Category: Diversity & Inclusion

Diversity and inclusion (D&I) is an important and ongoing strategy of any HR plan. Ensuring that your company supports hiring, engaging, and retaining diverse workers with varied backgrounds will set your company up for long-term success and an increased bottom line. This topic offers the latest strategies for talent management, key insights from diversity leaders, case studies on D&I in the workplace, and more.

Are rules for same-sex marriage about to change in Texas?

by Jacob M. Monty The Texas Supreme Court recently announced that it will review a case arguing that Texas employers shouldn’t be required to spend taxpayer funds to provide benefits to employee spouses in same-sex marriages, even if they do offer benefits to employee spouses in opposite-sex marriages. Depending on the outcome of the case, […]

Handling challenges to diversity in era of divisiveness

It may seem there’s no escaping political divisiveness. All manner of news and social media sources carry angry, frequently hurtful, and often untrue communication. And the workplace is not immune from the damage of those messages.  Presidential campaigns have been heated before, but the 2016 contest seemed especially rife with venom. Since the campaign was […]

Are decisions made for the reasons you think?

by Dinita L. James Employment laws prohibit intentional discrimination based on race, sex, or other protected characteristics as well as practices that have a discriminatory impact if they’re not supported by business necessity. Implicit or unconscious bias isn’t technically unlawful in the workplace if it doesn’t cause an unjustified adverse impact.  Yet a presidential candidate […]

Walking the workplace proselytizing tightrope

by David L. Johnson “Have a blessed day.” “I’m praying for you.” “Are you a believer?” “Would you be interested in attending church with me?” Comments and questions like those may be common in your workplace. On the one hand, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 bars employers from discriminating against employees […]

leadership

ADA interactive process: When does your obligation to engage begin?

by Susan Hartmus Hiser Q We have an employee whose work performance has been slipping lately. We have reason to believe that she is suffering from depression because she was diagnosed as bipolar and had a bout of depression a few years ago that led to a similar decline in her work performance. We allowed […]

U.S. Supreme Court to consider transgender restroom lawsuit

by Ryan B. Frazier During the 1990s, Saturday Night Live, a popular TV sketch comedy show, featured a recurring gender-ambiguous character, Pat. The gag in Pat’s comedy sketches often involved others’ failed attempts to determine the seemingly androgynous character’s gender. The skits played off the then-prevailing view that a person’s gender falls into one of […]

Warding off age discrimination claims in era of older workers

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that nearly a quarter of the workforce will be made up of people age 55 and older by 2024. That contrasts to 1994, when just 11.9 percent of workers fell into that age group. If the projection for 2024 is correct—and the aging of the baby boomer generation […]

What’s gender identity got to do with work?

by Amanda M. Jones From Bruce Jenner’s announcement that he was transitioning to become a woman named “Caitlyn” to North Carolina’s passage of a so-called bathroom bill requiring schools and public agencies to restrict bathroom use to the facility corresponding to a person’s biological sex at birth, gender identity issues have become the subject of […]

Election dynamics in the workplace: Free speech? ‘You’re fired’

by Courtney Bru None of us were immune from this year’s presidential election dynamics. Disrespect and name-calling have seemed more prevalent than policy discussions. The election was highly polarizing, potentially pitting employee against employee.  In the midst of it all, employees were often misinformed about their “free speech rights” in the workplace. A recent instance from Georgia […]

Target to spend millions on single-stall bathrooms

by Ryan Olson Target recently announced that employees and customers at its stores may use the public restroom that corresponds with their gender identity. Now, amid criticism of its transgender bathroom policy by some customers, the company has said that it will spend $20 million to make single-stall bathrooms available in every store. Controversial policy. […]