Episode 42: Disability as Strategy: Dylan M. Rafaty on Leadership, Access and Impact

Episode 42 Show Notes

Dylan M. Rafaty, President and CEO of the North Texas Disability Chamber, joins Lily Newton and Erin Hawley to talk about disability acceptance and advocacy. With clarity and conviction, Dylan outlines why disability should never be treated as an act of charity. Instead, he frames it as a strategic investment that drives innovation, empowers communities, and strengthens organizations from within.

Dylan reflects on his personal experience navigating the world as someone who is deaf and hard of hearing.. He explains that advocacy is often misunderstood as self-promotion, when in reality it is rooted in service to the broader disability community. His message is clear: individual success stories matter, but collective action is where lasting change begins. 

Through storytelling, policy engagement, and local civic work, Dylan models what authentic opportunity can look like in practice. This episode provides a deeper understanding of how to move beyond performative allyship and into meaningful participation for all policymakers, business leaders, or members of the public.

Connect with Dylan M. Rafaty on LinkedIn, Instagram, his website, and his podcast "Let's Work Inclusively." 

Transcript

Erin Hawley:
Hey, listeners, and welcome to another episode of Everything You Know About Disability is Wrong.

Lily Newton:
Today on the show, we have Dylan Rafaty.

Erin Hawley:
Dylan is an influencer and a disability rights activist. His personal mission in life is to increase opportunities by opening new doors so that everyone can have an overall better quality of life.

Lily Newton:
He's a vocal advocate for corporate social responsibility and an entrepreneurial and growth mindset.

Erin Hawley:
Dylan has previously served on several executive boards focusing on areas including advocacy, education, sports, and workforce development. He's currently a board member of the Dallas Regional Chamber and the North Texas Commission.

Lily Newton:
Diller is also the president of and CEO of the North Texas Disability Chamber and proudly resides in Frisco, Texas.

Erin Hawley:
Welcome to the show, Dylan. We're so happy to have you.

Dylan M Rafaty:
Well, thank you, Lily and Erin for the wonderful introduction. It's a pleasure to be on this show with you and I look forward to having a lively conversation.

Erin Hawley:
It's always exciting for us when getting to read someone's bio feels like us bragging about what an incredible guest we got. So it's fun to read your bio.

Dylan M Rafaty:
Say the. The. The star of the show is both you and Aaron, and I appreciate it. Lily. I. I think the, you know, we all come from various experiences and knowledges and backgrounds. I think one thing that sets us apart is our stories and I can't wait to share all about it with you.

Lily Newton:
I'm so excited. Before we dive in, let's go ahead and do our audio descriptions. I can start and I'll pass it to you, Erin. This is Lily speaking. I am a mixed race white passing woman with short brown hair with some blonde in the front. I have green eyes and I am wearing new Easter seals merch that says know the facts, disability is nonpartisan. Throughout the episode, I'll drink from my water bottle that has stickers from this new merch as well which say, know the facts, disability is relatable. And know the facts, disability is connection.
I'm sitting inside a blue room and I'll go ahead and pass it to Erin.

Erin Hawley:
Hi, this is Erin, I'm a white woman with red hair and blue eyes, and I'm wearing a pinkish shirt, and I'm sitting in my bedroom, and it's a tree, so I'll pass it to Dylan.

Dylan M Rafaty:
All right. Well, hello, everybody. My name is Dylan Rafaty. I'm a white young man wearing a. I would. I would say an Ellen Blue, wearing my branded logo, the North Texan Disability Chamber. I am in a grayish white office and. And proud to be.

Oh, and one fun fact. I love to dance. So if you might see me dancing on the show, then there you are.

Erin Hawley:
Well, now we have to dance on the show.

Dylan M Rafaty:
Yeah, there you go.

Erin Hawley:
So good. Well, Erin, take us away. Let's dive right in.

Lily Newton:
So the first question that we ask everybody is the name of the podcast is everything you know about disability is wrong, and what do people get wrong about you?

