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Kunal Mahajan is a life-long person who stutters based in New York City and has spent the majority of his career in the financial services profession. He has been involved with various stuttering and disability non-profits and support groups and has been a champion of helping create more awareness and opportunities for people who stutter and those with other disabilities with career opportunities. |
Change. Often it is the least popular idea in the room. Why change when there is a belief that the majority are ok with the status quo? The past 1.5 years in our world has shown us that the status quo is not ok for us to coexist as a society as we have seen an uprising with the social justice movement and from additional challenges that the COVID-19 pandemic has created for us all. Individuals who have spoken up for change are the ones that have created a movement and progress comes when we can create a movement and others join you on your mission. However, the ultimate question remains, what is the change we want to genuinely see in our world and are we ultimately speaking up for?
It is no surprise to any of us to hear that the stuttering community has additional barriers that we face in the workplace. Barriers during the interview process such as some corporations moving towards timed pre-recorded interviews limiting response times to 30 seconds per question which makes it nearly impossible for those of us who stutter with more severe blocks or repetitions to get everything out in the short time period. While we have started to see some progress of stuttering workplace initiatives by some organizations, overall awareness of stuttering at work remains limited. With it being an invisible disability, many do not even recognize that stuttering is classified as a disability under the Americans with Disabilities Act and it often is not incorporated within an organization’s disability awareness education or part of their disability employee resource group as misconceptions still exist where people think people who stutter are just nervous and need to calm down. Lack of awareness leads to all the items many of us saw growing up: people cutting off our sentences due to impatience, telling us to just breathe and talk slower, and judging us by how the words are coming out and not on what the words that are coming out mean.
Now is the time for us to speak up for change and enable our stuttering community to become more connected with all of these social causes that are experiencing inequities. As many of us are very connected to our respective stuttering support groups in our respective regions, we feel a natural connection to the stuttering community. However, let us not forget about the wider disability community who we are part of that we can collaborate with and help support our agendas together as one collective unit. With 70% of all disabilities being invisible, there is such a large community within our respective workplaces that are facing very similar challenges as ourselves. Fears of judgement and repercussions at work remain the top concern for the disability community. Our stories are more similar to the neurodiversity community, the hearing loss community, the vision loss community, and other disability groups more than many of us may appreciate. Intersectionality is a topic that we need to dive in deeper so we can work together with more parties to make changes. Our stuttering community has multiple identities coming from different genders, races, religions, sexual orientations, etc. so let us work together with these other movements to develop equity for all.
What can we all do to make change today? Below are a few things we can do now to make changes:
- Reach out to your Human Resources department to recommend changes to the interview process or about wanting to start a disabilities employee resource group
- Get involved with stuttering support groups to share ideas and experiences with others to empower each other
- Get involved in other non-profit disability groups to help their causes and help the greater disability movement
- Share your experiences with anyone who will listen – we are the best educators on the planet about stuttering because it is our lived experiences
- Face your stutter head on through challenging yourself – Toastmasters, Improv, taking on more speaking roles, etc. will show not only yourself how much you can grow, but it will show the world how capable our stuttering community is
Through each of these steps, we can each contribute to changing our society to become more empathetic, understanding, and equitable to give everyone an equal opportunity. This is what we all deserve from the world we live in.
Kunal, I enjoyed reading your piece.
As a fan, I commend you on your remarkable initiatives, truly pushing change in the world.
The practical tips shared in this piece are actionable steps for anyone looking for concrete steps forward. In youir suggestions, I see the tried-and-true benefits of expanding our personal comfort zone, as well as very timely suggestions of connecting with others who stutter as well as expanding our scope of familiarity and identification with others in the broader disability movement.
Kudos!!!
Thank you Uri! I have always been a fan of taking action as that is where we can make real progress. Understanding is all well and good but until we start to put ourselves out there for our voice to be heard and push these initiatives forward, it is difficult to create long lasting change that we are striving for.
Hello Kunai, I just read your paper and loved it you are doing and have done so much for the stuttering community .I am going to reread it because there were words and concepts in your paper that sound interesting but I had never heard of. Also I loved your tips for making changes the ones i could really relate too most and try and do are 2, 4 and five but I will look at exploring the others .Phyllis .
