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AMTA E-News
April 2010
Transport
Industry Will Need to Include People With Disabilities to
Tackle Pending Worker Shortage
Although Alberta’s economic boom has experienced a
slowdown, the province can expect to see a shortage of about
92,000 workers by the year 2018 due to the aging workforce and
declining birthrate. Where will Alberta transportation
employers find skilled workers in the future?
“Alberta employers will have to broaden their
hiring practices in the face of the changing labour market to
remain competitive,” says Mayne Root,
Executive Director, AMTA. “Persons
with disabilities are an underutilized pool of talent available
to meet the growing skill and labour shortages.”
AMTA
has partnered with Viable Calgary to develop a workplace
inclusion plan designed to provide transportation employers with
helpful information for hiring and retaining disabled workers.
Viable Calgary services support and assist Calgary employers in diversifying their
workplaces so they can find and retain the right person for the
job in the face of the changing workforce.
Prior to writing the inclusion plan, Viable Calgary surveyed
AMTA members to create a snapshot of
the memberships’ experience with employing persons with
disabilities and their existing knowledge of resources and
beliefs about persons with disabilities. This has resulted in
the development of a plan tailored to the road transportation
industry that is filled with practical tips and an extensive
list of resources. The plan provides steps to creating an
inclusive organization and covers interviewing, writing job
descriptions and recruiting, accommodations and dispels myths.
“The inclusion plan will better enable AMTA
employers to find the right person for the right job in the face
of the changing workforce environment,” says Mayne Root. “The plan provides
AMTA members with a systematic framework for securing and
retaining new talent that will be of tremendous value into the
years ahead.”
To obtain your copy, please contact AMTA’s James Courtney at
jamesc1@amta.ca
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