The Legal Environment: Equal Employment Opportunity and Safety class

1
The Legal Environment Equal Employment
Opportunity and Safety (class 6)

• Chapter 3 Tuesday, January 31st
• 2006

2
Agenda

• Learning Objectives
• The Home Depot Case
• The legal system in the U.S. and Major EEO law
  and how they are enforced
• Important court cases and types of discrimination
• Sexual harassment
• OSHA, and Business Week
• Job Analysis Due on Thursday February 2nd
  (class 7)

3
Learning Objectives

• Three branches of govt/role played
• Major federal laws-equal employment / protections
  of each
• Roles/responsibilities/requirements of federal
  agencies
• Three theories of discrimination (title VII)
• Sexual harassment org. steps to eliminate
• Preferential treatment
• Provisions of OSHA employee rights

4
Home Depot

• What are the important issues to take from the
  Home Depot case?
• What argument is Home Depot making to support its
  apparently discriminatory hiring practices
  against female applicants (hint BFOQ-easy or
  hard, p. 107)
• What would Home Depot need to prove in order to
  support a continuation of this kind of apparently
  discrepant hiring practice?

5
The Legal System

• The legislative branch (House of Representatives
  and Senate)-describe this and what comes out of
  this branch of the system
• Executive (President and regulatory agencies
  overseen by the President)-describe
• Judicial (court system)-describe
• (how do these branches of the system influence
  the legal environment for HRM? How would expect
  that they affect the profile of Home Depot -
  specifically?)

6
Summary of Major EEO Laws and Regulations
Protection of act against misapplication
7
Enforcement of Equal Employment Opportunities

• Equal Employment Opportunity Commission
• Investigation and Resolution
• Information Gathering
• Issuance of Guidelines (uniform guidelineswhat
  are these?)
• Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs
• Utilization analysis, goals and timetables,
  action steps

8
Court Cases

• Disparate treatment McDonnell Douglas v. Green
  Hopkins v. Price Waterhouse
• BFOQ?
• Disparate Impact Griggs v. Duke Power Wards
  Cove Packing v. Antonio
• 4/5th rule? standard deviation rule?
• (what is the difference between disparate
  treatment and disparate impact??) p. 109
• Reasonable Accommodation Walmart

9
Types of Discrimination
Disparate Treatment
Disparate Impact
Reasonable Accommodation

• Show intent?
• - Prima facie case
• - Employers
• defense
• - Plaintiffs
• rebuttal
• - Damages
• - Key
• litigation

10
Types of Discrimination
Disparate Treatment
- Show intent? - Prima facie case - Employers
defense - Plaintiffs rebuttal -
Damages - Key litigation
- Yes - member of protected group - show
BFOQ - reason a pretext - compensatory/
punitive - McDonnell Douglas v. Green Hopkins
v. Price Waterhouse
11
Types of Discrimination
Disparate Treatment
Disparate Impact
- Show intent? - Prima facie case - Employers
defense - Plaintiffs rebuttal -
Damages - Key litigation
- Yes - member of protected group - show
BFOQ - reason a pretext - compensatory/
punitive - McDonnell Douglas v. Green Hopkins
v. Price Waterhouse
- No - statistical disparity - show job
relatedness - other ways exist - equitable
relief - Griggs v. Duke Power Wards Cove
v. Atonio
12
Types of Discrimination
Disparate Treatment
Disparate Impact
Reasonable Accommodation
- Show intent? - Prima facie case - Employers
defense - Plaintiffs rebuttal -
Damages - Key litigation
- Yes - member of protected group - show
BFOQ - reason a pretext - compensatory/
punitive - McDonnell Douglas v. Green Hopkins
v. Price Waterhouse
- Yes -Failure to be accommodated - Job
relatedness and business necessity -
compensatory/ punitive -Wal-Mart
- No - statistical disparity - show job
relatedness - other ways exist - equitable
relief - Griggs v. Duke Power Wards Cove
v. Atonio
13
Sexual Harassment

• Unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual
  favors, and other verbal or physical contact of a
  sexual nature constitute harassment when
• Submission to such conduct is made either
  explicitly or implicitly a term or condition of
  an individuals employment
• Submission or rejection of such conduct by an
  individual is used as the basis for employment
  decisions affecting such individuals, or
• Such conduct has the purpose or effect of
  unreasonably interfering with an individuals
  work performance or creating an intimidating,
  hostile, or offensive working environment.

14
Sexual Harassment

• Sexual Harassment
• Bundy v. Jackson quid pro quo what is this
  case?
• Meritor Savings Bank v. Vinson
• hostile working environment what is this
  case about? (reasonable woman standard??)

15
Preferential Treatment

• Affirmative action-increase minority
  representation-originally make extra efforts to
  attract/retain minority employees
• In time has resulted in a quota system what is
  this?
• Imposed quotas-Fire Department in Brimingham,
  Alabama
• EEOC 50 of positions at all levels held by
  minorities even though labor market 28
  minorities reverse discrimination?
• ADA Americans with Disabilities Act
• Lots of legal activity focus is on minor
  disabilities problems with implementation
  /examples of ADA-induced changes? (educational
  contexts? professional contexts?)

16
OSHA

• Occupational Safety and Health Act -1970
• Authorizes the federal government to establish
  and enforce occupational safety and health
  standards for businesses engaging in interstate
  commerce (everyone)
• Employee rights
• Request an inspection
• Have a representative present
• Have dangerous substances identified
• Be promptly informed of exposure/given records of
  exposures to hazards
• Have employer violations posted at the worksite
• (OSHA here at the College of Business??)

17
Overview Systems-Thinking
Business Strategy
Labor Markets
Organizational Design/Work Processes
Behavioral/Role Requirements
HRM Systems
Legal Environment
Technology
18
Questions

• Many companies have dress codes that require men
  to wear suits and women to wear dresses. Is this
  discriminatory according to disparate treatment
  theory?
• The reasonable woman standard recognizes that
  women have different ideas of what constitutes
  appropriate behavior than men have. What are the
  implications of this distinction? Do you think
  it is a good or bad idea to make this distinction?

19
Questions?

• Job analysis exercise and sample job descriptions
  (team exercise due on Thursday)
• Ask any questions you have about the Job Analysis
  Activity Teams will turn in a single project

20
Home Depot

• Home products retailer home repair,
  do-it-yourself projects
• Founded in 1982, 100K employees, 500 stores
  nationwide
• Growth Strategy building new stores
• Superior customer service (i.e., hiring
  knowledgeable people, people who can teach
  customers how to do repairs)
• Huge competitive advantage in the market

21
Home Depot, Continued

• Legal problems 70 of merchandise employees,
  male, 70 of operations employees, female
• Lawsuit 17K current/former employees 200K
  rejected applicants
• Home Depots defense issue of experience
• Charge reinforcing gender stereotypes

22
Home Depot, continued

• Racial suit five black employees passed over
  for promotion in favor of equally qualified white
  employees performance reviews based on race

23
The Executive

• Propose bills to congress
• Veto-power over bills passed by congress
• Regulatory agencies responsibility for law
  enforcement
• Issuance of executive orders
• Appoints judges in federal judicial system

24
The Judiciary

• First level consists of the US district court
  system and judicial agencies (e.g., the National
  Labor Relations Board hears cases regarding
  disputes between unions and management)
• The US court of appeals hears appeals from the US
  district courts
• The Supreme Court serves as the final court of
  appeal decisions only overturned through
  legislation (the legislative branch)