1Self-Employment as a Mainstream Approach to Adult Life
Important Terms in This Chapter
community rehabilitation programs (CRPs): Local rehabilitation agencies that generally offer sheltered employment, supported employment, service coordination, and other state-funded services to adults with disabilities. Most are funded primarily for individuals with developmental disabilities.
Small Business Administration (SBA): A federal agency that sponsors small business development programs throughout the United States. This agency offers free-of-charge technical assistance, financing, and information on enterprise development.
Small Business Development Centers (SBDCs): Centers in many U.S. communities that provide free assistance regarding business feasibility, business planning, marketing suggestions, financing, and management. These centers are part of the SBA.
Social Security Administration (SSA): The primary benefits system in the United States for people with disabilities. The SSAâs most common benefits programs are Supplemental Security Income (SSI) and Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI). The SSA also manages the Plan to Achieve Self-Support (PASS) program.
vocational rehabilitation (VR): A state and federally funded program charged with assisting eligible individuals with significant disabilities in finding employment. This program can and does support business development, vocational training, and college education. The programâs offices are found in communities across every U.S. state and territory. Access to VR can also be obtained through local One-Stop Centers (see discussion of the Workforce Investment Act later in this chapter).
Workforce Investment Act (WIA): This federal act created One-Stop Centers (also known as Workforce Development Centers) across the United States to serve all people seeking employment. The VR program and other disability organizations are collaborators in WIA, which is another source of technical assistance and potential funding for wage jobs and self-employment.
Many people begin their working lives as teenagers. Delivering newspapers, mowing lawns, milking cows, preparing fast food, washing cars, and babysitting exemplify the diversity of jobs traditionally assigned to youth to build character and a strong work ethic. Unfortunately, for most students with significant disabilities, this natural part of learning real-life skills and lessons, acculturating, and growing a work ethic is missing. Various legislation and legal decisions hold the potential for and promise of equal access to careers and substantive employment: the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975 (PL 94-142); followed by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) of 1990 (PL 101-476) with its revision by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Improvement Act (IDEA) of 2004 (PL 108-446); andâsupporting people with disabilities into adulthoodâthe Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (PL 93-112), the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) of 1998 (PL 105-220), the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 (PL 101-336) and as amended in 2008 by PL 110-325, and the Olmstead v. LC (1999) decision from the Supreme Court. Still, most transition-age youth with significant disabilities graduate without paying jobs, and most adults with significant disabilities remain unemployed or severely underemployed throughout their lifetimes (Butterworth et al., 2012; Cornell University, 2010; Wehman, 2013). During the 1990s, despite one of the strongest economies in U.S. history, and through the recession years of the new century, enrollments for sheltered workshops increased and the number of special education students graduating into paid jobs remained agonizingly low (Butterworth, Gilmore, Kiernan, & Schalock, 1999; Butterworth et al., 2012; Migliore & Butterworth, 2008; Migliore, Grossi, Mank, & Rogan, 2008; Niemiec et al., 2009).
This same time period witnessed the success of supported employment techniques, with more than 200,000 individuals acquiring community jobs (Wehman & Kregel, 1998), and the emergence of customized employment, which refined community employment techniques and began the shift toward an economic development approach to job creation (Griffin, Hammis, & Geary, 2007; Wehman, Inge, Revell, & Brooke, 2007). These workersâ disabilities were once considered too significant for the individuals to gain employment, but the techniques of offering ongoing workplace and personal supports, coupled with matching people with jobs they enjoy, eroded previous stereotypes in the rehabilitation professions and within the business community (Callahan & Garner, 1997; Griffin, Hammis, et al., 2007; Wehman et al., 2006). Self-employment, as described in this book, is the next logical step in the evolution of supported employment technology.
As of 2013, self-employment and business ownership are recognized across the country in newly revised state Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) agency policies, throughout the developmental disabilities system, and through advocacy and policy from the U.S. Department of Laborâs Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP; see http://www.start-up-usa.biz). Because all people who are self-employed use, create, and purchase a variety of supportsâranging from accounting services to sales representativesâowning a business meshes well with the American dream and with the commitment of rehabilitation professionals, family members, friends, and neighbors to assist people with disabilities in achieving typical lives. Owning a business can be one of the least stigmatizing forms of employment for individuals with significant disabilities because the opportunity to gently rely on ongoing or time-limited rehabilitation services coexists with typically purchased business supports.