Dylan M Rafaty:
Well, that's a really good question. I think there's a couple things. One is disability is not a cherry. And I often, even though I work in the nonprofit landscape, disability should be a strategy. It should be an opportunity. It should be. And frankly, when people think about me in this space, they often think it's about self exposure and credibility and whatnot. I think for me, disability and how I would define disability is a leader who has potential, who has opportunities and willing to share opportunities.

But at the same time, I think disabilities should be a strategy, not a charity mindset. And if you're going to invest in us, invest in our future, invest in our ability to be contributing members of our society, and that's how I see about disability, is that we're part of a growing movement that is creating inclusive opportunities that everybody can participate, can be contributing members of our society, whether being in a homeowner or married or simply just a single adult living life the way they see fit and appropriate for them.

Lily Newton:
What a refreshing take on disability. I really appreciate that, and I think that in that disability as a strategy is such a great way to talk about that. And I'm sure we'll get more into that idea as we continue this interview with all of the work you've done as an entrepreneur. But I think that that connects so well to this current campaign that we're running at Easterseals about trying to redefine disability as what, like you said, opportunity. People think often that disability is this like other kind of issue or it only affects a small group of people. But the facts are that there are 1 in 4 Americans as disabled. That's 70 million people. That's larger than the population of Texas and California combined like this.

We are not a fringe group. I love the way you phrase that as opportunity strategy. And I often want business owners especially to understand that we have a pretty intense buying power from within the disability community. So forgetting about us as an audience, whether it's social media strategy or selling a product, forgetting about your disabled audience is forgetting about a major sector of people. So I think that's a really great.

Dylan M Rafaty:
Word that we could use. Not just an opportunity or a strategy. It should be considered a valuable investment. And if you notice, this year's National Disability Employment Awareness Month is all about celebrating value and talent and reality is my nonprofit landscape and the business network that I'm here, connected in North Texas is really focusing on investment. If you're going to invest in us, you're not only investing in us, but you're investing in yourself and you're investing in creating and improving and strengthening the normal and normalizing the disability experience.

Lily Newton:
Absolutely. And study after study shows us that the curb cut effect is real. Things that you do that make a workplace more accessible for your disabled staff makes your workplace better for everyone. This is known. And I think that that's a really important facet of this. Investing in us is investing in your company. It's good business. So you started to touch on this a little bit in your first answer.

One idea that we've talked about on our show a lot is the way that many of us are advocates by choice, but also as disabled people. Many of us are forced into self advocacy at a very young age just trying to be seen. And something you said in our prior conversation in the form you filled out for us was that many think that you are self centered or all about yourself when the reality is that you focus on being of service and support for your peers and the community at large. I think that Erin and I as disabled people immediately understand what you mean by that. But can you speak to potentially our non disabled audience and try to help them understand why a disabled person might seem self centered when really we're centering our community at large?

Dylan M Rafaty:
Yeah. And we also have to understand that our community has good intentions and what you perceive or what you see may not always be accurate. And that's okay as long as you're able to engage in a dialogue with us and to truly understand the meaning behind what we do. For me personally, I'm always in the limelight of discussions and the news and everything else. One thing I will tell people is that as a person growing up, I'm deaf and hard of hearing. I have some spinal back and neck fusions and some level of learning disabilities. You may not see it in person or meeting me, but those are real, valuable experiences. And I will say is when.

What I mean by sometimes we feel like we're selfish and self centered and all about image and all that. I get it. But I think we have to truly understand our personal experiences and how we have to constantly work to adjust and adapt to the world, because the world today does not adapt to us. We literally have to give up so much of our time, our energy, our knowledge and experiences to give to the world so that they can incorporate or include us as part of their world. And so I think people, and I would encourage people that are learning to get into this landscape. And one of the things that I've learned early on is even though I have slight to moderate disabilities, from a difficulty standpoint, I think what people need to realize is we also ourselves as humans with disabilities, need to immerse ourselves with other stakeholders in our community within the disability landscape. Why? Because one of the things that I've learned early on in my career at 20, 21 years old, I'm 35 now, is that I actually went into communities where there are predominantly those that are disabled vets. They don't classify them as disabled, but they consider them part of the veteran landscape.

