Because appraisals can influence compensation, promotions, staff cutbacks, and termination for cause, they are covered by employment laws. Applicable laws include Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which makes it illegal for a manager to discriminate against an employee because of race, color, sex, creed, or national origin; the Equal Pay Act, which stipulates that employees who perform similar jobs must be paid equally; the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA), which protects employees more than 40 years of age in hiring and promotion decisions; Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act, which prohibits managers from discriminating in promoting the handicapped; the Vietnam Era Veterans Readjustment Assistance Act, which protects disabled veterans and veterans of the Vietnam era; and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which makes it illegal to discriminate in hiring, in job assignments, and in the treatment of employees because of a disability.
The last doesn’t affect evaluations directly, but it should be considered if you are giving a poor evaluation to someone with a disability. Could it land you in court? Maybe, but it probably won’t. The law doesn’t allow disabled individuals—no matter the disability—to get away with not doing their work. But every reasonable effort must be made to accommodate an employee’s work to the disability, and you need to prove that you’ve done so. This brings us to the important subject of documentation.