Research purpose: The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which PWD in a public service department were exposed to training and development opportunities valuable for career advancement.

Motivation for the study: The primary researcher is living with a disability and has not only experienced discrimination but has also witnessed it throughout her career in the Public Service.

Research design, approach and method: The researchers followed a qualitative research design using semi-structured interviews and document analysis. A non-probability, purposive sampling technique was used given the limited number of PWD employed and seven interviews were conducted in the organisations.

Main findings: The perceptions of the participants were that they were mainly exposed to repetitive, low-level training leading to little or no career advancement. A document analysis of the number of PWD trained and employees without disabilities trained, showed an unequal distribution.

Practical/managerial implications: The organisations need to address the unfairness through their policies, ensuring increased and equally valuable training and development opportunities for PWD.

Contribution/value-add: The findings of this study provide an understanding of the exposure of PWD to valuable training and development opportunities and show that inequality still exists and needs to be addressed.

The main objectives of the above statement, issued by Ms Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi in her capacity as Minister of the Department Public Service and Administration (DPSA), were to introduce a new era for persons with disability (PWD) in the South African context and to create opportunities for the Public Service to treat PWD as equal to those without disabilities. Today, more than five years later, the question remains whether there have been any positive changes in this regard.

The World report on disability reiterates this for developing countries (World Health Organization [WHO], 2011), where PWD are not given equal opportunities in the educational sector or labour market. The United Nations convention on the rights of PWD (United Nations [UN], 2008) states that these members of society all around the world are still denied equal participation which is a direct violation of their human rights. Although this research project and article focused on the South African context, it is clear from the above that equal opportunities for PWD are still lacking all over the world.

The target for the employment of PWD in the Public Service was 2.00%, originally set by Cabinet in the White paper on the transformation of the Public Service (RSA, 1995). According to research conducted in 2008 by the DPSA (2008b), PWD constituted only 0.16% of the total number of employees in the Public Service by December 2005. According to the 2010 annual report of the Commission for Employment Equity (CEE) (2012), the representation of PWD in the Public Service was 0.60% and in 2012 it was 0.80% for the whole labour force. This clearly shows that there has been very little progress towards meeting the 2.00% employment target.

Furthermore, the researchers also considered whether the training offered to PWD in the dti and CIPRO contributed to career advancement. Vila, Pallisera and Fullana (2007) stressed the importance of skills and qualifications to integrate PWD into the workplace and improve their career advancement opportunities.

The Services Sector Education and Training Authority (SETA) (2006), in their training toolkit on the employment of PWD, mentioned that the development of PWD through learnerships or workplace mentoring and coaching, as well as accelerated training programmes that can make them eligible for promotion, should be seen as part of any organisation’s affirmative action interventions.

The objectives of the research were to:

• Explore to what extend PWD employed by the dti and CIPRO perceive that they are equally advanced in terms of skills development when compared with PWoD.
• Through document analysis, verify to what extent PWD were exposed to training interventions in the dti and CIPRO in comparison to PWoD.
• Make recommendations to the management of the dti and CIPRO regarding the empowerment of PWD in terms of training and development opportunities when compared with PWoD.

… those who have long term physical, mental, intellectual or sensory impairments which, in interaction with various barriers, may hinder their full and effective participation in society on equal basis with others. (UN, 2008, p. 4)

In South Africa, the EE Act (RSA, 1998a, p. 7) defines PWD as ‘people who have a long-term or recurring physical or mental impairment which substantially limits their prospects of entry into, or advancement in, employment’. ‘Long-term’ denotes a recurrent impairment that lasts for more than 12 months and includes progressive conditions that develop, change or recur over a period of time (e.g. degenerative conditions such as multiple sclerosis).

