that she asked for assistance in identifying alternative positions from other members of the human resources department and received minimal help in that regard. See id., vol. II, at 285. In short, there is at least an issue of fact as to whether BCBS failed to satisfy its obligation to interact actively with Cravens in the search for an appropriate accommodation. See Taylor v. Phoenixville Sch. Dist., 184 F.3d 296, 316 (3d Cir.1999) (“[W]hile an employee who wants a transfer to another position ultimately has the burden of showing that he or she can perform the essential functions of an open position, the employee does not have the burden of identifying open positions without the employer’s assistance. ‘In many cases, an employee will not have the ability or resources to identify a vacant position absent participation by the employer.’ ”) (quoting Mengine v. Runyon, 114 F.3d 415, 420 (3d Cir.1997) (Mengine)); Aka, 156 F.3d at 1304 n. 27 (noting that an employer has a “corresponding obligation to help [an employee] identify appropriate job vacancies (since [employees] can hardly be expected to hire detectives to look for vacancies)”); Dalton, 141 F.3d at 677 (“[T]he ADA places a duty on the employer to ascertain whether [the employer] has some job that the employee might be able to fill.”) (internal quotation marks omitted). The breakdown in communications that apparently occurred in the present case is especially troubling in a large company like BCBS, where workers “may not be aware of the range of available employment opportunities.” Mengine, 114 F.3d at 420.
Finally, assuming BCBS acted in bad faith by failing to engage in such an interactive process, BCBS has produced no evidence that reassigning Cravens to either the telecommunications position or one of the other nine identified positions would have created an undue hardship.
Thus, we hold that the district court erred in granting summary judgment for BCBS, because “there is a genuine dispute as to whether the employer acted in good faith and engaged in the interactive process of seeking reasonable accommodations.” Fjellestad, 188 F.3d at 953.
Conclusion
We therefore reverse the district court’s order and remand the case to the district court for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
SONY COMPUTER ENTERTAINMENT AMERICA, INC., a Delaware corporation, Plaintiff–Appellee,
v.
BLEEM, LLC, Defendant–Appellant,
and
David Herpolsheimer; Jaime Felix, Defendants.
No. 99–17137.
United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.
Argued and Submitted Feb. 14, 2000
Filed May 4, 2000
As Amended on Denial of Rehearing and Rehearing En Banc July 10, 2000[1]
- ↑ Judge O’Scannlain and Judge Rymen vote to deny the petition for rehearing en banc and Judge Leavy so recommends.
