026, HR Healthcare_Keynote Panel_ Elevating Accessibility and Inclusion

Announcer: Welcome back from break. Hope you all enjoyed that. Thank you. I'm glad there's still folks here ready to go because I wanna, I'm excited to introduce my friends f- that are gonna be coming up for this next panel of which I've just lost my place Okay, thank you. That helps. Coming up to talk about elevating accessibility and inclusion across the healthcare workforce I have Amanda Holdman, who is the vice president for Enterprise Talent and Culture at OU Health.

I have Marissa Hyatt, the director of Disability Experience at Mercy Health, and the very first person I met at the conference. And there is Bridget Marzet Bender, who's the vice president of Experience and DEIB at Mercy Health. Please help me welcome them to the stage.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): No, we don't have slides. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for sticking around. All right. My name is Bridgett Marzette Bender, and I'm the vice president of caregiver experience and inclusion at Mercy. And today we're gonna talk about elevating accountability, inclusion across the healthcare workforce.

Let me start with a simple question: What would healthcare look like if every employee had what they need t- in order to do their best work? And that is going to be the question at the heart of today's discussion. So today is not about checking compliance check boxes. It's about creating workplaces that are easier to access, easier to navigate, and intentionally designed so that all people of all abilities can succeed.

How accessible is your workplace for someone with an apparent disability, those that are visually impaired or physically disabled? How accessible is it for someone with a non-apparent disability, someone with autism or mental health impairment? Many of us know those answers are not always the same. So let me introduce the panel today.

So I'm gonna ask you guys to introduce yourself, your organization, your role, and in one minute or less, share what makes accessibility and inclusion a personal or professional passion for you.

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: Okay. Thank you so much. Amanda Hogan here vice president of enterprise talent and culture at OU Health and that is in Oklahoma City.

We are the academic medical system in the state. I enjoy this work, and I'm very passionate about this work because inclusion, to me, is providing opportunities for all to feel valued, seen, and heard. And with me in a very particular role of being able to own the entire life cycle at OU Health, I'm able to do that from hire all the way throughout their entire career at OU Health.

So everyone wants to be seen, and that's what I feel like inclusion is making sure we do that at all levels within the organization.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: Hi, everyone. Marissa Hiatt, and I serve as director of experience and inclusion, and I focus on our disability inclusion at Mercy with Bridget. And we did not wear our name badges- Dressed alike today.

Yeah. ... coordinated for today for those of you who saw us yesterday. Disability inclusion and accessibility is a passion for me, not only personally, but professionally. I have worked in the field of disability inclusion for 16 years, and what I've found is that we live in a society where people with disabilities are the ones that have to accommodate or seek out accessibility, and they have to change.

Whereas how I see it is that we, as HR and as a society, need to make those accommodations and learn and provide that support to individuals to l- to feel that sense of belonging and be included. That's on us. That should not be on them. And so that what, was, what really drives my passion at Mercy. And if I've been in any sessions with you all, I've probably brought up inclusion, I've brought up neurodivergency, because those are the things that you all need to go back and do at your own organization to ensure that we are including everyone, 'cause everyone means everyone.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): While our organizations may be different, we share a common challenge: creating healthcare workplaces where talented people are all, of all abilities are able to contribute, grow, and thrive. Amanda, what is the biggest opportunity and biggest challenge healthcare organizations face today when it comes to accessibility and inclusion?

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think the biggest challenge is looking at inclusion at every phase of the life cycle. Oftentimes we can focus on it as a standalone initiative, and it's not a standalone initiative. At OU Health, what we did is we made inclusion a value, and that way we have to make sure we're living into it in all areas of the organization.

And it's not just an HR thing, it's who we are as an organization. And thinking about it differently will allow you to be able to embed it into hiring and development and all of the things, and go beyond just networks or EIBs and accessibility and disability and claims and compliance to really, "This is who we are, we value you, we see you, and at every point we are here for you."

