The extent of an employer’s duty to provide reasonable accommodations to employees with mental impairments can be difficult to discern, especially where an adverse action is taken in connection with conduct that is caused by or related to an employee’s cognitive or mental health condition. In a recent decision, Mayo v. PCC Structurals Inc., the Ninth Circuit has recognized an exception to a well-settled precedent holding that an employee who is terminated for threatening conduct arising from a psychiatric disability may state a claim for disability discrimination because the conduct is, in fact, part of the employee’s disability.

ADA Standard for Workplace Conduct Violations -

The Americans with Disabilities Act defines disability discrimination to include the use of qualification standards or selection criteria that screen out or tend to screen out an individual with a disability or a class of individuals with disabilities, while recognizing an exception where the standard or other selection criteria is used in a way that is both “job-related for the position in question” and “consistent with business necessity.” The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has issued guidance interpreting this exception to mean that an employer may “discipline an individual with a disability for violating a workplace conduct standard if the misconduct resulted from a disability,” provided that the conduct standard is job-related and consistent with business necessity. If the employer is aware of the potential need for a reasonable accommodation, and that accommodation would enable an otherwise-qualified individual with a disability to meet the conduct standard in the future, there is a concomitant obligation on the employer’s part to provide such an accommodation, unless doing so would cause undue hardship.

Originally published in Law360 on August 28, 2015.