How To Avoid Disability Discrimination

The single most useful habit to avoid disability discrimination is asking whether a requirement is genuine or inherited. Most refused adjustments defend a way of working rather than a need of the role.

Test it with three questions. What outcome does this requirement actually produce. Would the work still be done properly if it were met a different way. And can you point to why this particular method is necessary, beyond that it is how the role has always run.

Applied to real examples, that separates a genuine requirement like being able to respond to a client within an agreed time from an inherited one like being physically present between fixed hours to do it.

Getting this right also improves the role description, which is worth doing regardless. The Commission’s guidance on employee rights under the Disability Discrimination Act sets out the obligation. This is general information rather than legal advice.

See Sentrient’s equal employment opportunity course and workplace compliance courses.