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: Thank you. Yeah. I would, gonna echo on the challenge part. I think a, a lot of times in the experience I've had, and Bridget and I are... A lot of leaders are like, "Oh, that's not my problem. I don't have anybody on my team that has a disability."

Oh, yes you do. They just haven't felt comfortable enough to share that with you. Or, "Oh, Marissa has disability in her title, she'll handle it." When actually inclusion and accessibility is everyone's job. It's not just Marissa's gonna solve her problems , it's how do we work together to break down those barriers so that you don't have to call Marissa.

I don't wanna get all the calls all the time. I want everybody else to own this work. And so that's a huge challenge. And then an opportunity would be, let's build things and push out things that have accessibility and inclusion in mind from the get-go. Do you guys have people at the tables when you're designing product, when you're launching a new initiative that say, "Hey, what about someone who uses a screen reader?

Would that work?" 'Cause we have people at our organization that use a screen reader for work, but we send out PDFs that they cannot read with their screen reader. You need somebody at the table to say, "Hey, let's design this with universally design in our minds," and ask, answer those questions so that when you don't have a caregiver in a place saying, "Hey, I can't access this because you guys didn't think of me."

So that's the biggest opportunity is do you have the right people at the table and are you asking those questions, "Hey, I'm, have a neurodiverse population that works for me. I, they process information differently. Are we communicating this properly?" So that's the opportunity that I see even at Mercy that we need to continue to work on.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): Okay. And you tapped on this a little bit, Marissa, but what is one thing that leaders always underestimate when it comes to disability and inclusion?

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: For me, I think people think, "Oh, it's charitable. It's the nice thing to do." "Ooh, it makes us feel good then when we hire somebody with a disability or we provide an opportunity."

But in reality, when you really start learning and educating your ma- managers on the benefits of inclusion in general, but not only... And that includes disability. So diversity includes disability. That's another thing I want you guys to remember. A lot of times disability is left out of that diversity conversation.

So when you look at inclusion as a business imperative, you're gonna have better outcomes, you're gonna have higher retention, lower turnover. You're gonna be a sought after place, right? People with disabilities, it's a $1 billion market. You want them to seek care at your facility, right? They have buying power.

And the other thing is that, you, it'll be better business for you guys, and there's all these statistics, and I could probably stand up here for another hour and talk about them. Yeah, you can. So if you wanna know let me know. But that's what we're training our leaders on, that this isn't... If you approach it with the ooey gooey warm feeling, which is great, we're all here in HR to help humans, but when you look at it from a, an actual business practice and a strategy, that's where you're gonna see better outcomes.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): What about you, Amanda?

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think one thing that people fail to do is sometimes just put their, themselves in other people's shoes. Oftentimes in the work that I do across from hiring all the way through, they don't pause as leaders or people within the organization and say, "What are my people really going through?"

"And have I taken a moment to really get to know them and understand them?" And it's a simple thing that we can do because visibility is oftentimes what we look for when we think of, disabilities or things like that, but who are the people that are suffering in silence? And how do we equip our organization w- and leaders with the tools to be able to help those individuals, whether it's visible or non-visible when it comes to looking at accessibility and inclusion across the entire organization?

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): Many organizations begin accessibility journey with the compliance. We gotta check the box or requirements, but true inclusion requires something s- so much deeper. What is the difference between meeting legal requirements and creating a culture where employees genuinely feel supported and included? And I'll start with you, Amanda.

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think it goes back to what I said of it, it is not an HR initiative. I think the benefit for us is our CHRO, when we were reshaping our values, he fought for inclusion to be a value. And really what I do on day one, when I get the opportunity to speak to the new employees, I say, "Inclusion is really interwoven within all of the values in order for us to treat our patients the best."

