HR Basics: Equal Employment Opportunity

HR Basics is a series of short courses, designed to highlight what you need to know about a particular human resource management topic. In today’s HR Basics, we define equal employment opportunity, exploring the law, discrimination in the workplace and the agencies responsible for preventing it.

Equal employment opportunity (EEO) is the term used to describe laws, regulations, and processes related to fair treatment of employees. Basing employment decisions on factors other than worker qualifications is generally illegal in the United States. The costs of litigation, penalties, and harm to the company’s reputation can be substantial when violations occur.

Discrimination means treating people differently. We choose to treat people differently every day. Discrimination becomes problematic when people are not treated fairly because of characteristics they possess that have nothing to do with their ability to perform a particular job.

In this course, we will cover EEO laws, concepts of discrimination and the regulatory agencies responsible for antidiscrimination in employment. Equal employment opportunity means that employment decisions must be made on the basis of job requirements and worker qualifications.

To begin, lets focus primarily on regulations in the form of equal employment opportunity (EEO) laws and other regulations related to fair treatment of employees. Equal Employment Opportunity laws prohibit specific types of job discrimination in the workplace.

Employment discrimination is a form of discrimination based on protected characteristics by employers. Unlawful discrimination occurs when those decisions are made based on protected characteristics, which are individual attributes such as race, age, sex, disability, or religion that are protected under EEO laws and regulations.

A protected class is a group of people with a common characteristic who are legally protected from employment discrimination on the basis of that characteristic. These traits are called “protected characteristics” and referred to as “protected classes.”

The two main enforcement bodies for EEO are the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) and the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) (in particular, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs [OFCCP]). The EEOC is responsible for developing guidelines and overseeing compliance with most of the antidiscrimination laws. The OFCCP is responsible for the same activities relative to executive orders.

Equal employment opportunity (EEO) is employment that is not affected by illegal discrimination. It is a broad-reaching concept that essentially requires employers to make status-blind employment decisions. Status-blind decisions are made without regard to individuals’ personal characteristics (e.g., age, sex, race).