Hello friends and colleagues,

Today I posted a new paper on the Cantor Access web site that documents the
case of an employee with a disability whose productivity quadrupled as a
result of a workplace accommodation:

http://www.cantoraccess.com/csun2006-casestudy.htm

Two accommodation strategies are described: the development of macros, and
training on keyboard-only access to Windows (i.e., operating a PC without a
mouse or mouse emulator).

Beside allowing her to complete tasks four-times faster, the accommodation
resulted in another benefit. In a previous job posting, excessive mouse-use
led to painful back spasms. The pain was severe enough to cause her to miss
work. During my training program, the spasms began to abate. Six weeks
later, she reported that the spasms were less of a problem than they had
been in the past. I credit the improvement to her newfound ability to
maintain more biomechanically-neutral postures while operating a PC.

This paper lends weight to a position I have advanced for several years:
Organizations may not be meeting their legal duty to accommodate if they
fail to provide software customization (e.g., macros, user interface
modifications, and scripting), alternative access training (e.g.,
keyboard-only techniques), and ergonomic adjustments. Had this employee not
been accommodated in these ways, she may not have been successful in this
job.

I will be presenting the paper at the CSUN Conference in Los Angeles on 24
March 2006. During the presentation, I will demonstrate macros I developed
for this employee. See http://www.cantoraccess.com/upcoming.htm#csun2006.

Alan

Alan Cantor
Cantor Access Inc.
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www.cantoraccess.com


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