Different types of impairments are classified in the Act as disabilities, for example, ‘a physical impairment refers to a partial or total loss of a bodily function or part of the body’ (RSA, 1998a, p. 7) and it includes in its definition sensory impairments such as hearing or visual disabilities (RSA, 1998a). The second type is mental impairments, which are clinically recognised conditions affecting a person’s thought processes, judgement or emotions. The Act’s definition indicates that these impairments must be substantially limiting in terms of a person’s ability to perform the essential functions of the job for which considered or employed (RSA, 1998a). Therefore, PWD will not be able to perform all the usual core job functions and might need the workplace or the job function to be adapted to ensure full participation in the workplace. This is usually achieved through reasonable accommodation measures and disability management (Department of Labour [DoL], 2003).

However, in their Report on disability equity in the Public Service, the Public Service Commission (2008) found that defining disabilities in terms of ‘physical or mental impairments’ confused both employers and employees and failed to indicate when an impairment could be considered as substantially limiting. The definition included in the JobACCESS strategy (DPSA, 2006) provides a more encompassing definition in an effort to provide a clearer understanding of ‘disability’. The definition states:

The loss or elimination of opportunities to take part in the life of the community equitably with others that is encountered by people having physical, sensory, psychological, developmental, learning, neurological, or other impairments, which may be permanent, temporary or episodic in nature, thereby causing activity limitations and participation restriction with the mainstream society. These barriers may be due to economic, physical, social, attitudinal and/or cultural factors. (DPSA, 2006, p. 44)

In addition to understanding the definition of disability, it is also important to understand the different types of disabilities. Figure 1 provides an overview of the different categories of disabilities, which include physical, mental and sensory disabilities. The disabilities mentioned in Figure 1 are however not exclusive.

FIGURE 1: Categories of disabilities.

Kleynhans and Kotzé (2010) indicate that the general negative attitude of managers towards PWD limits their opportunities for employment, career advancement and/or training. According to Ngwena (2004), the treatment of PWD in the workplace raises difficult questions about how to secure full enjoyment of human dignity, equality and freedom for such a marginalised minority and it is suggested that all steps must be taken to curb this marginalisation. In the 2001 National Census (Statistics South Africa [StatsSA], 2003), it was estimated that there were 2.25 million South Africans living with disabilities. This figure represented 5.03% of the total South African population, decreasing from 5.03% to 4.00% in 2007 (StatsSA, 2007). To consider the more recent 2011 Census statistics, the following should be noted: ‘Questions on disability were replaced by general health and functioning questions. Due to change in question, 2011 results are not comparable with previous Censuses 1996 and 2001’ (StatsSA, 2012, p. ii). This is because the questions used in the 2011 Census referred to persons with difficulty instead of disability, as per suggestions by the Washington Group (WG). The 2011 Census report mentions that:

Many countries that adopted the WG questions believe that this approach of measuring disability provides adequate estimates compared to the traditional approach where only severe disabilities are measured, leading to underestimation of PWD. (StatsSA, 2012, p. 39)

Therefore the latest Census results only indicate that more than 90% of South Africans experienced no difficulty in conducting their daily functions.

In the 2010 annual report of the CEE (2010a), the acting chairperson, Ms Mpho Nkeli, indicated that with reference to all designated groups, very little progress had been made in the labour force which could lead to young, qualified people still not finding suitable employment. This emphasises the slow transformation in this particular area and reinforces the fact that South Africa still has a long way to go in terms of affirmative action involving all designated groups, including PWD.

PWD represent an untapped source of skills and talent, including technical skills if they have access to training, and transferable problem‐solving skills developed in daily life. People who develop disabilities while working often have valuable skills and experiences learned on the job, in addition to their formal skills qualifications. (ILO, 2010, p. 1)

This stresses the importance of developing PWD which can be very valuable in organisations.

