Recently Mr. Bob Jones filed a claim after our production schedule changed to rotating 12-hour shifts with four days on and four days off. He states this violates his religious beliefs of not working on Sunday. His resignation may eventually be construed as constructive discharge and may require attention as once.

Due to the claim Bob Jones filed, we need to understand how constructive discharge is relevant. In Mourad v. Automobile Club Ins Ass’n, constructive discharge is the act of making working conditions intolerable forcing an employee to resign. Mr. Jones was unable to work on Sundays for the new rotation of production employees and resigned.

Covered under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, adverse impact would also be relevant in this situation by applying the same standard to all employees while only affecting one class negatively (Gomez-Mejia, 2010), in this case, religion. Mr. Jones could not work on Sunday due to his religious beliefs. This, in turn, will be seen as an act of forcing an employee to make a decision based on his/her religious beliefs.

In the case of Turner v. Anheuser-Bush, Inc., the employee actually quit, but the constructive discharge was actually viewed as termination. Also, in the case of Valdez v. City of Los Angeles, “whether conditions were so intolerable as to justify a reasonable employee’s decision to resign is normally a question of fact.” We do not want the court to believe we forced Mr. Jones to resign due to religion. Additionally, in the case of Dr. Sammie E. Harris v. Detroit Public Schools, we do not want the court to access taxable costs associated with a trial if we can prevent the trial from occurring.

My recommendation is to offer Mr. Jones a comparable position within the company if at all possible. We do have office staff positions that do not work on Sundays. This may be an option.