Customer service - Commissaries.com

Talent wanted for people with targeted disabilities
According to Grant, the renewed effort by DoD
Dr. Pete Skirbunt
Office of communication
DeCA intends to hire at least 189
“individuals with targeted disabilities,” or
IWTDs, in the next few years.
This hiring effort will be part of
an overall goal mandated by the Department of
Defense of ultimately having 2 percent of the entire
DoD workforce made up of individuals with these
disabilities. DeCA presently employs 126 such
individuals, so the additional 189 would bring the
agency’s total to 315 — and that is 2 percent of the
agency’s 15,714 civilian employees who are not
contract workers or “local nationals” working at
overseas stores.
Targeted
‘‘
disabilities
include – but are
not limited to –
hearing or vision
impairments,
missing extremities, and
partial or complete paralysis.
It also includes conditions
such as convulsions, mental
retardation, mental or
emotional illness, and severe
distortion of the limbs or
spine.
Claudie Grant of DeCA’s Equal Employment
Opportunity office stressed that the agency is not
simply filling an arbitrary quota with individuals
who may or may not be qualified for employment.
Instead, DeCA hopes to exceed the numerical goal,
while making sure that all individuals hired meet all
requirements for the positions into which they are
placed.
“Anyone with a targeted disability needs to be just
as qualified as the other top candidates for a given
job,” Grant said. “We will not relax our standards
either in hiring or in job performance just to hire a
person with a targeted disability.”
Cherry Point Commissary, N.C., leads the way in
DeCA in hiring the disabled. Store Director Phyllis
Black calls this team, “The Magnificent Seven.” Josh
Jones kneels in front; seated are Katie Wildermuth,
Samantha Wynn and Tiffany Keyes; and standing,
Manuel George, Grocery Manager Jozette Stewart,
Travis Parker, Black, and Joshua Daugherty. DeCA
photo: Maureen Burnetsky
!
I love working at the
commissary, talking
to the customers
and meeting people,
asking them if they
found everything OK.
Agency provides equal opportunities
and the agency has been prompted by a decreasing
number of individuals with targeted disabilities
employed by the department. “That means,” he
emphasized, “that we have to not only do a better job
of hiring such individuals, we also have to do a better
job of keeping them.”
While these efforts will be carried out at all
levels – headquarters, regions and commissaries
– several stores have already proven themselves to
be remarkably proactive regarding IWTDs. Grant
is especially impressed with the efforts of Store
Director Phyllis Black at Marine Corps Base
Cherry Point, N.C., who recently hired eight such
individuals – that’s 28 percent of the 29 people hired
by the entire agency in recent months.
Black says of her effort,
“It just took off! I got excited
about it, because there’s
nothing these people can’t
do, and I’m glad to give
them a chance to prove
it. They all have positive
attitudes that more than
make up for any problems
their disabilities cause them.
I wish I had more of them!”
Alan Jones, Cherry
Point’s zone manager, is
equally enthusiastic: “We’re thrilled to support this
program that brings us employees with positive
attitudes and great work ethics,” he said. Black’s
efforts recently helped her achieve DeCA’s award as
EEO Leader of the Year.
“If Cherry Point can do it, so can other stores,” Grant
said, “and we’re confident that’s what will happen.
Cherry Point has given everyone an example to
emulate. We’re not asking anyone to show favoritism;
we’re asking that hiring officials give everyone –
including targeted individuals – a fair chance.”
Bob Vitikacs, DeCA East acting director, noted
that stores in his region have recently hired 11 IWTDs
in addition to the eight at Cherry Point. “We’re
encouraging all of our stores to be proactive in this
program,” he said. “Cherry Point’s success is really
an inspiration to everyone. We can help improve
people’s lives and simultaneously improve the
agency.”
Keith Hagenbuch, acting director for DeCA
— Joshua Daugherty
West, said he and the region fully support the
w
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