Thank you Phyllis. Yes I think it is so important for us to think about this stuttering movement on a holistic basis so we can make wide spread impact and when we do so, we bring more people to the table to help us on our mission.
I am so glad it resonated with you and that you are willing to explore all of those options.
There is always more we can do for this movement, but finding the areas that we have not spent so much time in has the biggest upside for growth for us and can open up our world to new possibilities.
Great article Kunal! I didn’t realise you were working on the same kind of issue that I was. As a community we need to keep challenging employers.
Absolutely! Employers don’t know what they don’t know so we can be a huge asset to our organizations by educating them. It may feel like a hard hill to climb, however, people appreciate when you can help educate them and bring value to them in areas they were not previously aware of.
We all want to create a more equitable and inclusive environment at our organizations and no better way to do that than by educating our HR teams about stuttering and disabilities.
Kunal,
This is wonderful. People and workplaces are SO resistant to change, because it’s easier to believe “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it”.
Yet, as we know, people with disabilities, both visible and hidden, are treated differently in the workplace and by society at large. Some of that may truly be unintentional, as a byproduct of lack of awareness and education about disabilities. But some workplaces knowingly treat those with disabilities differently.
Many people with disabilities are still hired so that hiring managers can tick off the Diversity box or affirmative action box. Then, those people are given tasks beneath their capabilities and/or relegated to jobs that are not customer facing.
We need to continue to push a wider understanding of hidden disabilities, such as stuttering, so that workplaces can see the untapped talent they are missing out on. Your suggestions will go a long way in eliminating false assumptions and bias.
Pam
Thanks so much Pam for your comments. I completely agree and the power we have as a larger stuttering community and part of the wider disabilities movement is that we can create a social movement that influences corporations.
I think we are at a certain time in history that has never been seen before as more and more corporations are focused on making more social impact as they look to build out their Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG) and overall Sustainability measures.
We can have our stuttering movement be captured under this movement to encourage more corporations to make changes at their firms and to get more involved with the stuttering and other disability groups to mentor our constituents in the community.
The best way to develop more understanding is to give people exposure which is why I think it is critically important for us to be intentional about engaging with more corporations.
Kunal, it was such a pleasure meeting you virtually at the WHEN I STUTTER film screening in July, which you hosted alongside SMBC. It was also amazing to see you hosting a mock interview and mentorship event to benefit the stuttering community in Latin America. In very real and tangible ways, you are living “share your experiences with anyone who will listen,” and what an impact that is making here and abroad! Kudos to you!
Ana Paula
Thank you for the kind comments Ana Paula and am so glad you enjoyed the events in Latin America. We have a long ways to go in Latin America, but I genuinely believe we can follow the same kind of initiatives and programming that we have rolled out in the Americas in Latin America and we will make just as much progress in the region.
Ultimately, this movement is just about helping people become better individuals and I think through the film screening & mock interview event for the stuttering community in Latin America, we have already begun to do so.
I am excited to continue to work with you so that we can keep making progress in Latin America to help create more awareness, provide opportunities, and make overall social impact in the region.
Thank you for all you’re doing Kunal! As mom to a 25-year-old who stutters, it helps to know this kind of change is being encouraged. Having a hidden disability comes with it’s own unique set of challenges. I also appreciate your mentioning the idea of “intersectionality.” As a parent advocate, I am often told of the many parallels between what parents of children who stutter and parents of children with other disabilities (both hidden and visible) experience. Please keep up the great work!!
Thank you for the comments and it is wonderful you are so engaged in your child’s stuttering journey.
Yes this concept of intersectionality is so critical to help us grow the overall community who shares this mission we have in the stuttering community and by being a part of a much wider group, our cause becomes that much more powerful and relevant to our greater society.
Connecting the stuttering cause with the great disabilities cause is something that I think we all need to do a better job in making sure that connection happens as we will benefit long term by being a part of this wider disabilities movement.
