Home > Features > 'Secret Millionaire' businesswoman sees her blindness as a benefit
'Secret Millionaire' businesswoman sees her blindness as a benefit
24th February 2011
TV reality star Liz Jackson, who gave away 33 thousand pounds of her own money on Channel 4's Secret Millionaire', believes that having a disability can be a PR positive when it comes to business.
The Basingstoke-based director of Great Guns Marketing, which employs over 100 people, was speaking on the ´óÏó´«Ã½ Ouch! Talk show when she explained:
"I don’t think that people would write about me, or even read about me if I wasn’t blind.
"In terms of PR, if you can [start a business] as a disabled person, you’ve got heads and shoulders above able bodied people who do the same thing."
Liz went on to surprise the show’s presenters by professing to "pretty much never getting CVs from the disabled community".
The blind employer has her own ideas on why this might be the case.
"You have to earn a certain amount of money perhaps for it to make it worth your while going into the workplace. And I think if your confidence has been stripped away, perhaps it’s easier to sit inside your comfort zone than it is to step outside."
Nevertheless she is surprised disabled people don't target her when job-hunting: "You’d have to say that perhaps, given where I am, people might think I would be more approachable as an employer, but certainly I haven’t found that."
Listen to Liz Jackson’s full-length interview on the latest Ouch! talk show, . It also features Vanessa Heywood, winner of the 2010 Stelios Disabled Entrepreneur prize.
"I don’t think that people would write about me, or even read about me if I wasn’t blind.
"In terms of PR, if you can [start a business] as a disabled person, you’ve got heads and shoulders above able bodied people who do the same thing."
Liz went on to surprise the show’s presenters by professing to "pretty much never getting CVs from the disabled community".
The blind employer has her own ideas on why this might be the case.
"You have to earn a certain amount of money perhaps for it to make it worth your while going into the workplace. And I think if your confidence has been stripped away, perhaps it’s easier to sit inside your comfort zone than it is to step outside."
Nevertheless she is surprised disabled people don't target her when job-hunting: "You’d have to say that perhaps, given where I am, people might think I would be more approachable as an employer, but certainly I haven’t found that."
Listen to Liz Jackson’s full-length interview on the latest Ouch! talk show, . It also features Vanessa Heywood, winner of the 2010 Stelios Disabled Entrepreneur prize.
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Comments
When Ms Jackson says she "pretty much never" gets CVs from the disabled community does she mean:
- That the CVs she gets don't include details of people's impairments? Because mine doesn't, and I don't believe I'm unique in that.
- That the CVs she gets reflect the fact that many disabled people prefer not to disclose their condition or impairments during the job application process because they feel that it may put them at a disadvantage? Because I've only ever mentioned mine on a Two Ticks form or when making interview arrangements, and I *know* I'm not unique in that either.
- That the CVs she gets and the people she employs may be demonstrating the way that many disabled people *never* feel comfortable disclosing their condition or impairments to their employer, particularly in the area of mental health, because it is safer to "pretend normal" and then fall apart at home, than it is to risk workplace ridicule and scupper your promotion prospects?
- Or does she perhaps believe that she has the ability to tell if a person has an invisible or hidden condition with only minimal information? Has she, perhaps, got a little bit confused about the difference between reading someone's CV and reading their private medical records?
I think it might be possible that Ms Jackson gets more CVs than she thinks she does from the disabled community.
I also think that if, as Ms Jackson suggests, disabled people who've landed on the benefits system with no other resources to draw upon find that their "confidence has been stripped away", this might be a factor in why many of us are unable to effectively promote ourselves or anything else to the extent required by a marketing firm. Saying that people with no confidence don't put themselves forwards for jobs requiring confidence is perhaps a bit of a no-brainer?
I am also a self-employed disabled person. I will very readily admit that I am only in that position because I am *extremely* lucky to have a great deal of practical and financial support from not only the official channels (Social Services, Access to Work) but also from personal channels like friends and family.
It's very easy to go on an ego trip about "I'm disabled and pulled myself up by my bootstraps, so anyone can and they're just not trying!" but it's also insulting, offensive, and delusional. I would not have been able to access the 'official' support without the 'unofficial' resources I had. Lots of people simply aren't that fortunate and that's not a moral issue, or a hard work issue, any more than the fact of their impairments. Even with disability or the lack thereof set to one side, success in business and in life needs a big dollop of good luck along with the hard work. To use that good fortune as a stick to beat others with is hardly fair.
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