BHR 3565, Employment Law 1 Course Learning Outcomes for Unit II Upon completion of this unit, students should be able to: 1. Explain the substance of the relationship between the employer, employee, and independent contractor. 1.1 Distinguish between proper and improper selection processes that employers use in hiring employees. 1.2 Discuss how employee testing can be used by employers in hiring employees and how testing can be misused by employers. 1.3 Describe the requirements that employers must satisfy in properly terminating employees. 1.4 1.4 Identify the situations where an employer may properly require that employees submit to polygraph testing. Reading Assignment Chapter 2: Selection Chapter 3: Testing Chapter 5: Termination Unit Lesson Employers have a variety of responsibilities that they owe to employees, and those responsibilities exist throughout the employment relationship, starting before the employment relationship even begins. Employers are entitled to select employees that they believe have the best qualifications for a specific position and who they think will do the best job and be the best employees. However, most of this course deals with issues of discrimination in employment, and employers have to be concerned about discrimination, beginning with the process of selecting employees. That means that, though employers are entitled to hire the employees they think are best suited for the job and the employer, employers still must be careful that they do not discriminate improperly in the selection process. We will see when we begin talking about discrimination in earnest that not all discrimination is illegal. There are certain specific “protected classes” that are identified, and discrimination on the basis of the characteristics of those “protected classes” is prohibited by law. For instance, an employer cannot discriminate – in aspect of the employment relationship – against people because of their color, race, national origin, religion, gender, age, or disability. We will also see that discrimination that is not intentional but that results from a rule or procedure or practice that seems, on its face, to be proper, is still prohibited. Discrimination that is intentional is called “disparate treatment,” and discrimination that is not intentional but that results from something that seems to be appropriate is called “disparate impact.” Employers have to be careful in all aspects of the employment relationship to avoid both disparate treatment and disparate impact discrimination, including in the hiring process. Of course, since there are specified classes that cannot be discriminated against, that means that there is some discrimination that is not prohibited. For instance, if I apply for a job and the employer thinks that my disposition is too bad for the job that deals with angry customers each day, that employer can refuse to hire me on that ...

1. BHR 3565, Employment Law 1
Course Learning Outcomes for Unit II
Upon completion of this unit, students should be able to:
1. Explain the substance of the relationship between the
employer, employee, and independent
contractor.
1.1 Distinguish between proper and improper selection
processes that employers use in hiring
employees.
1.2 Discuss how employee testing can be used by employers in
hiring employees and how testing
can be misused by employers.
1.3 Describe the requirements that employers must satisfy in
properly terminating employees.
1.4 1.4 Identify the situations where an employer may properly
require that employees submit to
polygraph testing.
Reading Assignment
Chapter 2:

2. Selection
Chapter 3:
Testing
Chapter 5:
Termination
Unit Lesson
Employers have a variety of responsibilities that they owe to
employees, and those responsibilities exist
throughout the employment relationship, starting before the
employment relationship even begins. Employers
are entitled to select employees that they believe have the best
qualifications for a specific position and who
they think will do the best job and be the best employees.
However, most of this course deals with issues of
discrimination in employment, and employers have to be
concerned about discrimination, beginning with the process of
selecting employees. That means that, though
employers are entitled to hire the employees they think are best
suited for the job and the employer,
employers still must be careful that they do not discriminate
improperly in the selection process.
We will see when we begin talking about discrimination in
earnest that not all discrimination is illegal. There
are certain specific “protected classes” that are identified, and
discrimination on the basis of the
characteristics of those “protected classes” is prohibited by law.
For instance, an employer cannot
discriminate – in aspect of the employment relationship –

3. against people because of their color, race, national
origin, religion, gender, age, or disability. We will also see that
discrimination that is not intentional but that
results from a rule or procedure or practice that seems, on its
face, to be proper, is still prohibited.
Discrimination that is intentional is called “disparate
treatment,” and discrimination that is not intentional but
that results from something that seems to be appropriate is
called “disparate impact.” Employers have to be
careful in all aspects of the employment relationship to avoid
both disparate treatment and disparate impact
discrimination, including in the hiring process.
Of course, since there are specified classes that cannot be
discriminated against, that means that there is
some discrimination that is not prohibited. For instance, if I
apply for a job and the employer thinks that my
disposition is too bad for the job that deals with angry
customers each day, that employer can refuse to hire
me on that basis, even though the employer’s refusal to hire me
is a form of discrimination (discrimination
UNIT II STUDY GUIDE
Employers’ Treatment of
Employees
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UNIT x STUDY GUIDE
Title