There are people that are with motorized or wheelchairs and that landscape was total eye opening because you were in this confined conference ballroom and I was like, wow, I'm the only person that has walkability, legs, whereas others require accessibility, ability to navigate. And I felt out of touch, but it allowed me to realize there are more people in our community. We just haven't really immersed ourselves. And so when I go out in the community, talk about things, I let people know that I am not. I just represent a fraction of what our community is. And. But our experiences are similar. We have shared experiences, shared values, collective areas where we can work together.

And so when I go out in the community and brag about the work that is being done, or talk about the momentum and the moment, or if I'm going out and speaking at different events and so forth, my intention is to bring awareness or broaden its scope of what disability looks like as part of the human experience. But at the same time, I'm also working behind the scenes, but letting people know that I cannot be the only voice. There are many events and forums that I get invited to where I'm the only voice, and that to me is unacceptable. And so one of the things that I try to encourage is to amplify the disability voices in our communities and in educating and in empowering organization and leaders with the knowledge, the tool, the resource, the networks to be able to say, you know what, Dylan is not the only one doing this, but he is now bringing this awareness to the 400 plus people that I'm now connected with in the North Texas disability community that can be this voice. So reality is literally inherited that people need to first and foremost don't. Those assumptions are real. And I recognize that. But instead of having a preconceived notion reach out to us directly and really get to know us about our experience and why the way we are.

Yes, there are great leaders in a national level. I'm going to call them out because reality is they're doing great work. But one of the things that I think our community needs to work on and needs to improve is that there are great leaders across this country and they don't have the same benefit that a small sum has today at a national level. And we need to amplify each other and grow each other because we all have value, but to the sense that sometimes we have to work so hard to get our name out there to just be seen and heard and frankly, it shouldn't be that way, but we have work to do.

Lily Newton:
Absolutely. So much in there that you said, I just so resonate with. I think that the point on if you are a disabled person listening and have not immersed yourself within our community, I think it's a mistake. There is. We have so much to learn from one another. And on the point of why it's so important that we share our individual stories because the world was not made for us. So many of us have to be self innovators from a very young age. And I mean real life example through this podcast, there have been episodes we've had with other people who have the same disabilities that I do.

And they've said this is how I accommodate xyz. And I've thought, I've never thought of that. And the information sharing between our community is really important. And I think about especially when it comes to getting into leadership roles, if you are a disabled person who gets into a leadership role, that's information that you should be sharing with other disabled people of how you manage that, what you did. And I think the other really important point you made there was that disability is not a monolith yet there is a certain level of shared understanding and you can have that shared understanding and still be absolutely shocked by what you don't know about disability or what perspective you've never considered even as people within the community. And I think that that is just such an important lesson that I think probably everyone will always keep learning that oh, I, I, there's perspectives out there I haven't considered. So I really appreciate you sharing that and I think that, yeah, it's just, it's so crucial that we do lift each other up and try to benefit our own community. I think it is really important.

Dylan M Rafaty:
Yeah, it's, it's really, you know, the, the whole idea of, you know, thinking that, you know, we're in it for our own personal gain. Maybe so, but reality is that's not, that's more like a you problem. But I will say this, is that our community are oftentimes have limited opportunities compared to the general public. And what I mean by that is like speaking engagements. I mean I get asked to do speaking engagements, well guess what, I rarely get paid for it. And part of that is because I said we're a strategy, not a charity. And you know, we have to make a living too. And sometimes in the digital age now, we have to find ways to self brand ourselves and, and create more generated revenue so that we can to have a living.

We all want to be able to thrive and be a contributing member and be integrated in our communities. But as anybody knows, is that we have to stay afloat. And sometimes generating income can mean different things. Some of them do it for impact, some of them do it to support a living or their family or it could be a number of things. And so I think to our listeners that are listening today or just trying to understand that we are all trying to make world a better place by empowering ourselves and those around us.

