| | August 2020MANAGEHRMAGAZINE.COM8In MyOpinionUNDERSTANDING EMPLOYEES' NEEDS WILL PROVE HIGHLY BENEFICIALBy Bernadette Sargeant and Sharon Ng, Labor & Employment Partner, Stinson LLP"I'm just trying to do my job!" A shopper in the supermarket parking lot turned when she heard the man raising his voice at another shopper who was getting into her car several feet away. The shopper turned in time to see the man in his store clerk's uniform with a bandana over his nose and mouth catch a shopping cart the other woman pushed at him. Everyone in the store had seemed on edge. Many of the employees wore makeshift face coverings like the man in the parking lot but it was impossible to maintain the required social distance inside the store's aisles. When the shopper who watched this incident returned to the store two weeks later, she saw that all the store employees were wearing masks and gloves. She was surprised to see the positive mood among the employees many of whom nodded to her with smiling eyes as she shopped with her own nose and mouth covered by a scarf. She didn't have to be an employment lawyer to conclude that, based on just the small changes she could see, their employer's steps to improve working conditions had a positive effect on the workers in the store.As businesses plan a return to the workplace, employers must prepare to approach the concerns and requests that their employees will raise. Workplace safety is obviously a fundamental issue. Requests for accommodation are another set of issues employers need to address. An employer that responds in a timely and empathetic way will lessen the risk of liability and the added expense of potentially protracted litigation.African Americans, Hispanics and some other non-white populations are disproportionately affected by the pandemic. Regardless of the race of the employee, an employer needs to respond effectively if a worker with diabetes, for example, requests an accommodation because of his or her increased risk of severe impact from exposure to COVID-19. Equal treatment is the rule, but an employee could feel supported by an extra Bernadette Sargeant
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