2007 EEO-1 requires new data collection method
Issue:

Private employers with 100 or more employees, and those with 50 or more employees and who are prime contractors or first-tier subcontractors with a federal contract of $50,000 or more, must file the Employer Information Report (EEO-1). The EEO-1’s categories on ethnicity and race have been substantially unchanged since 1977, but in June 2003 the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission proposed changes in light of the 1997 federal government’s revision of standards for reporting race and ethnicity. The EEOC’s changes were finalized in November 2005. In order to give employers time to adjust to the changes, they were scheduled to take effect with the reporting cycle due at the end of September 2007. What must employers do differently to comply with the new format?
Answer:    

The changes to the EEO-1 impact the information collected and maintained, as well as the method for collecting it. The changes relate to both an employer’s new hire procedures and its current workforce.

Self-identification. Previously, employers determined ethnicity and race for the EEO-1 by visual observation. Now, however, the EEOC is strongly endorsing employee self-identification and says employers may use employment records or visual observation to gather race and ethnic data for EEO-1 purposes only when employees decline to self-identify. This means that employers must create a procedure for employee self-identification.

Two basic principles govern EEO-1 data collection:

  1. Employees must be offered the opportunity to self-identify, and
  2. Employees must be provided a statement about the voluntary nature of the inquiry.

Two-question format. The revised EEO-1 utilizes a “two-question format” under which employees are first reported as either “Hispanic or Latino” or as “Not-Hispanic or Latino.” Those employees who are reported as “Not-Hispanic or Latino” are further classified by race.

Ethnicity/race categories. While there were previously only five categories for ethnicity or race, there are now a total of seven categories. The two new categories are the result of:

  • adding a category for “Two or more races not Hispanic or Latino,” and
  • separating “Asians” from “Pacific Islanders.”

Although the EEOC did not mandate a specific questionnaire to obtain demographic data on its employees (and commends any employer efforts to collect more detailed data than is needed to complete the EEO-1 report), employers must, at a minimum, have the data necessary to complete the EEO-1 report. Therefore, they should undertake self-identification of new employees under the new ethnicity/race categories as soon as possible.

Resurveying not required. The new ethnicity/race categories also have the potential to render demographic data on an employer’s existing workforce obsolete. While the EEOC did not mandate that employers resurvey their workforce before submitting the first EEO-1 in the new format, the agency indicated that employers should take advantage of opportunities to resurvey their workforce as much and as soon as possible, such as through routine updating of employees’ personal information.

Hawaiians take notice. Establishments in Hawaii are no longer permitted to report employment data by gender alone. Rather, employers in Hawaii need to complete the revised EEO-1, reporting the gender, race and ethnicity of employees in each of the job categories.

Source: Human Resources Management, Equal Employment Opportunity Guide

[ Return to top of document ]