Spanish speaking employees are making negative comments - can we make them speak English? 01-04-2008

Inside of our company, there is a handful of employees, all men, who are bi-lingual. They speak English fairly well and are fluent in Spanish. When they get together they all immediately speak Spanish leaving everyone else in the room in the dark with regard to their discussion. However; many of us know a little Spanish here and there and can fairly guess that they are making negative comments, or just plain talking about non work related topics. Can we enforce an English-only work place?? Your advice on this topic will be appreciated.

Rita Risser replies:

Wow - people who speak only English at your workplace never make negative comments and never talk about non-work related topics??? Although there are a few limited circumstances when employers can enforce English-only in the workplace, the general rule is that people should ignore the conversations of others, and if any reprimands are to be made for making negative comments or non-work-related conversation, everyone must be reprimanded, no matter what language they speak.

Information here is correct at the time it is posted. Case decisions cited here may be reversed. Please do not rely on this information without consulting an attorney first.