Imagine for a minute you’re a salesperson. Today, you’re having a very important call with a possible client. Multiple agents from their offices have come together to discuss whether to hire your company for the job. All of the different voices get a little jumbled and difficult to understand. But you’re quite sure you got the gist of it.
And it sounds distorted and even less clear when you keep turning up the volume. So you just read between the lines the best you can. You’re very good at that.
As you try to listen, the voices sound particularly muffled for about a minute. Then all of a sudden you hear, “so what can your company do to assist us with this”?”
You panic. You have no idea what their company’s issue is because you didn’t hear the last part of the discussion. Your boss is counting on you to close this deal. What can you do?
Should you acknowledge you didn’t hear them and ask them to repeat what they said? They might think you weren’t paying attention. What about resorting to some slippery sales jargon? No, they’ll see right through that.
Every single day, individuals everywhere are dealing with scenarios like this at work. They attempt to read between the lines and get by.
So in general, how is your work being affected by your hearing loss? Let’s find out.
Unequal pay
The Better Hearing Institute questioned 80,000 individuals using the same method the Census Bureau uses to get a representative sampling.
They found that people who have neglected hearing loss make about $12,000 less per year than those who are able to hear.
Hey, that’s not fair!
We could dig deep to try to figure out what the cause is, but as the illustration above demonstrates, hearing loss can impact your overall performance. Unfortunately, he couldn’t close the deal. When they got the impression that the salesperson wasn’t paying attention to them, they went with someone else. They didn’t want to deal with a company that doesn’t listen.
He missed out on a commission of $1000.
The situation was misconstrued. But how do you think this impacted his career? If he was using hearing aids, imagine how different things could have been.
Injuries on at work
A study reported in the Journal of The American Medical Association found that individuals with untreated hearing loss are nearly 30% more likely to suffer a significant work accident. And, your risk of ending up in the emergency room after a serious fall goes up by 300% according to other studies.
And individuals with only slight hearing loss were at the greatest risk, unexpectedly! Maybe, their hearing loss is mild enough that they’re not even aware of it.
How to have a prosperous career with hearing loss
You have so much to offer an employer:
- Confidence
- Empathy
- Experience
- Personality
- Skills
Hearing loss shouldn’t overshadow these. However, that doesn’t mean it won’t be a factor. You may not even recognize how huge an impact on your job it’s having. Here are some ways to reduce that impact:
- Make sure your work space is brightly lit. Being able to see lips can help you follow along even if you don’t read lips.
- When you’re speaking with people, make certain you look directly at them. Try not to have phone conversations as much as possible.
- If a task is going to be beyond your capability you need to speak up. For instance, your boss might ask you to cover for someone who works in a really loud area. Offer to do something else to make up for it. If you do that, your boss won’t think you’re coping out.
- In order to have it in writing, it’s not a bad plan to write a sincere accommodations letter for your boss.
- Understand that during a job interview, you aren’t required to reveal that you have hearing loss. And the interviewer can’t ask. Conversely, you might need to think about if your neglected hearing loss will impact your ability to have a successful interview. You will probably need to make the interviewer aware of your condition if that’s the case.
- Wear your hearing aids while you’re at work every day, at all times. When you do, many of the accommodations aren’t necessary.
- Before attending a meeting, ask if you can get a written agenda and outline. It will be easier to keep up with the conversation.
- Request that you get a hearing aid compatible (HAC) phone. The sound goes straight into your ear and not through background noise. You will need hearing aids that will work with this technology to use one.
Working with hearing loss
Hearing loss can impact your work, even if it’s slight. But many of the obstacles that untreated hearing loss can pose will be resolved by getting it treated. Call us today – we can help!