Because if people are included and they feel a sense of belonging on their units within their teams, then what they do is they work harder, they are retained longer, and they wanna be within your culture. So what we chose to do is really make sure that inclusion was no longer just seen as a tactic, but it was seen as a cultural thing of who we are and how do we embed it in the OU Health way, and how do we make sure that leaders, employees, and all people own it, therefore, it doesn't just feel like it's something being told to them to do, but they're actually living it out.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: Yeah. And compliance is great. We need it. The ADA, the Americans with Disability Act, was signed into legislation 36 years ago this month, and so it provides civil rights to individuals with disabilities, so that is a very important thing. It breaks down barriers and provides access to those who don't have that luxury.

But what it doesn't do is creates that sense of a belonging, and that's what inclusion does, and that's what we need to do to empower our leaders to move from control to empowerment. So how do we help our leaders identify ways to support individuals, no matter if they have a disability or not, right? Im- control to empowerment, and that's a shift.

That is a shift for some of our leaders, but that is really helpful in creating an inclusive environment. So when you look at it from an empowerment standpoint and say, "How can I help you? What do you need to be successful on your role?" That provides that psychological safety for maybe a person with a disability to say, "Hey, I actually have autism, and I perceive the world differently, and when you give us directives verbally, I really lose the first and the last thing I need to do, so can you follow up with an email?"

That's a free accommodation, right? "Can you start our meetings off with an agenda? That helps me lower my anxiety." I could do that. That's free, right? So it's just, again, moving from control to empowerment and knowing that, yes we like the compliance and that holds us accountable, but it's really what we do with that to... that creates that inclusion.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): Okay. Inclusion becomes especially tangible when we look at how people enter, develop, and advance within our organizations. Amanda, how do healthcare organizations move from accommodating disability to creating environments where everyone can thrive?

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think it's really getting in a, a, a space where you as an organization begin to realize that it's a necessary item that is needed within your strategy.

It is not something that you just do to the organization. It's something that you partner with the organization and say, "How do we make it where we focus on the accessibility and inclusion of our team members?" And that is taking a strategic lens and looking at it from the entire spectrum of how are we being accessible in our hiring practices?

How are we doing it in our leadership development opportunities? How are we doing it beyond the belonging and inclusion networks that we have? Are we making it to where people feel safe enough when they are coming into our organization to share the information? It's really a strategy behind it, and oftentimes we think, like I said, focus on initiative, tactics, things we need to do.

How do we comply? How do we make it? You gotta raise up and look at it from a strategic view of how do we end up making this something that could really impact not only retention and turnover, but really create a, a, a safe space for our patients so that people can feel valued internally and externally as they walk through our doors.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): So what barriers do a person with a disability sometimes face at the organization, and what can the organization do to remove that barrier?

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think one thing that comes to my mind for sure is first day barrier. With me even from the onboarding piece of how are we getting to know our people through the talent acquisition side of how are... when we are hiring, are we having those discussions? At OU Health Rise, which is our orientation, we have had several people show up sometimes that d- weren't even told that they needed someone to come there and do sign language for them, or we needed someone there to interpret for them. So just having those small conversations with team members and putting in strategies in place to make sure that never happens, because all of us in here know first year turnover and first year overall for nursing is high.

And so one thing that we have to do is really make sure we're creating those, those limited barriers from entry point so that they feel valued from the start.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): And when you think about leaders, Marissa, that create environments where people can thrive, what sets them apart from other leaders?

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: Absolutely. So any Ted Lasso fans in the crowd? And who's excited August 4th, next season? So for those of you who don't know Ted Lasso, there's a scene where he talks about being curious and not judgmental, and that is an a mantra I've adopted in our inclusive leadership training, and that is what the leaders that I work with closely, that's what they do.

They might not even know they're doing it, but they're being curious and not judgmental. We are all wired for bias, myself included. And so being curious and not judgmental means you have your first thought. How can a nurse who uses a wheelchair be a nurse at the bedside? Then the judg- So let's...

Then let's go to the I'm curious about how did they get through their clinicals and schooling, and how did they accommodate?" And so this is a real-life example where I got a phone call from our recruitment team. "We have a nurse. He uses a wheelchair. What do we do?" Panic. I don't know.

