Discrimination in Hiring: What Does It Look Like?

Employers in Palm Beach Gardens and throughout the state of Florida are prohibited from discriminating against job applicants and cannot engage in unlawful discrimination while hiring new employees. While many current employees in South Florida know that they have rights when it comes to prohibitions against various kinds of discrimination in the workplace, it is essential for job applicants to know that they have certain protections, too. Indeed, whether you have simply seen a job advertisement for a position that you have considered applying to, or you have gone through with an interview and background check, a potential employer cannot unlawfully discrimination during the hiring process.

What does discrimination in hiring look like? The US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) provides information about various ways in which unlawful discrimination might occur during the stage of hiring, and a Palm Beach Gardens employment discrimination attorney at our firm can explain in more detail.

Recruiting and Advertising 

When an employer is advertising a new job position or actively recruiting applicants for an opening, the employer cannot engage in any form of discrimination that is prohibited by state or federal law, including discrimination on the basis of race, religion, sex, age (40 or over), disability, and other protected classes. What this means in practice is that an employer cannot post job ads that seek employees of a particular race or sex or state a preference for employees of a particular race or sex, for example. Further, employers cannot discourage certain applicants from applying on the basis of their membership in a protected class. This also applies to any word-of-mouth recruitment practices.

Reviewing Job Applications and Conducting Interviews 

Employers cannot discriminate (on the bases discussed above, as well as based on membership in other protected classes) when reviewing job applications, deciding who to interview, or in conducting interviews. What this means in practice is that an employer cannot decide to interview candidates of a particular race or sex or religion, for example, or decide to interview only people under the age of 40. Employers also cannot decide to reject applications from job applicants with disabilities, and cannot ask questions about an applicant’s membership in a protected class during a job interview with the intention of excluding applicants of certain protected classes from the possibility of receiving a job offer.

Pre-Employment Inquiries Cannot Involve Discrimination 

Finally, employers are not prohibited from making pre-employment or pre-offer inquiries about a job applicant’s disability status, and employers should not ask pre-employment or pre-offer questions, especially about an applicant’s membership in a protected class, other than to determine whether the job applicant is qualified for the position.

Contact Our Palm Beach Gardens Employment Discrimination Lawyers 

Did you recently apply for a job or go through an interview process that involved what you believe was unlawful discrimination? It is important to have a lawyer assess your case as soon as possible. One of the experienced Palm Beach Gardens employment discrimination attorneys at Sconzo Law Office can talk with you today to learn more about your experience in a job hiring process and to assist you in filing a claim if you faced unlawful discrimination. The best way to determine if your experience did involve unlawful discrimination is to discuss the particulars with a lawyer who routinely represents clients in employment discrimination cases. Contact us today for more information.

Source:

eeoc.gov/prohibited-employment-policiespractices