"Job: searched and found ... "

In this new section I will regularly write about the topic “work” myself, or invite guest bloggers. The aim of this section is to approach “work and hearing impairment” in an open and versatile way, to show the bottlenecks and positive sides.

In my blog I sometimes use to write about people with hearing impairment and their challenges in finding a job or at work.
There are people with a hearing impairment who see no or few challenges in finding a job or in the workplace.
There are people with a hearing impairment who feel somewhat challenged about “work” and people who feel particularly challenged.
Of course, the first question that arises is: what makes the difference? Why do some people manage to easily find and/or keep a job? Why do some manage it with difficulty and some hardly or not at all? Of course, this question cannot be answered unequivocally, because it is usually not only the auditory challenge that plays a role.

About the many reasons why it is often more difficult for people with an auditory challenge to find a job is already much written and also I have already written about it https://hardofhearingweb.wordpress.com/2016/06/19/good-work/. They are all good reasons not to deny and not to underestimate.
Today, however, I would like to shed light on a reason that you almost never get to read, but that is still more important.
And this reason is called: How does one stand to its hearing impairment, how independent and self-confident is the hearing-impaired job seeker or employee?

In the 15 years that I have been active professionally and otherwise in the world of hearing-impaired people, one thing has become particularly clear to me from the beginning: the more self-conscious the hearing-impaired person is, the further he or she will go in private and working life.
If you are self-conscious about your hearing impairment, this is not a guarantee that you will not face challenges, but self-confidence is a good prerequisite to achieve a goal, for example, acquiring a job.
If one is “self-conscious”, one knows better one’s own strength and weakness, one can orient oneself also better on a suitable job or training and, just as importantly, one can present oneself in the application process as well.

Employers like to see employees or job candidates who know what they need, know what they want and why they want to work exactly in this job or at this company. For employers, the main thing is that they hire the right person for the right job, matching their company. And if the candidate, hearing impaired or not, cannot convey the message that he or she is this person, he or she will hardly stand a chance.
And that’s where the shoe usually pinches for a hearing impaired person! A hearing impairement often brings with it uncertainty, which can impair self-confidence. Uncertainty about one’s own talents, whether one can do a job or not dare to emphasize one’s own strength in the application process.

If  you think about how one could bring potential employers and hearing-impaired job seekers closer together, above all the self-consciousnes should stand in the foreground.
Employers should look more at what an applicant can do, rather than focusing on what an applicant can’t do.
Hearing impaired applicants should also become more aware of what skills they do have instead of what they cannot. And if they find it difficult to find out for themselves, they might ask for some help with that.