Lily Newton:
I totally agree. Although I do want to point out that like there's this expectation within the disability community, especially online, is that if you're not doing advocacy, you're not doing anything. Which I think is not. Because if you're not disabled and you don't do advocacy, no one says anything to you. It's this expectation that we have to politicize our lives and sometimes you just want to sit back, read a book, watch a movie, go out shopping and not like film it and make content about it, the advocate for something. Do you know what I mean? So I do think there's this balance between being an advocate and being a self advocate because you have to and feeling like you have to do everything in your life on an advocacy level.

Dylan M Rafaty:
Yeah, There's a philosophy, Aaron, and you make a great point. There's a philosophy that I instill in myself is that I want, I have an advocate and a self advocate for me too. And the people I care about and love is. I have always wanted to increase the quality of life so that we have the barrier free access to opportunities and services. And that's such a broad mission. But there are people in our communities that frankly just wants to live a life of opportunity and impact without having to really put themselves out there. And in a lot of ways I get it. And not everybody wants or is willing to put in the time and day because really disability advocacy is a daunting experience.

It can be time consuming, it can be stressful. I have a gala next week and frankly I'm a micro leader of an organization and I'm managing almost 400 people for an event. And from the check in process to the raffle to the banquet to all the different things, it's a lot of work. And not everybody has or is willing to want to participate in Magna H. And so I think it's important for listeners to also know and understand that we, yes, we can also be advocates, but not everybody wants to be in the space and sometimes they just want to enjoy a life for themselves and they love.

Lily Newton:
Yeah, totally. And also this is kind of related. The other day I was on YouTube as I usually am, and I saw a video about tiny houses and how like tiny houses can change the game for disability to give us housing. And the first thing I thought of is like, I don't want to live in a tiny house. Why is my option a tiny house? Like disabled people need access to different types of housing however they choose. It's about choice, not about giving us what you think you should have. And I say that because it kind of relates to feeling like advocacy is our way of life. I don't know how it's connected.

It's connected in my head. Do you know what I'm saying?

Erin Hawley:
Yeah, I mean, I think it has to do also with what Dylan has said about we're not a charity. Like this idea of oh, here's something that could work for them is very charity case given. And, and I think that that's, you know, should be a red flag in, in if you're a leader and you're non disabled and you're trying to help, quote unquote, our community. I think any kind of like, well, maybe this will work for them is probably well intended but makes us feel like we're like this cherry case is the only word, I think, that describes it well. So I definitely see the connection.

Lily Newton:
Right.

Dylan M Rafaty:
Well, I would also look at it, Aaron, that I often talk about accessibility is baked at the very beginning. Accessibility in the world today is, oh, we care about access from getting point A to B. Point B. Okay, great. But accessibility also means giving us the flexibility to decide what works for us, rather than giving us the flexibility and the access or the accessibility to allow us to decide what works for us. For example, I went shop at Costco the other day, and what Costco has a lot of options or any kind of big box store is really understanding as we go there, people don't want to be told, hey, these are the only options you have. Well, allow us to decide what works for our organization or our community or ourselves or the home, you know, in a tiny house, although nice and quirky and all that kind of thing. But I could see myself living in a tiny house, but not everybody, my peers would, you know, I also see it a house where I can have a lot of land and be able to roam around and enjoy nature and life and whatnot.

I think it's really important to know that we don't fit everybody in a box. And if we fit everybody in a box, well, guess what? We're going to be living in a small world. And if we live in a big world, which we do, we need to allow people to have a choice, an option, a preference, and allow them to make their own decisions. As we always talked about in the disability space is that we want to live in a world where we have the freedom and the choice and make our own decisions. What we can do to improve the world is to inform the world about the challenges and the opportunities that come with it and allow them to make their own informed decisions on how they want to best represent or serve or be a part of a community.

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Lily Newton:
Yeah, it's that autonomy piece. It's so important. Autonomy is everything. And that's kind of the. The question is like, is the person who you're making this choice for, are they autonomous in the choice or not? And usually, if you're making a choice for someone, the answer is no. So I think that that's super crucial. I want to back up a little too. You know, we're talking about the kind of overwhelming nature of how advocacy can seem like a mountain to climb.

