The concept of person-centered planning has been at play for decades, yet the publication of the Home and Community-based Services (HCBS) Settings Final Rule (“Final Rule”) in 2014 was the first time person-centeredness was explicitly tied to ongoing funding of home and community-based settings under the various Medicaid waiver authorities. As states work to comply with the Final Rule, agencies and service providers should embrace the important role they play in a state’s ability to make the shift to person-centeredness.

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, only 30 percent of the 15.3 million Americans of working age (between ages 16 and 64) with disabilities participated in the workforce in 2018, compared with 74 percent of Americans without a disability. An Accenture analysis of the research suggests that shifting recruitment efforts to focus on disability inclusion would therefore provide companies with access to a new talent pool of more than 10.7 million people.