California employers may not be as knowledgeable as they need to be as far as workers with disabilities are concerned. Federal law does not require disability training; therefore, employers may not always act prudently while facing issues regarding employees with these issues.
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission issued a report stating that the number of disability discrimination claims had surpassed the number of racial discrimination claims in 2019. According to several human resources managers, companies in the United States have few initiatives that address disability inclusion and, according to the Society for Human Resource Management, approximately 50% of all human resource managers have not received any training for disability inclusion.
This lack of disability training could explain why employers may not understand how to address disability inclusion issues within their organizations. In fact, employers may be focusing on sexual and racial discrimination training, even though disability inclusion training is equally as important. If human resource managers have never experienced any disability conflicts within their organizations, disability inclusion training may not have been top-of-mind for their employers. However, lack of proper disability training does not mean that employers are exempt from complying with federal or state laws.
Disability inclusion training entails providing instructions on how to provide accommodations that can allow disabled individuals the ability to function within the workplace as well as the recommended methods of communicating with them, including refraining from speech or actions that disabled individuals may consider offensive. Although some employers may think of disabilities as being physical, they should consider mental disabilities as well.
Disabled individuals may struggle with discrimination in the workplace. Employees who believe they are being discriminated against at work may benefit from speaking with an employment law attorney who may be able to offer a positive legal solution.