But at the same time, for any listeners who are, you know, hearing us say, well, Dylan's dealing with a 400 person banquet so soon, maybe you're hearing that and thinking, I don't know if I have the capacity for that. I want us to have a conversation a bit about how important everyone's individual stories are because it plays into what Dylan was saying about how we can't be put into a small box as a community. And I think that the perhaps unfortunate reality is that there are still a lot of people who have assumptions about disability and what disability is. And because of those somewhat unfortunate assumptions, I think the power of telling your own story as a disabled person is huge. And to Aaron's point, that you can share as much or as little as you want to, but I never want to undermine the power of your individual story. So as someone who's been in the disability policy world for a long time, I'd love to hear in your words, Dylan, why it is important for disabled people and caretakers and loved ones of disabled people to share this stories of the inaccessibility or barriers we face or of our successes. Why do you think that's so important?

Dylan M Rafaty:
Well, you know, disability policymaking, you know, I will say I live in a state of Texas and in a lot of ways we are behind compared to most states in United States. And I will say behind from a funding perspective for some instances it could be. But I will say the determination of individuals on leaders within our communities here in Texas are handling and managing it well compared to, you know, we all in the. We live in a world where funding helps us solve some of our biggest issues. Yes, I'm aware of that. But I will say is that we do things differently here in Texas. But also we know that, you know, and the point I'm trying to come make is that across the United States, you know, some states are performing, providing boatloads of money to support our communities, where in Texas we're not. What I'm saying is that we have to think strategically on, for example, let's say One organization gets $35 per person to support our community in a different state, whereas in Texas we get $6.

So imagine the gap in funding. So we're having to think innovative and creatively and collaborating with different stakeholders to be able to get that in my state, one thing that I often tell people is advocacy. It can go in a number of ways. It can go from yourself, it could go to those who you support, or it can go to the community at large. And what I will say in Texas and what I've done in the previous years, both serving as on the Texas Governor's committee on people with Disabilities for about eight years, and then now being activists with the local governments and other things, I think one thing's for sure, that policy influences change. Yes, policy influences change. To get there, it's a whole lot of work and time and energy and a lot of communicating and meeting with your legislature and so forth. But also, you don't necessarily have to advocate at the state level.

You can also advocate in your local cities or your county governments or whatever department you want to reside in based on issues of interest. But also in the state that we live in, we don't have a lot of data. And that's why I said I'm working in the nonprofit landscape, is to empower organizations and foundations to fund research and curating real time, accurate data among our communities, because our legislators today don't have the data piece to be able to influence legislation on our communities. So I will say is that policy changes are important. It helps shapes on how we run or do business or impact a community. Policy changes also determine funding allocations. It can also encourage budgets. But also it can interpret how we engage or interact with the world, the way we live here in the state.

But from a funding perspective, I always tell people policy goes in different levels. In my perspective of policy is, I believe in empowering people with the knowledge and the resources. We can change every policy in the world, but it may not necessarily impact everybody. You know, when it's all said and done, you know, you know, the legislature, they always meet and. And they often try to slim it up. The proposal at first was so big. Now it's so small. And it may not necessarily impact everybody.

But I don't know if it answers your question, Lily, but my focus is really to say that policy influences change. You have to know who to go to, where to go to, and you have to determine whether this would be a local, a regional, or even a state issue. And also knowing the landscape, that not every state have the funding and that we have to think strategically and aligning with organizations that would empower changes or advocacy within it.

Erin Hawley:
Yeah, absolutely. I think that for any listener, that's like, well, I don't know where to go.

Lily Newton:
For this episode. Actually, if you look in the link in the description, we'll make sure to link to our Easter Seals kind of story collection page where you can share your story and of barriers or inaccessibility you faced. Because sometimes just simply sharing your story can change someone's perspective. I think that sometimes it can. It can be a simple solution to think like oh, the, the people in charge are bad. They don't care about me. They don't like our community when in reality some people don't know. And that's hard.

And I think that there's a lot of anger within our community that is entirely valid. And I think it is important to let yourself feel frustrated and let yourself feel let down. But at the same time we have to start somewhere. Exactly what Dylan's saying. We have to, we have to do something. And sometimes as simple as sharing your personal experiences can, can make change. I like that you mentioned that kind of local aspect as well. I think that because we live in a world of social media and you know, making this massive world seem a little smaller, sometimes national level feels like the only option.

