
whatever you're doing. It's just not really known about or
talking about. So as we build in certain templates going, okay, well,
next time this is getting published, we've got to make
sure that it meets the accessibility requirements. We do that
externally obviously with things like wcaG requirements Internally, a lot
(15:21):
of companies struggle with that because it's not as clear
regulations or that type of thing. So I think for
the internal workplace perspective, just talking about it and letting
people know about tools, helping people learn how to make
things accessible, that's been a big journey for me. I
just will kind of pester anyone I see like, oh,
this bit's not accessible, or do you have this option
or that kind of thing? And that can be frustrating
(15:43):
for me sometimes as well. But it really helps because
people are so curious to learn and be like, oh,
I didn't know that existed. And so that is half
the problem, I think, is not knowing it exists. So
talking about it more openly, I think really sets everybody
up for success there of creating those environments for anyone.
It's not sort of like, oh, we can fix it
for this individual person if they ask you just kind
(16:04):
of build it inherently to be accessible. So flipping that,
I think more companies are getting a lot better with that.
But yeah, that's my hope that we'll get a bit
better at that.
S1 (16:13):
What advice would you give to someone who is a
little bit hesitant to disclose their vision loss at work?
They might have a bit of anxiety of a few concerns.
They might think, oh, oh, what are they going to
think of me? Was it going to, you know, impact
my role? There's, you know, a few trepidations. What sort
of words would you have for those people?
S2 (16:35):
Um, firstly, it's really normal to feel trepidatious and anxious
about it, but find one person that you feel like
you can talk to. Find me on LinkedIn. I'll talk
to you about it. I think it's so important to
just have people who might understand or can encourage you
to go for it, but you know, you're also not
(16:56):
obliged to. So I think you've got to think about
what life you want to live like. If you're not
in a role that's going to have any impact, or
if your vision is steady and might improve like it
depends where you're at. I have moderate low vision. I
have a degenerative condition. I know it's going to get
worse over my life, so I'm trying to set up
as much as I can now so that that is
less of a hurdle. When it starts. It already has
(17:17):
started to get worse. I'm setting my future self up
for success, so I think that helped me of like, again,
like I'm not feeling authentic to who I am. And
so if you want that like use that nerves then
to go, okay, but I'm doing this for my future self. Hell,
you're probably even doing it for other people. Like the
amount of feedback I've had of people sharing things with
me because I've been open. That also really helps me
(17:40):
because I think, like, okay, this is going to help
other people in some kind of way. And it kind
of pushes me along because it doesn't feel like so
much like I'm doing it just for myself. I don't
know if that works for everybody, but sometimes that thought of,
you know, this is going to be great for other
people or this was going to help people or something,
like just trying to kind of get yourself out of
your own head a little bit. You might never know
(18:01):
the impact that you have on other people, but it
really does for me. Just push me to go, well, yeah,
I wouldn't want anyone else to experience this. So if
I can go through the tricky bit, maybe next time
that person I'm asking here's this same thing, they'll be like,
oh yeah, I remember I helped me with that. So
let me take a bit of a different approach that
time and just finding that one thing, having a bit
(18:22):
of courage to go like, okay, I'll just try that
one thing, see how it goes. And then what next?
So you just kind of got to take it one
step at a time. I'm not a very patient person,
so I've tried to go. I go like, oh, do
everything all at once. But I can tell you from
experience that's not a very sustainable way to approach it.
So yeah, finding that way to just tackle one thing
at a time and then it's really wonderful to be like,
(18:43):
for me to be able to look back in the
last year of how much has shifted is pretty great.
So I think give it a crack.
S1 (18:49):
A huge thank you to Fiona for joining us today.
What an open and honest session filled with really valuable tips.
We hope you've walked away with a better understanding on
disclosure and how to make the right decisions for yourself.
The career path has been funded by the Department of
Social Services. Fiona, thank you so much for coming back
(19:13):
and having a chat with us today. It was great
to catch up with you for part two and get
some more valuable insights. So thank you again.
S3 (19:22):
Thank you so much for having me, Sam. Absolutely. My pleasure.
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