Otizmli insanlara iş imkanı

 Microsoft, daha fazla sayıda otizmli bireye tam zamanlı iş imkanı vereceklerini açıkladı.

Goal of Microsoft pilot program is to add autistic people to staff


Şirket ilk aşamada Washington eyaletinin Redmond şehrindeki merkezinde bir pilot uygulama başlatıp 10 otizmli çalışanı işe alacak.
Kararı blogunda değerlendiren Microsoft'un üst düzey yöneticilerinden Mary Ellen Smith, "Otizmli insanlar Microsoft'ta ihtiyaç duyduğumuz becerilere sahip" dedi.
Her bireyin yeteneklerinin farklı olduğunu ifade eden Smith, "Bazı insanlar veri depolama, detaylara dikkat etme, derinlemesine düşünme, matematik ya da bilgisayar kodlaması alanlarında muazzam becerilere sahip olabilir" dedi.
Microsoft otizmli çalışanlar bulması için insan kaynakları şirketi Specialisterne ile anlaştı.
İngiltere ve Danimarka'da faaliyet gösteren Specialisterne, hem yazılım sektörüne hem de diğer sektörlere otizmli çalışanlar bulmakta uzmanlaşıyor.

'Cesaret verici'

İngiltere'deki Ulusal Otizm Derneği, Microsoft'un bu adımını memnuniyetle karşıladı.
Dernek yöneticilerinden Sarah Lambert "Microsoft gibi küresel bir şirketin otizmli yetişkinlerin becerilerinin farkına varması ve bu potansiyeli kullanması cesaret verici" diyor.
Otizmli yetişkinlerin detaycı ve güvenilir olduklarını ifade eden Lambert, bu özelliklerden sadece teknoloji firmalarının değil birçok farklı sektörün faydalanabileceğini de vurguluyor.
Ancak Lambert, İngiltere’de otizmli yetişkinlerin sadece yüzde 15'inin tam zamanlı işlerde çalışabildiğine de dikkat çekiyor.
Lambert'e göre işe alım mülakatlarını bu bireyler için daha erişilebilir hale getirmek ve işyerlerinin 'yazıya dökülmemiş kurallarını' onlara izah etmek, bu grubun potansiyelinden faydalanılmasının önündeki engelleri kaldırabilir.




Microsoft is looking to recruit yet another type of diverse employee: The technology giant is piloting a program focused on hiring people with autism for full-time positions in its headquarters in Redmond, Wash.
The program was announced on Friday in a blog post by Mary Ellen Smith, Microsoft’s corporate vice president for worldwide operations.
Smith wrote that in addition to the general advantages of a more diverse workforce, Microsoft is getting behind the effort because people with autism “bring strengths that we need at Microsoft . . . some have amazing ability to retain information, think at a level of detail and depth or excel in math or code.”
Microsoft plans to launch the program with about 10 candidates, a Microsoft spokeswoman told The Washington Post. It will be working with Specialisterne, a training and consulting firm based in Denmark that helps match autistic workers with jobs.
The Danish company began doing that for another big software company, SAP, in 2013, finding employees particularly suited for jobs that require great attention to detail, such as software testing or debugging. Specialisterne also has worked with the tech company Computer Aid on similar hiring efforts.
Although Microsoft’s move appears to show a willingness to hire diverse talent, the company also might find highly entrepreneurial talent in the process. As billionaire tech investor Peter Thiel recently said, according to The Post’s Matt McFarland, “many of the more successful entrepreneurs seem to be suffering from a mild form of Asperger’s where it’s like you’re missing the imitation, socialization gene.” Asperger syndrome is a high-functioning autism-spectrum disorder.
What’s more, Microsoft’s move appears to demonstrate the real need that the tech industry has for certain kinds of talent.
In a 2012 story titled The Autism Advantage, the New York Times Magazine featured Specialisterne (which is Danish for “the specialists”) and profiled the firm’s founder, Thorkil Sonne. Sonne saw a potential fit for tech companies — which he’d seen struggle to find workers who can perform specific, intense and sometimes tedious tasks — and autistic workers, many of whom lack traditional social skills but have extraordinary abilities for memorizing and concentrating.
Sonne founded Specialisterne after watching his 7-year-old son replicate the page numbers on a map of Europe from a road atlas, theTimes reported.
But he isn’t the only one involved in bringing more autistic workers to big tech companies, or the only one in that field who has a personal link to the idea.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the head of SAP’s initiative has two children with autism.
And Smith wrote in her Microsoft blog post that her son, now 19, is autistic. She wrote that the day her son was diagnosed, she and her husband were at a loss for words.
She is now proud of the distinct advantages her son, a college freshman and part-time employee, has to offer.
“What we learned over the last 15 years was to find our voice,” she said.


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