Increasingly, Canadian employers face new and challenging requests for accommodation based on a variety of grounds. Understanding when the duty to accommodate is triggered and how far it extends can be vexing for even the most seasoned HR leader and employer.

This practical, half-day workshop will provide you with knowledge and tools to confidently assess and respond to a request for accommodation. Applying interactive learning, real scenarios, and templates to take back to your workplace, we’ll cover:

1. Duty to Accommodate

• What constitutes discrimination (and what does not)?
• An employer’s procedural and substantive duty to accommodate, and how to meet that duty
• Employer and employee legal obligations

2. Key Issues in Accommodation

• Duty to inquire: When does an employer have a duty to inquire?
• Medical information: How to obtain useful medication information in response to a claim of physical and/or mental disability
• Mental disability: Strategies to accommodate
• Family status: Work from home, scheduling, and jurisdictional differences
• Creed: What does it mean, what types of beliefs are protected, and jurisdictional differences
• Gender identity and expression: Facilities, leave, pronouns and names
• Conflicting human rights: When different employee rights clash

3. Discipline and Termination

• What is a “bona fide occupational requirement”?
• Can an employee receiving an accommodation be disciplined or dismissed?
• At what point is an employment relationship “frustrated”?

Every experienced HR professional knows these three things to be true:

1. An employer is required by law to investigate any allegation, or reasonably known incident, of workplace harassment;

2. A well planned and executed investigation can help an employer make sound and defensible decisions and minimize any liability that may arise.

3. Easier said than done!

This very popular, interactive workshop is designed to enhance your knowledge and skills and provide tools to conduct an effective workplace harassment investigation.

Using real life-scenarios, we’ll tackle:

• What type of incident or complaint must be investigated?
• What is (and is not) workplace harassment?
• How to prepare for and conduct an investigation interview.
• How to deal with tricky investigation situations.
• How to address credibility and other evidentiary issues.
• How to reach defensible findings of fact.
• How to write a complete, well-organized and effective harassment report.
• What to do after the investigation is complete.