4. against people who do not have a good disposition). However,
employers have to be very careful because
there are characteristics that an employer might not like, but are
characteristics that are related to a protected
class. For instance, you have gray hair, and an employer might
not hire you because he or she prefers blond
hair. On its face, that might seem like a proper decision for an
employer, but gray hair is an indication of age,
and, as we will see later in the course, an employer cannot
discriminate on the basis of age. Again, employers
have to be very careful in deciding whether or not to hire
someone.
Employers are safest when they concentrate on job
qualifications:
interact with other
employees?
These are the kinds of questions that employers should ask
themselves and potential employees when a
specific job is being filled.
Employers also have to be careful how they advertise a job
opening to be sure that the simple act of
advertising does not result in disparate impact discrimination.
For instance, advertising job openings in a
magazine that is specifically targeted at men might result in

5. very few job applications from women, and that
could result in disparate impact discrimination against females.
Employers also have to be careful that the
wording of their advertisements does not result in
discrimination. For instance, advertising a job opening for a
man or a person of a particular race or a person of a specific age
could very well result in discrimination.
There are a few situations when employers are allowed to
advertise and hire in a manner that would
otherwise be discriminatory. If a specific job requires a “bona
fide occupational qualification,” the job can
specify characteristics of those who will be considered for the
job that are attributed to a protected class of
people. A bona fide occupational qualification is a job
qualification that legitimately requires a person with
specific characteristics that would be discriminatory except that
the job requires those characteristics. For
instance, if I am the director of a new film, and a part in the
film calls for a female actor, I can advertise for and
terminate a female actor without discriminating illegally. Or, if
a college that is associated with a specific
religion needs to hire a professor to teach a course about that
religion, it is not improper for that college to
advertise for and hire a person who professes that religion
(Moran, 2014).
It is important to note that companies that employ more than
100 people are required to keep records to show
that the way they advertise for employees and the way they
select employees is not discriminatory. If you
have ever applied for a job and been asked to fill out a card
indicating items such as your gender and
nationality, that is part of this recordkeeping requirement.
These records that are required to be kept can be
reviewed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, a

6. federal agency that oversees employment
processes for discriminatory practices (Moran, 2014).
Employers, in an effort to ensure that they are hiring the “right”
employees are often interested in testing
employees to determine if they have the necessary knowledge,
experience, and aptitude for the job.
Generally, such tests are proper, if the employer can show that
the tests are legitimately related to the job
requirements of the job to be filled. That is, testing can be used
to discriminate in hiring (disparate treatment),
and testing can also inadvertently discriminate (disparate
impact).
Some specific kinds of tests that can result in discrimination
include residency tests or requirements –
requiring that employees live in a particular location can make
sense, but, if the location specified is
predominantly white, for instance, that could constitute
disparate impact discrimination because the
requirement would necessarily exclude other races from being
eligible for the job. Physical skills tests have
been a particular problem. It makes sense, for instance, that a
fireman should be able to carry heavy
equipment up a ladder, but requiring that a person meet certain
strength or stamina requirements could have
the effect of eliminating females from being eligible for the job
of a fireman because females, in many cases,
have less strength and stamina than men. The solution to this
problem, in most cases, is to tailor the specific
physical skills test to the specific requirements of the job
(Moran, 2014).
Another kind of employee testing that has caused a number of
problems is polygraph (lie-detector) testing.
Essentially, polygraphs are not accepted as evidence in court

7. and polygraph tests are considered to be an
invasion of privacy in many cases. There is a federal law, the
Employee Polygraph Protection Act of 1988,
BHR 3565, Employment Law 3
UNIT x STUDY GUIDE
Title
which prohibits employers from requiring or even suggesting
that employees take polygraph tests except in a
few very specific situations (Moran, 2014).
Another form of employee testing that continues to be an issue
is drug testing. Like polygraph testing, drug
testing is seen as an invasion of the employees’ privacy, so the
general rule for employee drug testing is that
it is appropriate when either every employee is tested or when
drug testing is done on the basis of reasonable
suspicion that an employee is using drugs. That is, the employer
has to have a reasonable belief that a
specific employee is using drugs before that employee can be
tested for drug use. This is a particularly
difficult subject because it is clear that drug use adversely
affects employees’ performance and the success of
the employer, but the requirement of reasonable cause to
conduct employee drug tests seems to be the
middle ground between the competing causes of employee
privacy and preventing drug use on the job
(Moran, 2014).

