Diversity Inc. on the pros, cons of disclosing disability in the workplace

From DiversityInc.:

If you're someone with a non-visible disability, you are entitled to your privacy and are under no obligation to bring it up in the workplace. But are there times when you should tell your employer—particularly if you need an accommodation such as flex time or a specific work environment? DiversityInc spoke to several experts to help you weigh your options and guide you through the process of disclosing a non-visible illness in the workplace.

To Tell or Not to Tell

"Under the law today, there is no duty to disclose unless [you] need a reasonable accommodation," says John D. Kemp, an attorney with Powers Pyles Sutter & Verville and executive director and general counsel for the U.S. Business Leadership Network (USBLN), a national organization that promotes the business imperative of including people with disabilities in the work force. He advises, "If you have a non-visible disability, share it carefully or not at all. It is of maybe no interest or business for the employer to know it if it does not affect your performance or the safety conditions [in the workplace]."

There is another point of view on this. National Organization on Disability (NOD)'s Director of External Affairs Nancy Starnes advises people to be proactive in their communication. "Certainly, if you know that your condition is one that you know is going to come up it's probably a good idea to take the bull by the horns and maintain control of the information flow and disclose it as soon as possible," she says.

When your safety and that of others in the office is an issue, however, it's best to be upfront with your employer. "The law has always allowed for the requirement of the disclosure of disability if safety issues are in play," warns Kemp. "If [employees] fail to disclose when they should have, it is grounds for termination or reassignment."

The Down Side

Unfortunately, failure to communicate can often lead to damaging misunderstandings about your standing as a successful or productive employee. "Sometimes an employer, if they are not aware of your disability, is going to equate difficulties with performance with the fact that maybe you're not good for the job when the issue is really about needing an accommodation for the disability," says Starnes. "You are the only one, if you have a hidden condition, who can make that distinction for the employer."

Lori Golden is the AccessAbilities leader and inclusiveness consultant at Ernst & Young, No. 3 in The 2009 DiversityInc Top 50 Companies for Diversity. AccessAbilities is an affinity group that provides guidance on and raises awareness of workplace issues affecting people with disabilities. Golden suggests not waiting until it's too late to share your disability with your employer. "If people wait until a disability has negatively affected their performance," she says, "it can be too late to rebuild the relationships and to rebuild the person's reputation."

The Up Side

If you should decide that disclosure is the best choice for you, be sure to include the following items on your checklist before you talk to human resources and/or your supervisor: medical or other documentation that shows a disability exists and possible documentation that shows that the accommodation being requested is reasonable for your condition. Be prepared: Your employer may want it authenticated by the company physician. Also, have a full understanding of your condition; your employer may have a lot of questions for you.

While it may be a bit overwhelming, there can be many positive results of disclosure, including your willingness to find the best work situation for your needs. "Just knowing what's going on in the workplace, coordinating your individual needs with the schedule of output, the goals and objectives of the company, shows that you're part of the team discovering the solution," says Starnes.

Golden adds, "It also has the benefit of building trust. Some degree of openness at some level builds trust with the people you work with. That's really important for everybody but especially important with an individual with a disability because that individual is going to need his or her supervisor and colleagues and organization to collaborate with him in order to literally work around that disability."

While an accommodation is a unique situation, it doesn't mean that the employee involved is adding any less to the company than his or her coworkers. "An accommodation does not mean you change the standards of performance; the bar is not lowered," emphasizes Golden. "Our people with disabilities need to and do perform at the same high-quality level, but they might get the jobs done differently. We find that by harnessing individual differences, we get better work results."