Or even state level when in reality your literal community, your neighborhood, the city you're in, wherever you are, might have some kind of monthly quarterly meeting that is for people who live in the area. Maybe there's leaders that go there. That is a place where you can go and you can say this bus stop is inaccessible for me. And it might just put it on the rate put your experience might just put something on someone's radar that they don't know about. And Dylan, you in our pre production shared a story of a time that you kind of experienced this. So I'd love to hear times that you've on that small level may change like that. Yeah.

Dylan M Rafaty:
You know, locally along with my good friend Meryl K. Evans, an international acceptance leader who is also proudly part of the deaf and hard of hearing community, she often she spoke at a city council meeting locally in front of city council in Plano, Texas and talked about the need for public facing televisions to include or incorporate captions. And especially encouraging businesses that often are in noisy environments and they don't have a sound on on their tv. They can have the captions as a way to keep up up to date. And believe it or not, social media is now incorporating captioning and people are encouraged and they are doing the extra step or the extra mile to include captions on their social posts. But I will say that this local city of Plano became the seventh city in the country and the first city in Texas to adopt a resolution on incorporating captions on public facing televisions. And the local city of Allen also incorporated that same resolution and beckoned the eighth city in America and second, sue and Texas to do so. But that became, and I'll tell you, long before that.

It told many interactions with the city manager, who is essentially the head government leader managing the city operations, building that relationship. Start small. And I will say, you know, one of the things that I've learned over the years is that you don't necessarily have to engage at the state level or warped in the capital city or be at the federal level. You can empower as much impact locally as much as state and national. And the biggest barrier that I'm seeing, unfortunately today is that we're not seeing an active engagement or civic engagement at our local communities. And frankly, I often say that yes, state and national issues are important, but what impacts our daily lives is our local communities. And you can have a bigger voice and impact by building relationships, starting just being seen and heard by building relationship with your local leaders. And as you develop those relationships, then you can become a seen leader or advocate.

And that's why Meryl and myself, who banded together to encourage our local cities involved to adapt. Captioning happened because of our respect and keep showing up. I always tell people, show up, be present and show out. Why show up? Because it's so important that we come in numbers, be present because we cannot be bombarded with our personal social media devices and really immerse ourselves in the community and building those relationships. And then the last thing is shell out, tell people, tell the world who you met, what you learned and, and the opportunities that you made, and then share that with people so that people can be a part of your growing movement, whether locally, state or national.

Lily Newton:
I love that. And I, yeah, I think it's so important for people to understand that you don't have to do everything all at once. And I also, this reminds me of in an episode where we had incredible artist and visual designer corn on on, and they were talking about the fact that sometimes it can seem easy to think you need to reinvent the wheel when the truth is that there are people in our community, in almost every community that are doing this work and they need that. They need the people to show up, be present and show out. And so I say that because if you're listening to this and you're thinking, I want to do that, but you don't know where to start. You know, look for the helpers that's that's kind of the phrase that gets used a lot, but it's the truth. There are people out there doing this work. And I would, I would guess that there are people in your community listener who would love to have your support and would love to have your stories so you can.

Erin Hawley:
Those are sometimes a little bit harder to seek out, but I do recommend starting with local meetings, asking people what's going on in the realm of disability accessibility in this town. And I'm sure you'll find people well.

Dylan M Rafaty:
And I would just say encourage people to go to your local affiliated Easter Seals and start building those relationships or partner outside in the disability space. Connect with your local chamber of Commerce. That's a great opportunity to really get yourself out there and immersing in the business and philanthropic government landscapes. Now, just so those people know on the call, there's only six disability chambers in the country. I'm one of them. But I will tell you that over 30 cities have contacted me across the United States that want to build something similar. So if you want to learn more about building a cultivating, strong, unified community of nonprofits, business, governments, sectors, reach out. I'm happy to assist and how you might want to navigate that.