Hi Kunal,
No doubt working together is powerful! great article and great points as an invitation to initiate changes in our immediate environment. Best regards
Thank you for your kind comments. Yes it is these immediate actions we can all take that enables us to start making progress tomorrow and if we all do these things collectively, we will make widespread impact.
Wonderfully written Kunal. We are very grateful for the stuttering community we are surrounded by, but this idea of ‘intersectionality and ‘collaborating with other disability communities’ to push the common agenda of spreading awareness about ‘disability, in general, is very interesting. Thanks for bringing it up.
Thank you Shilpa. Yes I think the intersectionality piece is an area that we could do a better job to emphasize in the stuttering community & will help us feel much more connected to a much larger group.
Ultimately, we all want to be heard and more included in our world and society so why not be a part of a much larger group that is trying to fight for all of these disability groups?
Our collective voice is much stronger than our individual voice.
Amazing article Kunal. I completely agree that it is so important to to speak up for change and enable the stuttering community. As we have seen with the recent social justice. movement change truly is possible if people join together and make their voice heard. I also think it is important for people who stutter to reach out to their human resources department and advocate for more rights surroundig stuttering. Moving forward I will get involved in stuttering groups because we are stronger together.
Thank you for the feedback. Yes speaking up is truly the critical piece here as we all have something to contribute to this world and we all have the ability to influence different stakeholders that impact our lives.
Yes a lot of human resources departments will be very appreciative to those who do reach out as there is so much for these teams to cover so they really do appreciate people who have an expertise on different subjects that can help them make the workplace more equitable and inclusive.
I am so glad you are going to get more involved as I know the community can use your insight as well
Hi Kunal,
I am a graduate student studying speech-language pathology. I am currently taking a fluency course that discusses the importance of working with people who stutter. I enjoyed reading your article about bringing change to develop equality for all. I completely agree that it is important to spread awareness for the stuttering community. I really liked how you included your personal experience and steps that we can do today to make a change for equal opportunities.
Thanks for the comments Hannah. Yes sharing the personal experiences is so key to help others feel emotionally connected to us and knowing the “How” to make change is critical so we can actually take action to make progress.
Kunal,
This was such an amazing article helping to promote awareness of stuttering in the workplace, especially during the interview process. It is not something many people who speak normally will think about to help advocate for inclusiveness. I enjoyed how eye-opening this article was and the advice you were able to include. I will keep this in mind for my future career post-graduate school.
I am so glad this article resonated with you. Agreed, unless you have a stutter or know someone who does, it is often very difficult to relate to what one who stutters experiences.
This is why we need more people speaking up and educating the world as I do think most humans have a good heart and are trying to do the right thing.
We have to give people an opportunity to learn and change and a lot of times we will be pleasantly surprised by how much people do care about being better and helping to create more equality and inclusiveness.
Hi Kunal!
I thoroughly enjoyed reading your story about bringing awareness of PWS in the workplace. There is an extremely noticeable lack of awareness and equality for PWS in the workplace; just like other’s needs, PWS needs should be addressed and accommodating accordingly. Like you stated, a stutter should not be a hinderance in a person’s ability to effectively work. I enjoyed that you listed changes that should be made, in order to accommodate PWS. I hope these changes are considered and carried out, so that we are able to see more equality among PWS in the workplace.
As a Speech-Language Pathology graduate student, I wholeheartedly agree with your statement of facing your stutter! Taking on more speaking roles and becoming more confident in your speech is absolutely the best way to show the world that your stutter doesn’t hinder you, but rather makes you uniquely you!
Thank you for bringing awareness to the issues PWS face in the workplace!
Yes it is so critical to have champions and advocates in the workplace who can push the agenda for the importance of creating awareness as the workforce just does not know the experience people who stutter go through.
Glad you like the action items as that is so critical to make progress and drive things forward.
Appreciate all of the comments and glad you are joining the field to help us put up the good fight!
Kunal
Yes, we are the best people to talk about stuttering. And if we don’t who will, and is even able, to do that for us? This is exactly the reason why I came up with my quote “Sure I stutter. What are you good at?” We’re the experts. We know stuttering. Now we only need to speak up and teach the world to listen. 🙂
keep talking
Anita