Carol McMullen, a learning disabilities specialist, found that 10% to 15% of the adult population has learning disabilities. Not linked to intelligence, learning disabilities show up as reading problems, poor spelling, difficulty learning a second language, and mathematical difficulty.

Take Ron. He has a university degree and sells computers and software to companies. He does well at meeting people and getting interest in the product. But he has problems on precise product specifications and pricing quotations, which makes his boss mad.

Instead of getting mad, the boss could arrange for Ron to get hands-on learning from a technician instead of trying to learn from a manual. Underlining relevant parts of the manual will help, too. For pricing problems, Ron needs to break the computations into simple steps and use a calculator. Asking someone else for an accuracy check is advised also.

Brenda, a receptionist, is liked by everyone and always willing to do extra work. The problem is she mixes up messages, reverses numbers, and gets similar sounding words wrong at times. To accommodate her learning disabilities, her boss should ask Brenda to check her source and read back details.

For other employees with similar problems, managers should use role playing, video instruction, and follow-up training to ensure task knowledge. Voice recognition and scanning software, additional proofreading, slowly spoken instructions, daily calendars, and other devices, too, can help people do their jobs better.

For more information, contact The Learning Disabilities Association of Canada (National Office), 323 Chapel St., Ottawa, Ontario K1N 7Z2, (613) 238-5721, information@ldac-taac.ca. McMullen can be reached at (519) 837-3169 or mcmullen@sentex.net. #1044

McMullen, C. (2000, Spring). When bright employees don't measure up. National 38(1).

Keyword: Employment