But at the same time, if you just want to immerse yourself and get to know people, local chambers and or Easter Seals, local affiliates would be a great opportunity for you to immerse yourself.

Erin Hawley:
I completely agree. Yeah. And I know like, on, like on Facebook, there's like different counties, different cities have Facebook groups. And that is a really good place to get your voice out and connect with people who maybe have the same issues or barriers that you have. And it's just a great place to connect.

Lily Newton:
Absolutely. Well, shifting gears a tiny bit so we can get to this part of the conversation before we run out of time. October is National Disability Employment Awareness Month, as Dylan already brought up. And currently right now I am recording this podcast at the Easter Seals national office, and I am in one of our new center, Sensory Friendly Rooms. These rooms were added as we did some new construction as part of an initiative to just make this whole office space more accessible. These rooms in general for neurodivergent people. And it's been really helpful for me to have a space I can come. And it was really wonderful to be included in on the process of the teams that were doing the construction.

Erin Hawley:
They asked all of us that are disabled in the office what kind of things would help. And that's just super wonderful. So I'm wondering from your perspective, Dylan, as someone who's been in this work for a while, what are some other ways that companies can create access in their workplace for employees with disabilities?

Dylan M Rafaty:
Yeah, companies will really need to first and foremost internally decide what are the greatest needs, either from a return on investment standpoint, or from a cultural standpoint or simply compliance or whatever necessary or important, you know. During my work, I partner with a number of national organizations like Samsung Electronics America to Comerica bank, to even our regional employer that has almost 50,000 employees, that is the DFW Airport. And for those who don't know, DFW Airport has a commitment, a plan to roll out sensory rooms for both children and adults with disabilities. One of my things I was advocating for adults, oftentimes sensory rooms are only meant for children, and that's not always the case. We can create an inclusive experience so that all people can participate as a way to decompress or to relieve anxiety or stress, like an airport, for example. But what I will say is that VFW Airport reached out to my organization to help bring voices of leaders with disabilities who are frequent travelers to figure out how do we improve the accessibility, the inclusion, the safety and the security aspect while they are visiting the airport. Either you're traveling in or connecting flights, or you're departing out or arriving at the airport. And so they've added a committee, an accessibility committee, focusing on how do we improve the passenger or visitor experience at the airport.

And the intentionality came internally. First they launched an erg accessible barrier free life for everyone able is what it's called. And from that they realized that they have a number of employees that are not only neurodivergent but also part of the spectrum of disability. And many of them are also caregivers as well. And so they noticed there was a huge gap and wanting to find ways to innovate and strategize. Again, disability is a strategy, not a charity. And that we need to strategize ways of how to improve the bottom line, whether employee engagement or morale. It could be cultural, it could be improving business operations or simply creating a better external racing experience for people while they're visiting the airport.

And so I would tell employers is first and foremost internally figure out what is the greatest needs or problems that need to be solved. And the second is partner with regional organizations that are serving the needs of our communities. But don't just partner with one, partner with a number of organizations, because oftentimes organizations are often focused on a specific demographic, geographic location. And that's why I say regional so you can partner with number of organizations we have serving. And then third is if you want to improve operations or whatever that might be, engage with leaders and stakeholders that directly support or benefit your business organization or constant consumers or matter of fact and allow them to provide expert recommendations. And then eventually you might want to consult with them and hire them to improve whatever necessaries or problem we might have so that you can better address and support our community. So there are many different steps, but it starts internally within. And the leadership of course, have to buy into it.

Lily Newton:
Absolutely. I think that just everything you said. I like that answer because I like that it's not just like a list. Sometimes when the question gets asked of how do we make workplaces more inclusive? It's like, oh, you could do this, this and this. And it seems like that's the answers. But as we have well established in this conversation, there's no list that's going to encapsulate the needs of every single disabled person. So it is important to start within your organization and find out what works for your team and what you need. I think that is just so crucial and also to work with other organizations that are doing the work.

I think that, that sometimes there is pressure to have all the answers immediately. And I think that it's a disservice to not take the time because if accessibility was not baked in at the very beginning, it's going to take some thought for how to. How to get your company up to speed. And I don't think it's.

