The Brief
- Major employers report festive work opportunities for women and persons with disabilities.
- Seasonal employment can offer income, experience and a route into the workforce.
- Accessible recruitment and workplace adjustments should continue beyond peak demand.
- Employers should track contract completion, access to ongoing vacancies and workers’ reasons for leaving.
Festive Hiring Boosts Diversity: How True is That?
The last festive order will eventually leave the warehouse. By then, employers will have recruited, trained and worked alongside people they may never have considered before. As festive hiring brings diversity into focus, there is an opportunity to reconsider who gets hired during the rest of the year.
The recruitment announcements deserve attention. In September, Amazon India announced more than 1.6 lakh seasonal work opportunities, both direct and indirect. It said its expanded workforce included thousands of women and associates with disabilities. Flipkart announced more than 2.5 lakh direct and indirect opportunities, including gig work, and reported increased participation by persons with disabilities across warehouse and delivery operations.
These are company-reported figures covering different kinds of work. They should not be read as counts of permanent jobs. Flipkart also reported that women held more than 20% of its supply chain roles; that figure describes its supply chain workforce, rather than the share of women among this season’s recruits.
For someone seeking a first wage, returning after a break or building experience, a short contract can be useful. Some workers may actively prefer a limited commitment. Seasonal employment deserves to be judged on its terms, working conditions and value to the person taking it up.
The question for employers is what they learn from making those opportunities available.
What can the festive season teach recruiters?
Recruitment teams could begin by comparing their festive and regular hiring processes. Did they widen their search? Reconsider an unnecessary experience requirement? Offer a more accessible interview? Explain the shift pattern clearly enough for someone to decide whether the job would work for them?
Our examination of women’s access to frontline jobs explored the gap between applying and receiving an employer’s response. A wider applicant pool achieves little if the usual screening decisions keep ruling people out.
Where a change helps someone demonstrate their ability, it deserves consideration in ordinary recruitment too. Employers can retain accessible application formats, assess the tasks a role actually requires and explain pay, location and working hours before asking a candidate to commit.
There is a similar opportunity inside the workplace. The International Labour Organisation’s guidance on reasonable accommodation covers adjustments to equipment, job content, working time and work organisation across the employment cycle. The starting point is the individual and the work they need to do.
A worker might need instructions in an accessible format, an adapted workstation or a change in how a task is organised. Managers should discuss those needs with the person concerned. Assuming that every disabled employee needs the same support can be as limiting as overlooking access altogether.
Employers should also ask who pays for and maintains each adjustment. A useful arrangement can disappear when a staffing contract ends, or a supervisor moves on unless somebody has responsibility for keeping it available.
Give workers a clear route beyond the contract
Year-round inclusion does not require a business to keep every seasonal position after demand falls. It does require employers to examine whether women and disabled workers have fair access to the continuing jobs that do exist.
Amazon says many seasonal associates continue beyond the festive period, while others return in subsequent years. Its September announcement does not give a conversion rate for women or workers with disabilities. There is scope for employers to explain these routes more clearly: which vacancies are available, how applicants are assessed and whether seasonal experience counts towards selection.
That information should reach workers before their contracts finish. Where no vacancy exists, an accurate record of skills, a reference and an agreed way to hear about future openings can still make the experience useful. A vague promise of permanent employment helps nobody plan.
For workers who do secure another role, continuity also depends on the conditions around the job. Helping women stay in work requires attention to care, travel and working hours. A predictable roster can make childcare easier to arrange; a changed shift may require a fresh conversation about transport. These are questions to resolve with workers rather than assumptions to make about all women.
Women with disabilities belong in this discussion too. Treating gender and disability as entirely separate recruitment categories can leave their combined access needs unexamined. Employees should have a confidential way to request support without being expected to become the public face of an inclusion campaign.
Count what happens after joining
Recruitment totals provide a starting point. A useful review would follow the same group of recruits through contract completion and any applications for continuing work. Employers could examine who completed the agreed term, who left early and why, who wanted an ongoing role, and who received one.
The reasons matter. A contract ending as agreed, a worker choosing to leave and someone resigning because an adjustment never arrived call for different responses. Combining them into a single attrition figure conceals what managers could improve.
Where staffing agencies are involved, the client and agency should agree who answers pay queries, arranges adjustments and resolves complaints. The worker needs a named contact and a workable response process. Any review of gender or disability outcomes should protect personal information and avoid identifying people in small groups.
Festive Hiring Boosts Diversity: Change in View
Festive recruitment gives employers a chance to work with talent they might otherwise miss. Its lasting value will depend partly on what changes in the next ordinary hiring round: who is considered, how the work is organised and whose experience helps shape the decision.
Women and persons with disabilities should be able to apply, contribute and progress throughout the year. Employers can start by retaining the practices that made this season’s opportunities possible, and by asking the people doing the work what still needs to change.
Editorial Note
This analysis draws on public company announcements and ILO guidance reviewed on 28 September 2026. Hiring figures are attributed to the companies and have not been independently audited. The article does not establish a sector-wide retention or conversion rate; its recommendations are editorial proposals, rather than findings from worker interviews or legal advice.
Sources
- Amazon India, 2 September 2026: Seasonal work opportunities ahead of the festive season.
- Flipkart, 15 September 2026: Festive employment opportunities and workforce participation.
- International Labour Organisation, 30 November 2016: Promoting diversity and inclusion through workplace adjustments: A practical guide.