For this research project, it was important to review available research about the relationship between PWD and the extent to which they were exposed to training and development opportunities, as well as the perceptions and relevant documented proof that exist. According to the Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act (Act No. 4 of 2000) (RSA, 2000):

… no person may unfairly discriminate, directly or indirectly, against an employee in any employment policy or practice, on one or more grounds including race, gender, sex, pregnancy, marital status, family responsibility, ethnic or social origin, sexual orientation, age, disability, religion, HIV status, conscience, belief, political opinion, culture, language or birth. (RSA, 2000, p.8)

Therefore, discriminating against PWD in terms of ETD is clearly in contravention of the abovementioned Act. The Services SETA toolkit (2006) views intentionally denying PWD equal access to training and career advancement as direct discrimination. Kleynhans and Kotze (2010) state that organisations and managers often avoid the training of PWD as they feel there will be disproportionally high costs associated with the training of these employees. However, they found that in reality this cost is often minimal and therefore managers should reconsider their negative attitudes.

The National skills development strategy III (NSDS III) (Department for Higher Education and Training [DHET], 2010) reports the following on the progress regarding the development of PWD:

Despite commitments from NSDS I and II to increase opportunities for training and skills development for PWD, we are still far from achieving our goals in this regard. Therefore, NSDS III aims to significantly open up opportunities for skills training for people experiencing barriers to employment caused by various forms of physical and intellectual disability. (DHET, 2010, p. 8)

Cassim (2005) stresses that although South Africa has considerable legislation, including the EE Act (RSA, 1998a) and the Skills Development Act (RSA, 1998b), in place to ensure that more PWD receive employment as well as training and development, progress in both the public and private sector in South Africa remains unsatisfactory. The perception that exists with regards to PWD being less skilled and qualified is also reflected in the CEE Annual report for 2010 (CEE, 2010b) when 24 608 of the 38 781 PWD in the South African labour market were at the semi-skilled and unskilled levels. In 2012 we found a positive trend in this regard, as not only did the numbers of PWD increase to 40 550, but 16 130 PWD against the 14 173 of 2010 were now skilled (CEE, 2012).

This strategy represents an explicit commitment to encouraging linking of skills development to career paths, career development and promoting sustainable employment and in-work progression. (DHET, 2010, p. 5)

PWD must be able to make inputs on their career advancement possibilities. According to the Technical assistance guidelines on the employment of PWD (DoL, 2003), decisions need to be made on where the PWD are and where they anticipate going with their career, as well how they will get there. This plan should also identify the training the employee will need in order to reach these career goals. As part of the implementation of this career plan, all effort must be made to ensure that the training facilities and material will be accessible and suitable for PWD.

According to Vila et al. (2007), the training institutions, as well as how these facilities influence the training of PWD, must be considered, as this influences the career and work life development of PWD. Engelbrecht (2010) states that employers who commit themselves to career advancement of PWD and develop strategies to this effect will become employers of choice for PWD. Just as PWoD want job satisfaction and the chance to have a career with opportunities to advance, PWD have the same needs (Lengnick-Hall, Gaunt & Kulkarni, 2008).

When the primary researcher looked at the educational status of PWD in other countries, she found that in a study by Hergenrather, Rhodes, Turner and Barlouw (2008), in which the respondents were 577 Americans with disability, 32.9% had a high school diploma. In 2006 in Canada, 24.5% of PWD had a high school education (Statistics Canada, 2006).

Education directly influences the chances of employment, advancement and training of PWD. In the 10th annual CEE report (2010a), the commission indicated that although there was some representation of PWD at all occupational levels, the majority of these employees were still employed at the lower levels, with only 17.5% of all employed PWD being employed as middle and senior management.

The WSPs and ATRs compiled by the two offices, in line with requirements of the Public Service Sectoral Education and Training Authority (PSETA), were sourced as official annual training statistics in an effort to support or negate the data collected during the interviews.