Dylan M Rafaty:
And you're going to have to consider the funding allocations as well. That is going to be a big burden for a lot of people and a lot of organizations. I'm fully aware of that. But in order to. You got to see the bottom line. The bottom line is that we want to create an accessible and inclusive opportunity for everybody to meaningfully engage, whether for your business or your products or solutions, service, whatever that might be. The idea that is a business strategy or strategy toward accessibility and disability inclusion and it's not necessarily an added task or, or a good benefit. Yes, it's good benefit, but reality is we need to look at our strategy and how it improves the bottom line where that everybody can meaningfully engage, gain access and create a culture of disability and culture.

Lily Newton:
Absolutely. And I mean I think it's important that you bring up that there is cost to making things accessible. There is a. Can be seen as a burden. But also there are many studies that show that businesses that prioritize accessibility are more successful and that there's a lot of success that comes from so while it might seem like a burden to accommodate these costs to make something more accessible, I think it goes back to what Dylan's been saying all along of think of it as an investment in any program that you would invest in for the sake of well, once we've done this, studies show that we'll have better business outcomes. And that's just the truth. An inclusive workspace, everything shows better business outcomes are usually the answer or usually the outcome of putting in the work to make your space accommodating and accessible.

And speaking of employment, I know you have a new podcast. Can you tell us about that?

Dylan M Rafaty:
Yes, Erin. Well, you know we just launched let's Work Inclusively podcast and it's all about cross sector collaboration between business, nonprofit and government sectors to talk about how do we improve access or equity and inclusion around our disability community. Our first guest was the amazing Sid Marshall. She was a former CEO of the Dallas Mavericks. Yes, I'm a huge die hard Mavericks fan and also she is my newest special advisor and she was formerly an executive at AT&T Corporate and so I will say is our first podcast was the least is a video in audio formats. It's called let's Work Inclusively with Dylan M. Rafferty. Our next episode we're going to feature three emerging leaders with and without disabilities talking about their leadership journey as they're being mentored by me specifically.

It's a lot of work but I will say is rewarding. It's enjoyable because I, Erin and yourself, Lily, we can't do this work alone. We have to generate new set of generation of leaders who could build the steps that we've started and make it better and bigger and exciting than ever before. But this podcast is meant to feature leaders within those three landscapes and really put a spotlight of the opportunities that are either creating on a national level, international or even local and state level. So yeah, thank you Aaron for the shout out. I love this podcast. We're doing the second recording this weekend. I'm like oh man, a lot of work but I love the results.

Lily Newton:
Yeah, I'm excited to hear. Sounds really awesome.

Erin Hawley:
Yeah, it sounds awesome and right up our listeners alleys. So listeners, if you enjoy this podcast, I am certain you'll enjoy that one. So we'll have it linked below in the episode description. Go check out the first episode and that second one will probably be almost close to released or released by the time this comes out. So that's super exciting. Congrats Erin and I know firsthand the lift it takes to start and launch a podcast. So congrats on that work.

Dylan M Rafaty:
So the know the fact I would say is in Texas there are roughly, well, specifically where I am in North Texas, there are 10% of our population in North Texas that consists about 800,000 individuals with disabilities. And in addition to that, another fact would be of interest is that compared to the general public, the average or medium income in poverty level is around $29,000 for individuals with disabilities compared to 39,000 for those without disabilities. And frankly, that's an alarming statistic that how can we support and make a living with 29,000 a year? And I don't know if that's before or after taxes, but still, that's not a lot of money. And frankly, I would encourage people to really invest in the pipeline of our population.

Lily Newton:
That's been know the facts. I think those were incredible facts. Thank you for sharing and thank you for coming on our show today. Dylan. This has been such a great conversation, listeners. Thank you for tuning in transcripts available online or if you're watching the video. Thanks for sharing the day with us. Erin, thanks for being my co host.

Erin Hawley:
I love you.

Lily Newton:
I love you.

Erin Hawley:
And we'll see you next week for another. Just kidding, not next week. I won't put myself under that pressure. Deadline. We'll see you next time for another episode of Everything You Know About Disability is Wrong.