The Compliance Radar with Amber

Starting September 2, suitability action appeals move from the Merit Systems Protection Board to OPM itself, and my concerns about housing rulemaking, enforcement, and appeals all under one roof are still valid, that kind of consolidation is worth watching regardless of intent.

That said, credit where it's due: a couple of the safeguards OPM added actually tighten up gaps that existed in the old process. The agency, not the appellant, now carries the burden of proving the charges and that the action was substantively proper, and adjudicators can order additional investigation whenever the existing record isn't enough to resolve a material issue, both real, specific improvements, not just window dressing.

So this isn't a clean "power grab" story, but it isn't a clean "nothing to see here" story either. It's a structure that added real due-process teeth while still keeping the whole process in-house, and both of those things can be true at once.

Once again, we see the EEOC stepping in to correct a discrimination imbalance. I get where the old thinking on roles like this came from, but both men and women have proven time and again that those generalizations don't hold up anymore.

Assuming someone can or can't do a job based on their sex, instead of actually testing what the job requires, is exactly the kind of shortcut that gets employers sued.

Bottom line: hire the person who's right for the job based on their skills and qualifications, not a long-standing tradition that stopped making sense a long time ago. If anything, this is a good nudge for employers to take a hard look at their pre-employment qualification standards now, before a lawsuit forces the issue.

There are so many red flags in this one, whether it's Sutter's staff needing more ADA training, a real review of what open positions actually existed, or a closer look at how qualifications get assessed role to role.

I don't think "reasonable accommodation" is actually the vague, hard-to-interpret standard employers sometimes treat it as. The EEOC's own guidance spells out exactly how the vacant-position process is supposed to work. So the real question is whether that language is being ignored rather than misunderstood.

And if an employee is still qualified to do a job somewhere in the organization, I genuinely don't see what an employer gains by jumping straight to termination instead of working through the accommodation process. It's not just a legal obligation, it's a loyalty and retention play.

Taking care of an employee who wants to keep working for you, even if it means a lateral move, builds the kind of trust that pays for itself many times over.

This one is full of red flags, and it's blatant discrimination against women, full stop. I understand an employer's concern about staffing gaps, even a temporary loss of an employee can genuinely strain a small business, but concern about scheduling doesn't justify denying someone employment outright, especially after she'd already proven she could do the job.

From a recruiting perspective, this is also a good reminder that asking about pregnancy, or someone's plans to become pregnant, opens the door to exactly this kind of liability. The question itself becomes evidence if a rejection follows, whether or not that was the intent.

Cases like this raise a bigger question across every industry: how many qualified candidates are quietly passed over the same way, without ever getting a quote like this one on the record?

It's the kind of story that creates real fear for people who have, or want, a family. Fear that being honest about their life will cost them a job or invite retaliation, even though the law has protected against exactly this for decades.