The following questions were included in the qualitative interview questionnaire:

1. To what extend do you believe does the dti or CIPRO support the development of PWD?
2. Have you attended any training courses in the past financial year?
3. Did you ask to attend this course or did your manager nominate you for the course?
4. Was the course you attended applicable to your work or do you feel that it made you a better employee for the dti or CIPRO?
5. How long have you been in the Public Service?
6. Have you been in the dti or CIPRO for the whole period or have you been in other Public Service departments also?
7. In your service record with the dti or CIPRO have you ever been promoted?
8. How do you feel about the dti’s or CIPRO’s approach to PWD in the general workplace?
9. Do you think the dti or CIPRO treat PWD differently or do you think they give these employees equal opportunities?

The questions focused whether the PWD attended work-related training (Questions 2 and 4), whether the training contributed to their career management (nomination) (Question 3) and career advancement (Questions 5–7) and on determining whether the participants experienced equal developmental and workplace opportunities (Questions 1, 8 and 9).

The literature review included, but was not limited to, academic books and scientific journal articles, policy documents, legislation and additional departmental documents reflecting relevant statistical training data. The analysis of the relevant WSPs and ATRs provided information on the number of PWD that took part in training and development interventions in the dti and CIPRO.

As mentioned above, the researchers also used content analysis in this study. Stemler (2001, p. 1) defines content analysis as ‘a systematic, replicable technique for compressing many words of text into fewer content categories based on explicit rules of coding’. This entails working through large amounts of data and extracting meaning from them by grouping and interpreting the information. In this study, content analysis was used not only during the literature review but also in analysing the departmental solicited documents, where large amounts of data and statistics were analysed. Firstly, the data reflected in the 2009 and 2010 ATRs were compared with the planned training reflected in the relevant WSPs of both the dti and CIPRO. The primary researcher then compared her findings based on the document analysis to those made from the individual interviews to support or negate the perceptions of the interviewed participants. This was part of the process of triangulation used by the researchers to verify the different findings. Stemler (2001) states that triangulation increases the credibility of a study and its findings because multiple sources of data, methods, investigators or theories are used to verify the data and subsequent research findings.

The quality of the solicited documents were not under the influence of the researchers, but, to ensure the best possible quality, the statistics used were of legally required documents sourced after departmental sign-off and official submission to the PSETA.

‘… he [my manager] was not willing to promote me because he thought I would not manage to work properly […] He was not really, ehh, happy before but then eventually I got promoted.’ (Participant 5, female, physical disability)

Another participant stated:

‘The fear is the moment that they develop you, then there is a question of losing you or that it places you in a position that they can maybe not even afford; it’s not due to monetary restraints; it’s the keeping me down, the pulling down syndrome.‘ (Participant 4, male, physical disability)

Furthermore, one of the participants indicated that he experienced problems with his automatic rank promotion, which was general practice in the Public Service before 2001:

‘Rank promotion […] so after four years you automatically qualify. Which I did not, apparently to them at that stage. They did reimburse me about five or six years back pay at a later stage.’ (Participant 1, male, physical disability)

‘So far, so good. I didn’t experience any problem; whatever […] I ask for I get […] assistance.’ (Participant 5, female, physical disability)

‘I can see that there [are] people that need more help. Fortunately, from my side, I don’t think there’s too much things that I need for them to support me, but some do.’ (Participant 2, male, sensory disability)

However, this experience was not shared by all. One participant, for example, expressed the following misgivings:

‘Yes, they provide training to dti employees. The only problem for me I can say is that even though on their forms they say identify if you need something for your disability but when you go there and attend the training they don’t make sure they accommodate [you].’ (Participant 7, female, sensory disability)

And another participant responded with the following:

‘I don’t know if people with disabilities will ever be respected as part of the society and especially in CIPRO. Even in training the idea of making special arrangements to accommodate PWD just seems too much and they [would] rather not nominate you than take the responsibility to accommodate you.’ (Participant 4, male, physical disability)

Concerns were raised regarding the general accessibility of the dti and CIPRO offices where in-service training and some formal training takes place. A participant shared the following experience:

‘Ek sukkel om deure oop en toe te kry, want ons het vreeslike deure wat vreeslik moeilik oop en toe maak, dis swaar deure […] Veral as jy iets vashou, en jy moet dan nog iets doen en jy moet ’n kaart “swipe” en die deur oopmaak, ek kan nie dit doen nie. [I have difficulty opening and closing doors due to the heavy doors that open and close with difficulty, they are heavy doors […] Especially if you are carrying something and have to do something else and also scan your card and open the door, I can’t do this.]’ (Participant 6, female, physical disability)

‘The dti is doing by all means [everything in its power] to accommodate everyone and not because they want to reach their number, but because of my qualification and the input and the experience that I can provide for the department as compared to other departments.’ (Participant 7, female, sensory disability)

Another participant’s response regarding equality was:

‘Ek dink hulle gee gelyke kanse vir almal. [I think they provide equal opportunities for all.]’ (Participant 6, female, physical disability)

However, there were also negative responses. A participant referred to inequality between different Public Service departments:

‘Why do you not give that person this support? But I feel like someone who’s not in that situation [and] does not know what the issues are, I feel like, I feel like it needs to change.’ (Participant 2, male, sensory disability)

Whilst other participants observed:

‘I’ve seen many PWD because we differ with disabilities, so I must say they were undermined most of the time, and they were not recognised and they will say this is not for them, this is for us.’ (Participant 3, male, physical disability)

‘[Once] we had a person in a wheelchair that the building was inaccessible to him; we had sort of a fight and a semi arrangement but ahh, not a real solution.’ (Participant 1, male, physical disability)

Concerns relating to employment were also raised:

‘Another thing is like you find that even the employment of the disabled people is […] is still very low.’ (Participant 2, male, sensory disability)

‘… the enforcement of the Employment Equity Act as by the Department of Labour, I see it as a, some kind of a, let me say askew. It’s just letting people know that it does exist but the actual implementation of it, this is including the act, is not happening, therefore in whatever level or whatever way, if there could be anyway where this people can be conscientised that these persons with disability are real people and these people need real attention including skills, eh, including their development, then I think that will be best.’ (Participant 4, male, physical disability)

‘… they are trying, they are really trying, it’s just that I don’t think that they know exactly, they are still not organised to prioritise persons with disability, but they are still trying.’ (Participant 5, female, physical disability)

Other participants made the following positive remarks:

‘I attended a number of good training [sessions …] since I joined CIPRO, I got training. I got the skills I need.’ (Participant 2, male, sensory disability)

‘Ja ek word gestuur op training so ek het nie wat training aanbetref ’n probleem nie. [Yes, I get sent on training and therefore I do not have a problem as far as training is concerned.]’ (Participant 6, female, physical disability, [authors’ own translation])

A participant commented on improvement in terms of training:

‘For the past 10 years or so there was no support given to persons with disability. Only now recently [have] they started giving support […] for the past two years there is support for persons with disability.’ (Participant 3, male, physical disability)

Other participants expressed concern that, when training is requested, it is perceived as irrelevant to the employee’s position and that managers become oversensitive if he or she persists with the request:

‘… but like I say, what they normally say is that they are not relevant to your position. And then they become tender.’ (Participant 4, male, physical disability)

‘Indeed there was courses [sic] interested, and that is why I say it is window dressing. I’ve been fighting with management for the past year, 2 years to put me on a EMDP course and they eventually did and I’m now busy with it […] as a result of my persistence and not due to their perception that I am going to be a good leader in the next 5 to 10 years.’ (Participant 1, male, physical disability)

There were the following frustrations expressed by some participants:

‘… while I am here at CIPRO, my job is only specialising on one component of it which, maybe you focus on 2% of what you’re supposed to do and the 90% on whatever. In the end it’s a little frustrating if you do so much for something and in the end you cannot perform it.’ (Participant 2, male, sensory disability)

‘Not specifically, most of the things I’ve learned were basically general knowledge to me.’ (Participant 1, male, physical disability)

As well as:

