The Essential Guide to Family & Medical Leave

68 | THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO FAMILY AND MEDICAL LEAve
Leave for Employee’s Own Serious Health Condition
When an employee takes time off for his or her own serious health condition,
an additional qualification applies: The employee must not only have a serious
health condition as defined above, but must also be unable to perform the
functions of his or her job.
An employee is unable to perform the functions of the position if the
employee cannot work at all or cannot perform one or more of the essential
functions of the job, as defined by the Americans With Disabilities Act
(ADA). Under the ADA, essential functions are the fundamental duties of
the position—those things that the person holding the job absolutely must
be able to do.
It can be tough to figure out which job duties are essential, unless you
already have a job description that designates the essential functions of the
position. If you don’t, you’ll need to consider which functions are absolutely
necessary to doing the job successfully and which are not.
RESOuRCE
Need help drafting job descriptions? For detailed guidance on identifying
a job’s essential functions and using them to create a legal, effective job
description, see The Job Description Handbook, by Margie Mader-Clark
(Nolo).
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), the federal
agency that enforces the ADA, looks at these factors in determining whether
a function is essential:
• the employer’s own assessment of which functions are essential, as
demonstrated by job descriptions written before the employer posts or
advertises for the position (this caveat is intended to discourage employers
from designating essential functions solely to disqualify particular
applicants with disabilities from holding the job)
• whether the position exists to perform that function
• the experience of workers who actually hold that position
• the time spent performing that function