Job Description Mistakes You Don’t Want to Make
HR Law 101 Ep.4: What You Need to Know About Creating Effective Job Descriptions
A federal appeals court recently clarified that an employee may qualify for a reasonable accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) even if they can perform essential job functions without such an...more
The Americans with Disabilities Act defines a protected qualified individual as one who can perform the essential functions of the job, with or without reasonable accommodations. ...more
On October 17, 2024, the U.S. District Court for the District of Kansas entered summary judgment in favor of the Unified Government of Wyandotte County/Kansas City, Kansas, as representative of the Kansas City Board of Public...more
A school district in Texas recently prevailed in a failure-to-hire lawsuit when the court ruled that a legally blind applicant for a teaching position could not demonstrate that she’d have been able to manage student...more
When employers think of “medical leave,” most minds understandably jump to the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) or time off that employees may be entitled to under company-provided policies (sick leave, vacation, PTO, etc.)....more
This month, the California Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s grant of summary adjudication to the employer in a disability discrimination case alleging violations of the Fair Employment and Housing Act (FEHA). The...more
When a disabled employee requests a workplace accommodation, the Americans with Disabilities Act instructs the employer to determine whether the requested accommodation (or an alternative) allows the employee to perform the...more
When reviewing requests for accommodation from sick or injured workers, employers often focus on whether the requested accommodation is reasonable or whether it imposes an undue hardship on the company. ...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: The Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a summary judgment award on an employee’s failure-to-accommodate claim. The Court’s decision focused on the employer’s improperly narrow delineation of the...more
In EEOC v. Charter Communications, LLC, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals recently held an employee with a disability may be entitled to an Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) accommodation to get to work when attendance...more
Many employers have experienced an increase in employee requests for accommodations in the past few years. A federal jury’s recent award in Lisa Menninger v. PPD Development L.P. reminds employers that accommodation requests,...more
Your job descriptions may be more important than you think, and what better time to review and update them than the start of the new year? In this blog, we discuss why job descriptions are important and the things to consider...more
Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, employers are required to consider reassignment to an existing vacant position as a last ditch form of reasonable accommodation for an employee unable to return to their previous...more
Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, if an employee with a disability requests accommodation, the employer must work with that person to determine if there are reasonable measures that can be taken that allow the...more
Seyfarth Synopsis: Athleisure company is rightfully able to terminate the employment of individual with physical limitations, despite that individual’s ability to delegate such functions of her position. See Tonyan v....more
On February 24, 2020, the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of North Carolina issued an opinion in Brown v. Martin Marietta Materials, Inc. regarding disability discrimination, reasonable accommodations, and...more
In order to claim discrimination under the Americans with Disabilities Act, employees must demonstrate that they could perform the essential functions of the job but were denied a reasonable accommodation. Some employers...more
From time to time, we encounter requests from employees for accommodations under the Americans with Disabilities Act that appear unrelated to the employee’s underlying medical condition. For example, an employee with a back...more
A North Carolina federal trial court recently denied an employer’s request to dismiss a former employee’s disability discrimination and retaliation claims under the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”). The case provides a...more
On December 6, 2019, the New Jersey Appellate Division in V. L. v. Hunterdon Healthcare et. al., reversed and remanded a trial court’s order dismissing an employee’s claims of disability discrimination and retaliatory...more
The retail setting is a particularly difficult one in which to make accommodations. This is because retail employees engage in a host of different duties that require all manner of physical activities. Those who are...more
What happens if you give an employee an accommodation that goes above and beyond what the ADA requires? Can you change your mind down the road and stop providing that accommodation? Or are you stuck providing that...more
If asked to describe the essential functions of a given job, most employers would include actually showing up to work as a critical component. In recent years the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has taken the position...more
On October 29, 2019, a panel of Seventh Circuit Appellate Court Judges held that the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) does not cover alleged discrimination based on future impairments. Shell v. Burlington N. Santa Fe Ry....more
Under the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”), an employee is entitled to a reasonable accommodation if the employee has a disability and is a “qualified individual,” meaning that the employee can perform the essential...more