‘Nowadays you know that a person needs to be computer literate to fit into, eh, to fit into the developments of technological advancement but if you keep on doing [an] entry course, entry course all the way it does not serve a purpose.’ (Participant 4, male, physical disability)

‘… in terms of our personal development we need to identify the courses that we need, […] So most of the courses I do I choose myself, but then it’s up to my manager to approve it or not.’ (Participant 7, female, sensory disability)

From the data in Table 3, it is clear that, in 2009, both the dti and CIPRO trained more PWD than they had planned. In 2010, CIPRO trained the same number of PWD as planned, whilst the dti trained none of the 21 PWD planned for and employed by them in 2010. The reports analysed did not reflect what training was given or why a certain group was not trained.

This contradicts the comments from participants that the dti train PWD, whilst those in CIPRO felt they received fewer opportunities:

‘Yes they provide training to dti employees. The only problem for me I can say is that even though on their forms they say identify if you need something for your disability but when you go there and attend the training they don’t make sure they accommodate.’ (Participant 7, female, sensory disability)

‘The fear is the moment that they develop you then there is a question of losing you or that it places you in a position that they can maybe not even afford, it’s not due to monetary restraints, it’s the keeping me down, the pulling down syndrome.’ (Participant 4, male, physical disability)

The analysed data from the WSP and ATR therefore do not tally with the comments made by the participants regarding the issue of not being exposed to equal training opportunities. More of the dti participants indicated that, in their experience, the dti exposed them to training equal to that of their able-bodied collegues. However, this was not always reflected in the ATR. In the 2009 ATR (dti, 2009) it was indicated that six PWD received training. Although this figure was higher than the planned one employee with a disability, it was still a very small percentage compared to the staff complement of 1079 employees. The 2010 ATR (dti, 2010) showed that no PWD employed by the dti had received any training compared to the 21 PWD they planned to train in this period according to their WSP.

For CIPRO, the 2009 ATR (CIPRO, 2009) reflected that five PWD were trained, compared to the two that were planned for 2009. In 2010, the ATR (CIPRO, 2010) reflected that two of the PWD were trained in line with the two planned for that year; however, this still only represented 0.40% of the full staff complement (502 employees). The number of PWD grew from eight in 2009 to 11 in 2010, but only two of them received training in 2009.

This confirms Lagadien’s (1993) findings that the attitudes of others are the main barrier to PWD and from the participant responses it is still evident today. If society has an open mind towards PWD and refrained from stereotyping them, many of the other barriers they face would not exist, because the decision-makers would consider their needs when drawing up policies and legislation. This was again confirmed by Kleynhans and Kotze (2010), who indicate that negative attitudes often keep PWD from promotion opportunities, which was clear in the interview with Participant 5.

Thus, it was found that, compared with the employees without disabilities, the PWD in the two organisations are not equally exposed to ETD interventions, especially those interventions that can lead to career advancement. The skills development targets as envisaged by the JobACCESS strategic framework (DPSA, 2008a) and the White paper on affirmative action (RSA, 1998c) were therefore not met.

It is also recommended that PWD receive fair representation during the compilation of the WSP and the planning for training interventions. A good guideline may be to ensure that at least 2% of the planned training will involve PWD, in line with the 2% employment target set by government.

Whilst some participants indicated that training and development opportunities were offered, they had negative perceptions of these opportunities as they felt that they were low-level courses or that they did not teach them any new skills. These participants felt that those opportunities offered to them contributed little to their career advancement, possible promotion or career growth. Furthermore, they mentioned that during training sessions, facilitators and other participants were not sensitised to PWD and that their special needs were not accommodated.

In 2011, during his State of the Nation address, President Zuma (2011) declared 2011 ‘a year of job creation through meaningful economic transformation and inclusive growth’. One can only hope that this will also lead to higher levels of employment and growth for PWD in the future and provide an end to the marginalisation of this group of our population in the democratic South Africa, awarding equal human rights and opportunities to all.

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