Self-employment is booming across the United States, and according to Carl Schramm (Fairlie, 2010), President and CEO of the Kauffmann Foundation for Entrepreneurial Leadership, there are an estimated 700,000 new companies springing up annually. Of the estimated 32 million businesses across the United States, 75% are singleâowner-operator enterprises that were started for an average of $10,000 each (Wells Fargo/Gallup, 2006). The self-employment rate is growing at more than 20% annually, with microenterprise (businesses employing one to five workers) generating 64% of all new jobs in the United States, according to the Small Business Administration (SBA, 2013). Also, since the early 1990s, women owned 60% of microenterprises, and overall, 20 million small companies combined created more jobs than did all of the Fortune 500 (Access to Credit, 1998; Fairlie, 2010; Forrester, 1996; Friedman, 1996; Sirolli, 1999). This cultural and economic shift of taking individual opportunity, which appears to be largely unaffected by good or bad economic times, presents another promising career option to individuals with significant disabilities (Brodsky, 2002; Fogg, Harrington, & McMahon, 2010; Griffin & Hammis, 1996).
Across the country, state VR agencies support approximately 2% of those served in achieving self-employment, but the numbers vary widely from state to state (Arnold, 1996; Revell, Smith, & Inge, 2009). The good news is that although these closure rates are low, many people are actually being closed as âsuccessfully employedâ under the Supported Employment funding category, thereby depressing the actual number of self-employment closures (Revell et al., 2009). In addition, numerous types of agencies (e.g., VR, developmental disabilities, mental health) in various states (e.g., Florida, Ohio, Texas, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Iowa, Maryland, New York, California) are exploring policy, vendor development, and funding mechanisms to increase self-employment opportunities. In 2001, Congress created ODEP at the U.S. Department of Labor. This agency encourages small business ownership through its guiding legislation, the WIA, and is funding special projects on customized and self-employment, such as START-UP/USA, which is a national training and technical assistance resource for self-employment and disability operated by Virginia Commonwealth Universityâs Rehabilitation Research and Training Center and Griffin-Hammis Associates (http://www.odep.gov/odep; http://www.start-up-usa.biz). The Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA) within the U.S. Department of Education promotes self-employment as a reasonable outcome for state VR agencies and also is demonstrating various aspects of entrepreneurial ventures, and several states have model programs in development. See, for example, the Texas Department of Assistive and Rehabilitative Services Strategic Plan for 2011â2015 (http://www.dars.state.tx.us), Florida VRâs Community Business Technical Assistance Certification program (http://www.rehabworks.org), and Ohio Rehabilitation Services Commission Assets and Neighbors program (http://www.rsc.ohio.gov).
Still, to succeed, there must be a concerted and well-funded effort to train and retrain staff charged with supporting individuals who seek self-employment. Without this significant investment, community resources that exist to assist all citizens will be untapped, community rehabilitation agencies and VR counselors will be overtaxed due to the intensity and complexity of some business ventures, and consumers may be denied possible career advancement (Griffin et al., 2007; Revell et al., 2009; Shelley et al., 2002). It is also certain that if transition-age students are not expected to deserve more than just a plan, then what lies ahead for them is graduating into the dead end of day activity centers, sheltered workshops, or adult services waiting lists (Butterworth et al., 1999; Wehman, 2013). A thorough literature search reveals that school-to-work transition produces plans without employment outcomes and remains a better paperânot a better-outcomes processâand that only 8% of students who receive special education services graduate with a job in the community (Condon & Brown, 2007; Hughes et al., 1997). Self-employment, and perhaps graduating as the owner-operator of a small business, is a more positive option.
CHOOSING SELF-EMPLOYMENT
Self-employment is not for everyone. It is a personal choice that should be balanced by a variety of life circumstances, including financial position and funding, availability and quality of business and personal supports, and the viability of the business idea. Just as in customized employment, the driving ethics are that everyone is ready to work and that it is the responsibility of special education and rehabilitation professionals to provide or facilitate the supports that make success possible (Griffin, Hammis, et al., 2007; Griffin-Hammis Associates, 2012). In some cases, allowing the person to experiment with different career options is the greatest support available.
There appear to be certain indicators of the potential for success in self-employment, however. For instance, many small business owners learned a trade and understand the market because they worked for someone else first (Doyel, 2000). Still, because so many people with disabilities never get the chance to begin with a typical job, self-employment presents a unique opportunity to create an employment circumstance specifically tailored to their personal situation, degree of mobility, skills they have and those that can likely be taught, speed of production, health, and accommodation needs. Again, a personâs disability should not determine his or her fitness for self-employment. Rather, each situation is assessed to point out the need for supportsâsuch as financing, skills training in specific tasks, and tooling and/or assistive technologyâin the same manner that any entrepreneur requires supports in areas of need. Typical business owners outsource accounting, marketing, subcomponent manufacturing, and other functions that they either cannot handle themselves or do not enjoy (Doyel, 2000).