Did you ask him how he got through clinicals or what support he needs on the job?" "Oh, we can do that?" I said, "Yeah." He shares with us what they didn't do, what he has not had experience with, and this was an acquired disability, so this was also new to him. I then started reaching out to practice managers in the clinical setting, right?

That makes a little bit more sense than, in a hospital. I had two practice managers after meeting this gentleman fighting over him, not seeing that he used a wheelchair, but seeing the skill set that he had because he was licensed by the State of Missouri, so he was definitely qualified to be a nurse.

And so he now works at one of our pediatric clinics doing triage while they figure out how he can do the bedside, the, the, the actual room, rooming and those sort of things. So he's running triage. And for Halloween, this is just a fun part of it, for Halloween, they sent me a picture, and he's the only man, and so he was the dragon, and all the ladies were the princesses.

And so he-- Talk about sense of belonging. He felt like he belongs. But it was a barrier. People were like, "He can't do it. He can't do it," but he can. And after that interactive conversation, we figured it out.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): What is the one thing every leader in this room can do differently tomorrow?

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think the one thing every leader can do differently tomorrow is think about yourself and think about your family. I always tell people, put yourself in a mother's shoes who comes in or who has a, a child who's going into work every day that needs an organization to see them like she sees them, and oftentimes we don't do that.

We look at people as employees or I always tell people, yes, employees are our greatest asset, and the one thing we must do as leaders is always see them as people, see them as a child, see them as a sister, see them as a mother, see them as a aunt, see them as a father. And when you look at people, you humanize it, and you allow yourself to really live into why we are in the calling of healthcare from the jump.

Because I tell people it's not just a, a industry we're in just because. Most people that are here are really living into a purpose that's higher. And so when leaders can begin to look at their people and say, "How can I treat them and make sure they have everything they need to support them in b- with invisible or visible or even none, n- nothing?"

Treating them as humans is what we need to get back to the core of doing versus treating them as a asset that's creating outcomes.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: I think for, for you all to go back and just educate yourself a little bit. You don't have to become the disability education or disability inclusion expert, but has anybody used the Job Accommodation Network, askjan.org?

Write it d- JAN's my buddy, okay? I've been doing this a long time, but I'm not an expert on all disability. So as leaders, if you know where the resources are, this isn't a... You don't have to do it alone, and I think that's what leaders are fearful. What if I say the wrong thing? I feel like I'm not supported in this journey.

I have to get caregiver relations involved, and it has to be very transactional. But in reality, educate yourself. Use the resources that are already out there. So if you've never hired someone who's deaf, go to askjan.org and click on deaf and h- hard of hearing, and you'll learn what accommodations are out there or what questions you can ask, and that will help you feel more confident in the situation, and also educate yourself that...

And that's what we need more of, 'cause people just think, "Oh, disability doesn't have to do with me. I'm not gonna worry about it."

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): Askjan.org. Okay. Inclusion is also reflected in how work itself is designed. Amanda, what does accessible workforce design look like in practice from technology and communication to physical environments?

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think that's a great question because I get the lens of seeing it all. I think the technology piece is key. I will say specifically to give an example, a lot of certain populations of employees within our organization struggle with the technology piece that we have for hiring. So when I'm talking to my team, I'm like, "What are the ways that we are going to ensure that all people have access to the ability to come into our organization?

And how do we set up systems in place for them to be able to be included in our processes, even though it might look a bit different?" When you look at the onboarding process, how are we onboarding and giving people the proper things because some people don't have access to the phones or the computers that we automatically think.

When we're thinking through leadership development, it's almost like you were mentioning, how are we shaping the academies that we have within our system to really reach the people and all people no matter what learning style they have? Are we thinking through that when we're building that? And then with workforce development and inclusion, how do we make sure even our performance management system and our engagement system has accessibility?

