MYDOST app aims to increase mainstream career opportunities for people with intellectual disabilities

People with intellectual disabilities find it especially hard when it comes to finding mainstream career opportunities. MYDOST, the app developed by impact enterprise v-shesh aims to change this. The innovation is among the 11 winners of the ‘Innovate for an Accessible India’(IAI) event held by NASSCOM Foundation and Microsoft India in partnership with the Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities, Department of Science & Technology (DST).

People with intellectual disabilities face many challenges when it comes to analysing, planning, organising, scheduling, and completing tasks on deadline. This makes it difficult for them to learn and work independently, and hampers their ability to perform basic, sequential tasks.

Aiming to change that is MYDOST, the technology solution developed by Chennai-based impact enterprise v-shesh. The app, among the winners of the recent Innovate for an Accessible India’(IAI) event, will enable a person with intellectual disability to perform tasks with greater autonomy, efficiency, consistency and accuracy, both at home and at work.

Enabling solution for workplace & home

“We found that people with intellectual disabilities at the workplace had the skill to perform a task in a certain manner, but when it came to sequential tasks, they faced a challenge”, says P Rajasekharan, Co-Founder, v-shesh. “This meant an employer had to put a buddy system in place for a much longer time. Not many employers have the bandwidth to do this”.

MYDOST offers a simple technology solution to this. With the app, task sequences can be dynamically created as per individual needs and this can be customised for the specific domain. It also has in-built analytics to record the progress of skills. Based on this needs-based assistance can be extended.

We thought a tech solution that would enable an individual to be prompted with cues could help them understand what comes next and perform those tasks. This would help employers and unlock individual potential in a bigger way and help acquire multiple skills. Employability prospects increase and the skills will be portable across sectors and organisations – P Rajasekharan, Co-founder, v-shesh

The innovation will no doubt help boost confidence levels among people with intellectual disabilities, open the job market and opportunities for more varied roles.

v-shesh plans to start testing MYDOST soon. “The award is a major boost and will help us to build the tech solution and enable employers and people with intellectual disabilities test it out”, adds Rajasekharan. “We plan to launch the implementation quickly and this will help people with intellectual disabilities across retail and hospitality sectors”.

The tasing is likely to take three months. “The burden on them and their parents is significantly high when it comes to jobs and we hope MYDOST will alleviate that”, adds Rajsekharan.

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