How Will This Affect My IT Career?

Nafe92014

Hey all,

The bad news:

I'm not sure how to say this, but I've be hearing impaired my whole life (24 years) but 2 weeks ago, my left ear gave up and now lately, I've been suffering from vertigo, which caused me to fail a rewrite exam of a college course. 😞.

The good news:

My hearing audiologist referred me to a specialist to see if I am qualified to get a cochlear implant surgically placed on my failed ear. To be honest, I feel that hearing out of one ear now won't help me do well in this field. I just want to hear life again and smile everyday I get out of bed and hear the birds chirping. Now here's a big question:

How would most employers understand or hire a tech/engineer with a cochlear implant? Remember, a CI works differently than a HA. I'm just a bit worried that the CI will interfere with networking equipment and whatnot (the implant is a magnet).

Thoughts?

SweenMachine

We have a someone with a CI - It has not impacted his ability to do his job, and do it very well.

-scott

Cisco Inferno

CI's have come a long long way in the past decade alone. It actually wont even be noticeable.

I do not think any employer even NEEDS to know you have one. Hell, I've seen engineers who are missing fingers. You've got nothing to worry about.

Do not worry about equipment. You aren't wiping harddrives by holding them to your face lol. dont worry.

UncleB

Sorry to hear the bad news but I'm sure you came here for advice so let's get on with it.

You ask about future employers discriminating against you in the selection process so let's start with this. In short, yes it will work against you overall so you will have a challenge without the more common entry level jobs such as service desk as the amount of time on the phone for these will be the issue.

Other entry level jobs are fewer and often have a higher barrier to entry so you need to make sure you know your stuff and can impress the potential employers with your knowledge and motivation.

Given your particular circumstances I would recommend trying some volunteer work initially so you work through the challenges and adapt to a working environment - without this track record it may be a hurdle for an employer to pay you when you lack work experience or a track record of working with your disability in an office environment.

As for the implant being an issue, unless you attract iron objects as you walk down the street, it won't be an issue. You are unlikely to be sticking electronics onto your head so the diminishing power of the magnetic field over distance (power drops by the square of distance I recall) means you are not going to be causing electromagnetic chaos as you work. I guess you may develop some interesting party tricks with it if you are creative, but for the office you'll be fine.

One thing to do when applying for the jobs is to detail your situation but emphasise that you are able to work normally in an office environment using the implant. The application should go via the HR dept and they will be required to make sure you are treated no differently than others.

You will need to get a lot of practice with the implant before interviewing to make sure you have adapted to its differences and that should help the interviewers concerns by showing you can work at the same level as others in a conversation. This means practicing in closed spaces, open meeting rooms, rooms with significant computer noise (fans, typing, beeping etc) in the background and in situations where you may have a panel of interviewers asking questions from multiple positions in front / to the side of you.

Where any situation is found where the implant is not effective, make sure that if this is a possibility in the interview then you can let the interviewer know before you kick off. Don't tell them before you even get in, but if the setting looks like a problem then say something like "is it possible to hold the interview in a different place please, my hearing implant can make it difficult to hear you clearly with this level of noise in the background". Be prepared for some more questions on the implant after this, especially if you are expected to work in computer suites or NOCs where there is a lot of this sort of noise.

In essence, so long as you are a great candidate with skills and motivation then you should be OK. Just make sure the employer knows you have put a lot of thought into working around your issue and have demonstrated a "can do" attitude rather than expecting them to come up with suggestions.

In the meantime, get skilled up while you job hunt as it may still be a challenge if you lack work experience. Maybe get on track for your CCNA and focus on roles that are less likely to need a lot of phone time so you have plenty of time for yourself to adapt. You will need to try harder than the average Joe but that should make you better than them in the long term.

Good luck and ask away if you have any specific questions.

Russ5813

FWIW, my mother had the same symptoms. A CI did wonders for her hearing, and after a change in diet (reduced sodium), routine exercise, and some meds, her vertigo is under control as well. Your CI shouldn't cause problems unless you have electronics within ~3cm of the implant , or are routinely electrocuting yourself

paul78

I've worked with several people in the past with hearing and visually impairments. Two individuals stick out in my mind. One was born hearing impaired and as I recall he was deaf in both ears. He had a CI in one ear and it was never an issue. People just got used to always being on the side that he had the CI in meetings. He was actually one of the brightest that I've ever worked with. I think he's a director someplace now. I recall that he had this one advantage that whenever the office got too loud and he needed to concentrate - he would just turn off his CI.
Another individual that I worked with was legally blind, he was a software engineer so that meant getting magnifiers and a large screen. He ended going into management and he's a VP now.

Your disability will definitely be tough and I don't want to discount the difficulties that you are facing. I can't even imagine how it must be. But I wanted to share these anecdotes hopefully as encouragement that you can do it too.

Good luck to you.

NOC-Ninja

This actually gives you a better chance of getting hired. Believe it or not, BIG corporations and government have their OWN budget to help handicap. They get hired first and the company work with them.

I know someone at my work who has the same problem as you. One of the smartest and nicest person I know.

Employers will understand you. I used to work in CI industry. CI can be tuned and very advanced. You will do just fine. YOu can also turn it off if you dont want the noise. It will work great.

SweenMachine

NOC-Ninja wrote: »

This actually gives you a better chance of getting hired. Believe it or not, BIG corporations and government have their OWN budget to help handicap. They get hired first and the company work with them.

I know someone at my work who has the same problem as you. One of the smartest and nicest person I know.

Employers will understand you. I used to work in CI industry. CI can be tuned and very advanced. You will do just fine. YOu can also turn it off if you dont want the noise. It will work great.

I tend to agree with you. When I worked at a large corporation, with 90K employees based in Chicago, they prided themselves on being as anti-discriminatory as possible. We had all sorts of people in my department with varying degrees of disabilities, ailments, but the one common denominator was they were all great, smart, hard working employees. And to be as frank as possible, that is ALL I care about when I make hiring decisions. I know people can have prejudices and I know I am not perfect, but really it is all about how you fit in with the culture and can help my business be successful. Additionally, I have seen a lot of people in my lifetime use their challenges and struggles (whether they are disabilities, or failures in the past, or difficult upbringing) as fuel.

I am not saying that to diminish your challenges, I am saying that quite simply if you are a quality human being that can provide a great value to a business, they will hire you and work with you.

-scott