So even for our engagement, what we do is we set up computers around, and we have people waiting to be able to help people take the engagement survey. We have different languages that people can interpret the survey in because we always gotta think from every point how we design the work strategically is also providing access and inclusivity to all of our employees, so there's no gaps in that space.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): What is one change that you've seen that's made a significant difference for an employee or employees?

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think one change that's that we made within the organization is making sure that we're having intentional conversations when we are onboarding team members. We kept having people show up to orientation that weren't comfortable sharing with the recruiter that they had something.

So what we do is now a face-to-face call, just a brief one with new employees to say, "Is there anything we need to be aware of? Is there anything that we need to make sure the team or your leader is capable of knowing so that we can make sure that when they come on day one, not only are they prepared, but the team is prepared to give them anything that they need?"

Because I'll tell you, you'd be surprised how many leaders don't follow up or don't know what's going on with someone they've interviewed, and I think it's because, you're interviewing, you wanna make a good impression. But how is it that we're doing that conversation with them early enough to understand this is someone we need to see differently, but we need to include in this way.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): Okay.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: Yeah, I think for us it was having those touchpoints at each- ... point of the life cycle. So just a simple application assistant button on our application. We assume that everybody can get online and do our application. What if we have a screen reader and it's not working? Or what if... there's a lot of what ifs when it comes to that, but who do they contact?

And so the application assistant button for us sends it to me, and we can have that conversation, which is a little different than someone fr- a recruiter having that conversation, 'cause it, it can be uncomfortable. And the person's probably been discriminated against, so they don't wanna share- that they have a disability or a need. But I will tell one success that just happened last week. I received a call that we offered we have an interview with someone who needed ASL, and the recruiter reached out to me immediately. We had an in-person interpreter, guys. The deaf community wants in person.

Don't roll out that VRI if you don't have to, okay? And so great success. She's o- she is now on, getting onboarded, and we got an ASL interpreter. There is a little bit of an investment, but it's worth it, right? Because this person may be with us for her whole career. And so it really just showed that instead of me pushing, we had the recruiter seeking us out. So things are slowly changing for the better but it's taken time.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): And I'll share a little example. We work for Mercy, which is a faith-based organization, so every morning we start with prayer. There's prayer in your email, or we start our meetings with prayer. E- if you have eight meetings a day, you're gonna pray eight times a day. And one day I think it was during Deaf Awareness Month-

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: September ...

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): September, we had a caregiver, he was d- he is deaf, and he did prayer in sign language, and it went over really well, not only in sign language, but we had the closed captioning underneath. And that's a small change you guys can do, too.

When you're hosting your meetings, make sure you put closed captioning under your screen because you don't know who is slightly impaired, hearing impaired, and it makes a huge difference.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: Yes, please. Yeah. And all, like, all videos that you post for your social, if your social team is not adding closed caption, you are definitely excluding a huge population.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): A population of people, yeah. What is the... Let me ask this question. What is one change you've seen... No. Share a moment in your career or in your organization that changed the way you think about accessibility and inclusion, and I'll start with you this time, Marissa.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: So I'm gonna... I have so many to share and Bridget will have to take me off the stage. But I'm gonna share something that happened recently and that is very personal to me. So we every January around Martin Luther King, we provide a, an award to s- a caregiver who's gone above and beyond with community service, right? 'Cause that's what Dr. King was about, was being of service to your community.

And so this is something that our team has, has put together, and the caregiver that received the award is someone that I know through our Disability Resources Council. Our ERG. And she had shared with me that she was a person on the autism spectrum, but that wasn't widely known. But it was something that she felt comfortable sharing with me.

So we were so excited. It was... We didn't know she was getting the award, and she received the award, and she goes up to accept the award, and this is being broadcasted through our whole system, through our whole m- ministry. So 50,000 people have access to this video. And she gets up there to thank everyone for the award, and she uses this platform to share with our whole ministry that she is a person on the spectrum, and God didn't make a mistake.