EXAMPLES OF SUCCESSFUL INDIVIDUALS AND BUSINESSES
The authors and their colleagues across the country are privileged to work with numerous individual business owners whose stories illustrate the concepts and approaches to enterprise development found throughout this book. Consider, for example, Andrewâa middle-age gentleman who spent most of his life in institutions, workshops, and group homes. The authors and other staff at the University of Montanaâs Rural Institute, using the strengths-based approach, developed an inventory of positive attributes that included Andrewâs friendly smile, his interesting sense of humor, his skills and the tasks he enjoys doing, and a personality that makes those around him comfortable. Two noteworthy interests or strengths included his stuffed animal collection and his enjoyment of an existing volunteer position. As a volunteer at the local nature center, Andrew rapidly acquired skills as he fed and groomed animals, interacted with other staff and volunteers (although he used little verbal language), and assisted with various chores, illustrating how well the center matched his optimum working conditions.
The professionals in his life considered this gentleman âtoo disabledâ to work, and although the nature center staff valued him as a volunteer, they did not have revenue for or an interest in hiring him. With Andrewâs significant input, a proposal was developed for him to sell stuffed animals at the center. The proposal included assistance from the provider agency staff, which would manage his books and inventory, and called on the nature center staff to help with daily operations, such as money exchanges. The design of the business was not typical, and management of the business was different from most, but sales flourished and a strong partnership grew as the entrepreneur paid 10% of profits to the nature center for rent and minor assistance with the largely self-serve operation. Seven years later, the business expanded to sales of stuffed animals to other downtown stores. Andrew is now welcomed as a âregularâ on Main Street and is viewed as a success by the local developmental disability agency, which helped him move into his first apartment. In addition, because he has a bank account in the companyâs name, Andrew soon amassed cash savings in his business checking account, well above the $2,000 limit for someone receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI) payments.
Using the strengths-based approach, known as Discovering Personal Genius⢠(DPG) and detailed in Chapter 2, this businesspersonâs deficits were reframed, and his many attributes became apparent. Creativity, inventiveness, intuitive consideration of the tourist market, and ongoing and largely invisible supports that cost far less than the average day program led to success.
In the rural South, a young man with autism constantly ran from his sheltered workshop. The DPG approach for assessment and employment development revealed that a strong vocational theme for George was agriculture, and that he was recognized in his family for his light touch when transplanting seedlings and for his infatuation with trucks and farm tractors. Seeing such equipment drive by is what prompted his running from the workshop. George was simply trying to catch a ride.
The team designed a job development plan targeting agricultural employment for George. As often happens, however, an informational interview (Griffin, Hammis, et al., 2007) with two brothers who owned a local farm and an unsolicited donation of a greenhouse led to the establishment of Georgeâs business. He started a greenhouse next to the brothersâ roadside fresh produce stand. After several licensing delays, âGeorgeâsâ opened its doors to supply specialty plants and vegetables to customers of the roadside stand and to start seedlings for the brothersâ farm. George was once considered unemployable due to the severity of his disability and his challenging behaviors. Today, he has a part-time employment specialist helping with production. In addition, George has rich natural supports from his family as well as from the two brothers who own the farm and teach him the trade using their experience and specific quality standards (they also give him occasional rides on their tractors). The business exceeded its profit projections for the first year by growing specialty food crops and poinsettias for the holiday market. Even if his income has been less than projected, George now has a rich and growing business relationship with two community members, meets dozens of customers weekly, is considered a talented business owner by his family, and earns self-employment wages well beyond anything he earned in the workshop. Perhaps most surprising is Georgeâs impact as a role model. Georgeâs success has inspired more than a dozen agency staff to discuss their own personal small business ideas with the authors. These frontline employees are gaining personal strength and taking risks because George led the way (Kroth, 2001).
Sarah is a middle-age woman diagnosed with depression and a secondary developmental disability living on the West Coast. Her vocational themes included a strong interest in cooking, artistic creativity, and sports. She and her team explored several vocational options and in the process became acquainted with the owner of a local bakery. The owner mentioned adding an espresso machine once she saved enough profits to cover the $4,000 cost. Using agency funds and assistance from the state VR office, a proposal to have Sarah operate an espresso business within the bakery was developed and accepted. The company selling the equipment provided training to Sarah, a short-term job coach, and the shopâs counter staff. Sarah launched her business making espresso and was instantly successful, while paying 15% of her gross receipts to the bakery for ongoing support, water, electricity, and floor space. The cross-training proved invaluable for the few times when Sarahâs symptoms made it difficult for her to go to work; the staff sold espresso, and Sarah still retained the profits...