Many companies support their employees’ religious expression in the workplace by allowing workers to participate in religious discussions, prayer groups, email listservs and so on. Though these companies want to be as supportive as they can, it’s important to understand that there are risks inherent in allowing religious activities to take place in the work environment, particularly when one employee’s religious activity infringes on another employee’s rights or sensibilities.

Harassment and Accommodation

According to EEOC statistics from 1992 through 2005, there has been a 45% increase in religious discrimination charges filed. “Though all employees have first amendment rights, those rights are reduced in the workplace because they butt up against harassment and discrimination laws,” says Lynn Lieber, an employment law lawyer and CEO of Workplace Answers, a firm that sells Web-based employment law training. “At a certain point you don’t have the right to proselytize, to convert somebody to your religion, or to go to your temple or place of worship [during working hours].”

Another employment law lawyer, Dean Schaner, says that, typically, religious discrimination cases are related to either harassment or accommodation. Harassment cases generally involve individuals who proselytize—or are perceived to proselytize—in the work environment. That might be the employee who believes his calling is to convert his coworkers to his religion either overtly or in more subtle ways, through prominently displayed posters or religious symbols that coworkers consider offensive.

Accommodation cases relate to the employer’s duty to accommodate individuals’ religious beliefs. For example, this issue commonly comes up for Seventh Day Adventists, says Schaner, because their religion requires having time off work from sundown Friday to sundown Saturday. This isn’t a problem if the employee can exchange schedules with other employees. But, if such an employee’s time off causes other people to work harder and longer, then it could be construed as an undue hardship, says Schaner.

Other areas where the issue of accommodation may be raised relate to uniforms and dress codes, and affect employees who believe wearing certain clothing is part of their religion.

Perception Is Reality

Perception also plays a major role in creating or defining issues related to religious expression. For example, suppose an employee, who regularly attends a CEO-led prayer session, gets promoted over another employee who doesn’t attend the sessions. Or suppose a manager throws a party at home and invites a few staff members whom she is close to, but doesn’t invite a staff member who happens to be Jewish. There may be no intent to discriminate or exclude, but the opportunity for the perception of discrimination exists.

To help ensure that your well-intentioned efforts to provide a forum for employees to share their beliefs don’t backfire, here are some suggestions:

Be Inclusive

For example, instead of allowing for certain days of observance, consider offering paid time off that allows employees time off based on personal preference, not mandated observances.

Audit Your Hiring Practices

Be careful during an interview to avoid any religious questions or references, not only during the formal interview process, but during any part of your interaction with perspective employees. A casual discussion in which you might mention, in an off-handed way, that you and your children spent the weekend at a Bible camp, or that you attended a nephew’s Bar Mitzvah, could lead to future claims of bias.

Teach Sensitivity and Tolerance

Even inadvertent comments or discussions can create “hostile environments.” For example, a group of employees talking about controversies in the Middle East might say something negative about Israel or Lebanon, which could offend someone who isn’t even of that national origin or religion. Make sure that you educate staff, particularly management, to be aware of how things they say can be perceived as insensitive.

On the flip side, it’s also important to let employees know you support tolerance of other views and to teach them to consider intent behind inadvertent comments or inappropriate actions before taking offense.

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