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Is this a team mate at a US company? If so, note that Teams live captioning may not be enough to meet your non discrimination requirements. Your company may hav
by elil17 4y ago
Is this a team mate at a US company? If so, note that Teams live captioning may not be enough to meet your non discrimination requirements. Your company may have a legal obligation to hire an ASL interpreter or human transcriber, including for in person meetings.
My biggest recommendation is to use a phone call for audio because he can then use America’s free video relay service for ASL or captioned telephone service. The captions on captioned telephone use both an AI and a human in conjunction, so they are much more accurate.
Try to do some audio-free team bonding exercises. Perhaps charades (with everyone typing answers).
If he uses ASL, learn some and provide resources to other teammates to learn some. Knowing some ASL, at minimum enough to do some small talk, will be a huge sign of respect towards him if that’s his native language.
Finally, something that people might not think about: If he misses something someone said and asks you what it was, never say "it's nothing" or "it wasn't important" or "it was just a joke" no matter how minor the comment was. Just repeat it no matter what.
- aaaaaaaaata 4y agoUsing the relay for a meeting? Have you done this effectively in a work environment?
- elil17 4y agoYes, I have done many virtual meetings using VRS. You do have to ensure that you do everything a little slower if you’re using a lot of technical language because the terps need time to fingerspell. I’ve also used a video interpreting service for in person meetings (the terp is virtual everyone else is in person). That works well because private interpreter services will take the time to review a slide deck, notes, or a glossary ahead of time and learn any jargon or be prepared to come up with abbreviations with the Deaf coworker.
- aaaaaaaaata 4y agoIn my experience, it hasn't been just a little slower — but that could of course be dependent on the response time of the callers I specifically was interacting with via the service.
- elil17 4y agoIt can depend quite a bit on the interpreter too.
- jdoconnor 4y agohttps://www.drawbattle.io/ https://www.drawbattle.io/ is a great bonding game with no audio needs
- leonidasv 4y agoNice suggestion! In the same spirit, Gartic Phone[1] is also a great team bonding game that needs no audio. It plays like a telephone game, but with drawings and (written) guessing. The way the initial message is transformed during all the drawing-guessing rounds is always hilarious. [1] https://garticphone.com/ https://garticphone.com/
- dymk 4y agoWe play https://skribbl.io/ https://skribbl.io/ religiously
- winnerkiller356 4y agohttps://drawbattle.io/AMHQ https://drawbattle.io/AMHQ
- sdrothrock 4y ago> Finally, something that people might not think about: If he misses something someone said and asks you what it was, never say "it's nothing" or "it wasn't important" or "it was just a joke" no matter how minor the comment was. Just repeat it no matter what. This is absolutely critical. It's hard enough to interrupt multiple times (especially when you need to ask about the same misheard thing multiple times) and being shut down makes it even harder.
- pugworthy 4y ago100%. As someone who's HoH (Hard of Hearing) this is by far the worst thing. It can lead to frustration, depression, and also self isolation simply to not be exposed to it. Being Deaf or HoH can be very isolating. Sometimes it's nice (think "built in noise cancellation!"), other times not (feel really left out). Do what you can to include your team mates.
- bombcar 4y agoFor these kinds of things, especially in a virtual meeting, having a "side channel" chat can be entirely helpful - I do it for people who aren't fully paying attention or are otherwise distracted.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- unsupp0rted 4y ago100% this. I'm not deaf, but when working in foreign countries functionally I am. Repeating stuff back to me as "it's nothing" is extremely frustrating. I'd rather be the judge of "it's nothing".
- basilgohar 4y agoI really appreciate reading this. This is good for me to know if I ever have the opportunity to work with a non-hearing person (not sure what is considered the most acceptable term).
- elil17 4y agoDeaf or hard of hearing (if they can hear but not as well as a hearing person - e.g. they need a hearing aid and a quite environment to understand speech) are used most commonly.
- NylaTheWolf 4y ago> Finally, something that people might not think about: If he misses something someone said and asks you what it was, never say "it's nothing" or "it wasn't important" or "it was just a joke" no matter how minor the comment was. Just repeat it no matter what. I’m not deaf or hard of hearding but I have ADHD and I might have auditory processing issues and I cannot stand when someone does this.