8. Finally, in considering how employers treat employees, the
subject of employee termination has to be
addressed. Clearly, employers, especially in employment-at-will
situations, should have the right to terminate
an employee who is not doing his or her job or who is not
following company policy. In those situations, the
general rules that we have been discussing apply – employees
can be terminated, but the termination cannot
be discriminatory. That is, an employee cannot be terminated
based on a characteristic of a protected class.
A person cannot be fired by his employer because he is a male
or because he or she belongs to a certain
religion. The termination has to be based on not doing the job
that he or she was hired to do or not following
company policy. Of course, that means that the job requirements
have to be fully explained to the employee,
and except in the most extreme case, the employee has to be
told that he or she is not measuring up to the
job requirements and given an opportunity to improve. In the
case of a termination for not following company
policies, those policies must be clearly stated and the employee
told that he or she is not following company
policy and given an opportunity to show that he or she can
comply with company policy (Moran, 2014).
Reference
Moran, J. J. (2014). Employment law: New challenges in the
business environment (6th ed.). Upper Saddle
River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

9. Key Terms
1. Bona fide occupational qualification
2. Breach of contract
3. Constructive discharge
4. Negligent hiring
5. Nepotism
6. Polygraph
7. Residency requirement
8. Retaliatory discharge
9. Suspicion-based drug testing
10. Suspicionless search
11. Termination
12. Wrongful discharge
Unit VI Reflection Paper
Throughout this unit, you have learned that certain links exist
between emotions, motivation, and stress. In fact, if one does
not handle his or her stress effectively, numerous health issues
could arise.
For this assignment, you are to compose a two-page reflection
paper in which you examine a current or former stressful event
in your life. You must embrace Selye’s general adaptation
syndrome (GAS), and describe your reactions to the stressful
event during each stage. Be sure that you recount the various
facial expressions that you displayed as you progressed through
each stage as well. What coping strategies did you embrace to
help solve the problem? Additionally, how was your
professional work impacted by the stressor? Furthermore, did
you experience additional conflicts with other individuals as

10. you endured this life trial?
You must effectively examine each of the areas listed above.
Furthermore, you may visit the CSU Online Library to identify
a source that provides specific information on how this stressful
issue could impact your health, future goals, and motivation.
You must at least integrate the textbook as a source.
meant to give a concise overview of the featured stressful event
and is usually one paragraph in length. In your introduction,
you will reveal the featured stressful event that you will
description of the required areas listed above in the opening
statement, including Selye’s GAS, your facial expressions,
coping strategies, professional impact, and relationship
Analysis: In this portion of the paper, you should
provide information from the textbook and an additional source
identified from the CSU Library to analyze the impact that the
stressful event could have placed upon your health, future goals,
and motivatio
reflections for the featured topic. For instance, what
implications have you uncovered during your research that you
will apply to future stressful events?
Note: Do not forget to double space your response and use
Times New Roman 12 pt. font. This written assignment should
have a cover page, two full pages of content in which you
organize the four sections of the reflection based on the
guidelines as listed above, and a references page. You are
required to utilize the textbook and it should be included on
your references page along with any additional sources you may
have used. You should also have accompanying in-text citations
for each source that you have used throughout your response.
Unit 2 Case Study
Please read the Case 3.3 Velma Sue Bates v. Dura Automotive
Systems, Inc., found on page 76 of the textbook. Once you have
read and reviewed the case scenario, respond to the following

11. questions:
1. Do you agree with the court’s decision?
2. Is termination of nondisabled employees permissible when
they have a prescription for the medication for which they
tested positive?
3. Is there an ethical resolution to this case?
Your response should be a minimum of 400 words in length.
You are required to use at least your textbook as source material
for your response. All sources used, including the textbook,
must be referenced; paraphrased and quoted material must have
accompanying citations per APA guidelines.