Disability carers choose among a range of options when considering what, and how much to disclose about their caring responsibilities to managers and co-workers, according to new research from the Australian School of Business.

Researcher, Dr Hugh Bainbridge, from Organisation and Management, worked with Carers Victoria to interview 32 carers who provide care for a person with a disability. 

“It’s more complex than a simple yes or no choice,” said Dr Bainbridge. “ I found that carers use six distinct disclosure strategies to communicate information about caring responsibilities to others at work,” he said.

There are an estimated 2.3 million unpaid carers in Australia. Friends and family take on around three-quarters of the national burden of care for people with disabilities and chronic illnesses. There are over 748,000 carers in NSW – 11 per cent of the NSW population - who provide unpaid care to family members or friends. 

Dr Bainbridge said the decision about whether to disclose is important as this information influences perceptions of, and behaviours towards an employee.

“Managing social attitudes involves assessing the likely impact of disclosure and anticipating how information about caring will be viewed by co-workers,” said Dr Bainbridge.

“Carers must select the appropriate people to inform, identify a way in which they will communicate information, and weigh the benefits and risks of their choice,” he said.

The study found that carers use six key strategies:

Differentiation to highlight the caring role and how it distinguished them from other people. Carers differentiated by highlighting the unique demands they faced and by challenging inaccurate beliefs about caring and disability.

Normalising to make the caring role appear commonplace or ordinary. This approach emphasised the prevalence of caring in Australia and outlined that caring activities were  shared experiences .

Signalling to hint at the carer’s responsibilities. Signalling involved providing hints or subtle pointers about caring activities or “relabelling” the care recipient’s disability to a name that was less likely to evoke negative reactions. For example, carers may mention that the person had a mental illness (rather than schizophrenia), or just say that their spouse was “going through a bad patch.”

Discretion to side-step discussion of the issue. A discretion strategy was often found in the carers attempt to do everything possible to minimise work absences. Carers using this strategy also avoided developing close social relationships, discouraged questions on non-work issues, and attended fewer work functions, to reduce the likelihood of inquiries about their personal life.

Concealing to prevent others from acquiring information about the relationship. For example, carers were at pains to conceal the effects of caring on their personal health, and even resorted to taking calls in stairwells to conceal their responsibilities from co-workers.

Fabricating to convey false information to others. For example, carers attributed days off to personal sickness rather than caring, and sometimes subverted work polices preventing the use of work phones for personal calls.

“Each of the six disclosure strategies has costs and benefits,” said Dr Bainbridge. “For example, carers who used a differentiation rather than a concealment approach were able obtain workplace accommodations such as flex-time, leave provisions, or part time options because access to these benefits usually required the carer to justify his or her needs.”

“Consequently, carers who differentiated were able to make better use of work-family policies to support their activities. Differentiation also held appeal as a mechanism for changing workplace attitudes and was used by some carers to bring caring ‘out into the open’,” he said.

However, carers who were relatively open about their responsibilities were exposed to co-worker and manager attitudes about caring and disability – and not all of these were positive, said Dr Bainbridge. “This places an additional burden on these workers,” he said.

“If organisations are more supportive of employee caring responsibilities, more carers might be able to maintain paid employment. It’s not enough to encourage carers to work outside – we also need to develop organisation practices and supportive attitudes that make it possible for them to do so.”