Every year, “Blue Monday” (the third Monday in January) trends as a cultural moment to acknowledge the weight many people carry into a new year. The concept itself has been widely debunked as a marketing invention rather than science, but it still opens a door for constructive conversations about mental health at work.

Whether or not we buy into the “saddest day” framing, the week is a timely cue to examine how depression and other mental health conditions can be misread as misconduct, and how that misreading can escalate into harassment or discrimination problems if we don’t apply a human rights lens early and consistently.

1. What We Often Miss: Depression ≠ “Rude,” “Aggressive,” or “Unprofessional”

Depression doesn’t always announce itself as sadness. In the workplace, it can present as: withdrawal or avoidance, reduced communication, irritability or impatience, slower responses or decision fatigue, emotional flatness, or inconsistent follow through.

In a fast paced environment, those behaviours are easy to label as insubordination, attitude problems, or poor performance. Colleagues can feel dismissed; managers can see delays as defiance; teams can interpret disengagement as intentional.

And that’s precisely where a human misunderstanding can become a legal problem, if we treat health related manifestations as discipline worthy conduct without pausing to ask the right questions.

Where Ontario Law Comes In: Two Duties That Change the Conversation

Under Ontario’s Human Rights Code, most mental health conditions, such as depression, fall under the protected ground of disability. That triggers two employer obligations that matter profoundly in investigations:

• The Duty to Inquire

When an employer knows or ought reasonably to know that a change in behaviour may be disability related, it has a duty to inquire, basically, to open a reasonable, non intrusive conversation before making adverse decisions. This isn’t a diagnosis seeking moment; it’s a door opener to have a candid conversation that helps avoid mischaracterizing symptoms as misconduct.

• The Duty to Accommodate to the Point of Undue Hardship

If depression is influencing conduct, employers must explore accommodations, modified duties, flexible timelines, additional supports, until undue hardship is reached on cost, health, or safety grounds (a high bar most workplaces never reach).

Accommodation obligations operate alongside the duty to maintain a healthy, safe and respectful workplace. Accommodation doesn’t excuse harassment, but failing to consider disability related factors can itself be discriminatory.

2. A Canadian Story: Fair v. Hamilton Wentworth District School Board

• The stress signal.

For years, SF supervised asbestos removal for a school board, a high stakes work with personal liability risks. She developed an anxiety disorder, later accompanied by depression and PTSD, and went off work. Her physicians said she could not return to an identical high liability supervisory role but could work in other roles.

• The missed turn.

While SF was off, two supervisory roles opened up, and they did not carry the same personal liability stressors. The Board did not place her in those roles, and ultimately terminated her employment, asserting it could not accommodate without undue hardship.

• What the Tribunal and Courts found.

The Human Rights Tribunal of Ontario (HRTO) found discrimination based on disability: the employer failed to explore individual accommodation options, both procedurally and substantively. The remedy was extraordinary: reinstatement (about a decade post termination) and lost wages plus compensation for injury to self-respect, dignity and feelings, decisions upheld by the Divisional Court and, in 2016, by the Court of Appeal for Ontario.

• The lesson for investigations.

The Fair case is not a “discipline for misconduct” scenario, it’s an accommodation failure, but it stands as a cautionary tale for any file where symptoms (slowed responses, withdrawal, avoidance) might be misread and acted upon without a human rights screen. The cost of missing that screen can be measured not just in damages but in trust, reputation, and team safety and health.

3. The Blue Monday Takeaway

Symbolic or not, this week is a reminder that mental health is part of the investigative landscape. Misreading mood disorders as intentional misconduct risks proportionality and legal exposure. A trauma informed, human rights aware investigation recognizes that impact matters, context matters, and accommodation is part of the fairness architecture, not an afterthought.

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