This is who she is, and that she is so blessed and feels so comfortable to work at Mercy that she gets to come to work every day and be who she is, autistic and all. And that we value what she brings to Mercy and her view of this world. And I am sitting in an audience like you guys, bawling. I was-

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): She was crying.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: And she's looking at me, and I'm looking at her, and I was like... It was so unexpected. A- and that's the journey that we're on, is that you create this space that, that people feel that they can share, and representation matters. So I guarantee you people who were watching that who are on the spectrum that have not shared are feeling a little bit more empowered to ask for help when they need it, to bring their authentic selves to the table. And for me, that was a, a game changer- ... not only personally, but professionally.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): Make me feel comfortable, make me feel safe, right? What about you?

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think for, for me one of the things that stuck out is we had a employee, a younger gentleman, who ended up having a seizure in the middle of our orientation.

And my team is all outside. They're running in the... And I just told everyone, "Let's calm down. Get everyone out of the room." Let them take a break. Lets us, let us handle the situation and get the medical people that we need to make sure that this individual's okay." And basically, what had happened is, what was life-changing to me is we had three physicians who were joining the organization that day, and there were nurses as well as other corporate services.

But those three physicians and nurses rallied around that person and made sure he was good before we even were able to get the actual medical team to come and actually support him, and they were immediately... It wasn't a question asked. It wasn't a thought. It was, like, seconds, and they were right there taking care of it.

And that mother actually ended up coming up to us at the end because she came in, of course, to make sure everything was okay, and he ended up being all right, and she said, "My son has been struggling with seizures his who- seizures his whole life to the point to where we were terrified to let him come to work, and we were super excited that OU Health allowed him to have a position."

And she said, "And the fact that you all gave him an opportunity, we were nervous about him coming alone. But after seeing how you all handled him and took care of him and made sure he was okay, I know he's in the right hands, and I just wanna thank you," 'cause even my team walked her to where she needed to go because inclusion, oftentimes we look through the employee lens, but it's also through the families of the patients that we serve.

It's also through the patients that you see in the hallways that you're saying, "Are you okay? Do you need me to walk you somewhere?" So really being able to see that cultural impact that we made on that mother and allowing her to see we had her son made her feel safe every day to have him come and contribute to our organization every day.

That was a game changer for me because it let me know the work that we're continuing to do every day is making an impact in the lives.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): Yeah. This is questions for y- question for you guys. How many Americans identify as having a disability? So raise your hand. The options, one in eight-

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: One in eight ...

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): One in six-

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: One in six. Raise your hands if you think-

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): One in four or one in 10. So let me repeat the question. How many Americans identify as having a disability? One in eight-

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: Okay ...

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): One in six, one in four, or one in 10. Okay. The answer is one in four. S- specifically 28.7 of the US adults come in from the U- United States Center of Disease Control and Prevention.

We're going to Talk about neurodiversity, but we don't have much time to talk about that, so let me open it up for questions. Do you guys have any questions for us? Okay

And before you guys answer that question, you wanna give them a quick definition since you were starting? I'm gonna ask you to give a quick definition of neurodivergent for those that may not know.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: So neurodiverse is how individuals see the world differently. It's a social construct, so many... It's not a diagnosis, right?

So diagnoses can like autism, OCD, dyslexia, dyspraxia, Down syndrome, any way that you process information differently or see the world differently can be considered neurodiverse. And so to your point, the ADA provides rights to those students. So I don't know what that accrediting body is, but they sh- you should be able to say, "I have a disability.

I need this accommodation," just like an IEP in school, and they should be able... Whether it's reading it out loud to them, giving them more time, those are all things that, that they have to do by law. So-

That's still considered neurodiverse, like general anxiety, anything like that. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know.

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think as we close, Yes, we have to close. It goes it goes to the point of back to what I was saying with strategy. With workforce development, me and my director have meetings with the deans of the colleges.

