It is illegal to discriminate in the workplace based on religion. Employers are expected to reasonably accommodate the religious practice of an employee or prospective employee unless doing so would cause an undue hardship to the employer. Use this information to guide you.
Accommodations
Employers should:
Inform employees that they will make reasonable efforts to accommodate employees’ religious practices
Train managers and supervisors on how to recognize religious accommodation requests from employees
Consider developing internal procedures for processing religious accommodation requests
Individually assess each request and avoid assumptions or stereotypes about what constitutes a religious belief or practice or what type of accommodation is appropriate
Employers and employees should fully and promptly discuss the extent needed for any necessary information about the employee’s religious needs and the available accommodation options.
An employer is not required to provide an employee’s preferred accommodation if there is more than one effective alternative to choose from. An employer should, however, consider the employee’s proposed method of accommodation, and if it is denied, explain to the employee why his proposed accommodation is not being granted.
When faced with a request for a religious accommodation that cannot be promptly implemented, an employer should consider offering alternative methods of accommodation on a temporary basis while a permanent accommodation is being explored. In this situation, an employer should also keep the employee apprised of the status of the employer’s efforts to implement a permanent accommodation.
Undue hardship
Managers and supervisors should be trained to consider alternative available accommodations if the particular accommodation requested would pose an undue hardship.
The “de minimis” undue hardship standard refers to the legal requirement. This means that, as with all aspects of employee relations, employers can choose to go beyond the requirements of the law and be flexible in evaluating whether or not the accommodation is feasible.
An employer should not assume that an accommodation will conflict with the terms of a seniority system without first checking if there are any exceptions for religious accommodation or other avenues to allow accommodation.
Nor should an employer automatically reject a request for religious accommodation just because it will interfere with the existing seniority system. Although an employer may not upset co-workers’ settled expectations, an employer is free to seek a voluntary modification in order to accommodate an employee’s religious needs.
Employers should train managers to be aware that if the requested accommodation would violate the seniority system, they should confer with the employee to determine if an alternative accommodation is available. Reasonable accommodation may require making exceptions to policies or procedures that are not part of a seniority system, where it would not infringe on other employees’ legitimate expectations.
Schedule changes
Employers should work with employees who need an adjustment to their work schedule to accommodate their religious practices.
Employers may choose voluntarily to incur whatever additional operational or financial costs they deem appropriate to accommodate an employee’s religious need for scheduling flexibility.
Employers should consider adopting flexible leave and scheduling policies and procedures that will often allow employees to meet their religious and other personal needs. Such policies can reduce individual requests for exceptions.
To do this, employers might consider:
Floating holidays
Alternative work schedules
Voluntary substitutes or swaps
An employer should encourage voluntary substitutions and swaps with employees of substantially similar qualifications by:
Publicizing its policy permitting such arrangements
Promoting an atmosphere in which substitutes are favorably regarded
Providing a central file, bulletin board, group e-mail or other means to find a volunteer to substitute or swap
Change of job assignments and lateral transfers
An employer should consider a lateral transfer when no accommodation is possible without undue hardship. However, an employer should only resort to transfer after fully exploring accommodations that would permit the employee to remain in their position.
Where a lateral transfer is unavailable, an employer should (if possible) consider offering a lower-paying position if that position would enable the employee to abide by his or her religious beliefs.
Modifying workplace practices, policies and procedures
Employers should make efforts to accommodate an employee’s desire to wear a yarmulke, hijab or other religious garb. If the employer is concerned about uniform appearance in a position that involves interaction with the public, consider whether the employee’s religious views would permit him to resolve the religious conflict by, for example, wearing the item of religious garb in the company uniform color(s).
Managers and employees should be trained not to engage in stereotyping based on religious dress and grooming practices and should not assume that atypical dress will create an undue hardship.
Employers should be:
Flexible and creative regarding work schedules, work duties and selection procedures to the extent practicable
Sensitive to the risk of unintentionally pressuring or coercing employees to attend social gatherings after the employees have indicated a religious objection to attending
Permitting prayer, proselytizing and other forms of religious expression
Employers should train managers to:
Gauge the actual disruption posed by religious expression in the workplace rather than merely speculating
Identify alternative accommodations that might be offered to avoid actual disruption (e.g., designating an unused or private location in the workplace where a prayer session or Bible study meeting can occur if it is disrupting other workers)
Employers should incorporate a discussion of religious expression and the need for all employees to be sensitive to the beliefs or non-beliefs of others into any anti-harassment training provided to managers and employees.
Employee best practices
Employees who seek to proselytize in the workplace should cease doing so with respect to any individual who indicates that the communications are unwelcome. They should:
Advise their supervisors or managers of the nature of the conflict between their religious needs and the work rules
Provide enough information to enable the employer to understand what accommodation is needed and why a religious practice or belief necessitates it
Source: U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
