Pregnant women face numerous medical challenges. They also frequently experience professional setbacks during and after pregnancy.
While there are federal and state regulations prohibiting pregnancy discrimination, businesses may still try to push a pregnant worker out of the company to control costs or avoid perceived inconvenience. Pregnant professionals generally need to understand how discrimination might manifest in the workplace so that they can respond effectively.
What are the most common forms of pregnancy discrimination?
Refusing to hire, promote or include pregnant women
Employers might ask inappropriate questions during job interviews or when an existing professional applies for a promotion. Workers should not have to disclose their pregnancies or lose opportunities because of them.
In some cases, pregnant women may not lose their jobs. Instead, they may not get to continue working in customer-facing positions or to participate in the best projects due to their visibly pregnant state.
Denying reasonable accommodations
Pregnant women often need certain accommodations to continue working safely throughout their pregnancies. Employers should offer reasonable accommodations during pregnancy and if a woman breastfeeds her child.
Refusing to modify job tasks, allow work-from-home arrangements, provide assistive technology or work around pregnancy symptoms can all leave pregnant professionals at an unfair disadvantage in the workplace. Some women lose their jobs when they become pregnant. Others find that their career development stalls because of pregnancy.
Fighting back against pregnancy discrimination generally requires documentation and legal support. Women who fight back can potentially regain lost ground regarding their career development and even prompt companies to change how they treat their employees.