I get to heavily work with not only our CPE, but he's the Dean of College of Medicine for physicians. Our CNE is the Dean of College of... for Applied Professional for Clinical Nursing. I think it's having the conversations around the table and saying, "How can we alter these?" And we've had to do that in a couple of instances of some of the workforce development programs we have, and the pipelines we're building, is how do we accommodate the future?

Because what we've done in the past is not what we need to do in the future, so how do we strategically look at things differently? I don't think we're there yet to the point of what you're saying, but I think we can get there if we continue to have the conversations. And that's what I recommend, is going and meeting with the deans of the colleges.

Yeah. Going and having conversations with the key stakeholders of the professors of the different courses. And really, you actually see great outcomes come from that, 'cause they begin to see from your lens of what you're facing in the system or what people are telling you, and then they can work with you as the academic partner.

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: And I... One really quick thought is that there are a, is a lot of statistics around neurodiversity, and the fact that this next generation coming through the workforce has an even higher rate of self-identification. And And they have the expectation that you are gonna accommodate. They live in a world where, they s- they see that representation.

So if, again, there's that business case, so if you ever wanted to prese- you know, like work with that as far as like statistics and the future, 'cause the future is c- here, and they're neurodiverse, so we should make sure that we're accommodating. So I'd be happy to share some statistics with you.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): Last question. We gotta go.

Audience Member: Really quick so the DSM-V, it's always moving. There's always new, disabilities that come into play. And generationally, education in terms of disabilities is limited. When it comes to managers, when it comes to employees, how do you... and, advocating for, employees advocating, managers advocating, it's hard. What are some strategies, because it's always changing, what are some strategies that would help this ever-changing in the workforce?

Marisa Hiatt, Director of Disability Experience, Mercy Health: I think for me it's not about diagnosis, right? At the workplace, I don't care if you have autism or a mental health impairment, I know what... I wanna know what you need to be successful. So it doesn't really matter what diagnosis you have. It really is, how can I support you? How do you learn best? You brought that up about learning styles. How, is it a sensory thing? Do you... These, these lights are terrible. I hate them so much. It's a conversation about those things that are on the job because when someone comes to me and says, "I have autism," I'm like, "Great. I love that." I know a lot of people with different types of disabilities, but each person is unique in the needs that they have, and so that's really a conversation starter, and then that person also needs to learn what they need.

So a thing that we're doing when we have an inclusive interviewing event is we're going to the community and saying, "Hey, community of candidates with disabilities, this is how you disclose if you want to." It's up to them, but we can't ask you if you have a disability, nor do I wanna know, but I do wanna know what you need to be successful.

And so that's been the con- more of the conversation instead of I don't care what diagnosis you have, 'cause that's none of my business as an HR professional.

Amanda Holguin, Vice President, Enterprise Talent and Culture, OU Health: I think it comes to understanding and providing the knowledge for people to understand. Like you said, it's always advocacy that's necessary when understanding and knowledge isn't present.

I think that's the one thing that we have started to really lean into. Each division within our organization has to go through inclusion training now that includes a lot of things. Because what happened, what we realized is before we were going out and doing these trainings, people had even a whole misconception of what belonging and inclusion was.

And so when you get in a training and you get all of the leaders within the divisions is who we've piloted, we're about to really roll it out for FY '27, we got feedback as what is it that you wanna see in this inclusion training to better help you be equipped as a leader? And how do we embed it within our entire practices from hiring, these are what you need to do, this is what you need to look for, this is what you need to think about.

From on the floor, this is how you need to operate. When someone gives you this request, this is how you handle it. It's understanding what it is so that we can then lean into it better and be able to really allow our culture to thrive.

Bridgett Marzette Bender, Vice President, Experience & DEIB, Mercy Health (Moderator): I'll just end it with a quote, and it's not in my script. It's from Maya Angelou. "People will not... People won't remember what you said, and they won't remember what you did, but they will remember how you made them feel." Thank you, guys.

Thank