Engaging employees with disabilities in Vietnamese business context

Purpose There has been a growing number, though still modest, of organizations in Vietnam context that hire employees with disabilities and build disability inclusive management practices and disability diversity climate for them to engage in their work roles. The purpose of this paper is to investigate how disability inclusive HR practices contribute to work engagement of employees with disabilities working in Vietnam-based information technology (IT) industry. Design/methodology/approach The research model was tested through the data collected from employees with disabilities and their direct supervisors from IT companies based in Vietnam. Findings The data analysis revealed that disability inclusive HR practices influenced employees with disabilities to engage in their work activities through organizational identification as a mediator. Moral leadership exhibited a positive interactive effect with disability inclusive HR practices in promoting organizational identification of employees with disabilities and, in turn, their work engagement. In addition, employees’ idiosyncratic deals were found to serve as an individual enhancer for the link between their organizational identification and work engagement. Originality/value This research sets a milestone for more empirical inquiries on disability-oriented antecedents at both organizational and individual levels that can foster work engagement of employees with disabilities.