Jamie Burton, Vice President of Dolphin Digital Technologies is proud to share the innovative practice of the company she works for. And she can! Dolphin is the first company to have developed an entire employment strategy for people with disabilities. Its main focus: to encourage people to recognize their talents. 3 questions asked to this uncommon vice president.
Fiorella Vargas: In the conference you talked about undiscovered talents. Do you think that you could enlarge your company’s practice to refugees?
Jamie Burton: Absolutely, we’ve been asked to. The reason why the equation works so well is because it has first and foremost the premise of respecting the individual for the value that he possesses. We just have to figure out how to access it. So, while this focus is on people with disabilities we know that it would work with anyone. Actually, Dolphin is working right now on an algorithm to help identify the idividuals who most need our help to succeed.
F.V: Have you been the inspiration for other companies to begin to hire people with disabilities?
J.B: Absolutely, the first year that we started disability’s mentoring we had four companies. Now, we have over eighty-five companies participating. They are coming to us and we help them figure out their equation in order for them to hire more people with disabilities. They need talents and they’re trying to figure it out on their own and it’s not working. Some of the companies are global, they have over forty percent turnover so they’re looking at us to help them find that solution. And so, I have every confidence that we are showing them how.
F.V: Do you think if society encouraged more people to exploit their talents there could be a decrease in poverty and unemployment?
J.B: Of course! I know that’s the truth. That is why we do what we do, because we’ve seen the value of investing in individuals. It made our company more profitable, it helped us discover new innovations that we wouldn’t have had otherwise. But it also encourages individuals who had nothing before to develop, and who knows where they’ll end up, but it will be a much better place that from where they have started.
To conclude, we could say that the problem is actually society’s way of seeing the individual. The society does not really want to exploit their actual talents and does not encourage them for what they are. Dolphin gives us a new instrument to boost economy and more importantly, the individual’s value. More, it considers individuals who are discriminated, such as people with disabilities and refugees. This way of thinking could be essential for today’s problems resolution and tomorrow’s world prosperity. Let’s recognize the human as a source of talent and ideas, instead of diminishing it to a profit machine.
Fiorella Vargas – ESPOL Lille
