Religion is often treated as a private matter that should remain outside the workplace. Yet new research from Rice University suggests that this approach may be creating more problems than it solves. Faith influences how many employees understand ethics, identity, community and personal responsibility, even when they rarely discuss religion openly on the job. When organizations avoid the subject entirely, researchers say, they may overlook a major dimension of workplace life—and miss an opportunity to improve inclusion for religious and nonreligious employees alike.
Elaine Howard Ecklund, a sociologist at Rice University, has spent years investigating how religion operates inside professional environments. Her research draws on surveys of more than 15,000 workers and job seekers, focus groups involving religious leaders and employees, in-depth interviews and a broad analysis of existing scholarship. Together, these methods provide a detailed picture of how people experience faith at work, including the ways religious identity can influence hiring, workplace relationships, ethical decision-making and feelings of belonging.
The findings challenge the assumption that religion is primarily a source of conflict that organizations must control. Although religious disagreements can create tension, Ecklund’s work indicates that faith is more often connected to ordinary questions about meaning, integrity and social responsibility. Employees may interpret their work through religious values, seek time or space for prayer, observe dietary or holiday practices, or draw on faith-based communities for support. Others may identify as atheist, agnostic or religiously unaffiliated and still be affected by the ways organizations handle religion.
“Whether or not you are personally religious, religion still matters in society,” said Ecklund, professor of sociology, the Herbert S. Autrey Chair in Social Sciences and director of Rice’s Boniuk Institute for the Study and Advancement of Religious Tolerance. She argues that many workplaces reduce religion to a compliance issue, treating it as a potential source of discrimination or disruption rather than as part of the complex identities employees bring with them. This narrow approach can encourage silence, leaving workers uncertain about whether they can discuss their beliefs, request accommodations or challenge religious bias without being viewed as difficult.
From a technical research perspective, the project examines religion as a social identity that interacts with organizational systems. The researchers consider how formal policies, informal workplace norms and power relationships shape employees’ experiences. A policy may officially protect religious expression, for example, while an office culture subtly penalizes workers who request schedule changes for holy days. Similarly, a company may prohibit religious harassment yet fail to recognize how jokes, assumptions or stereotypes can influence promotion decisions and team dynamics. These gaps between written rules and lived experience are central to understanding why inclusion policies sometimes produce limited results.
Ecklund describes faith as a “window” into wider tensions involving ethics, identity and belonging. Discussions about religious accommodation can expose broader questions about whose needs are treated as normal, whose practices are considered inconvenient and who is expected to adapt. The same organizational systems that make it difficult for a Muslim employee to observe daily prayers, a Jewish employee to take time off for a holiday or a Christian employee to avoid Sunday scheduling may also affect workers with disabilities, caregiving responsibilities or nontraditional family obligations. Designing workplaces that respond thoughtfully to religious diversity can therefore reveal principles that support inclusion more broadly.
Rather than presenting the findings only in academic journals, Ecklund and Denise Daniels of Wheaton College translated the research into the book “Working for Better: A New Approach to Faith at Work.” The authors designed the book for readers outside universities, including managers, employees, religious communities and people who simply want to understand how faith enters professional life. Ecklund has discussed the research with religious organizations, faith-based colleges and universities, major research institutions and professional associations. She has also tested the accessibility of the work through informal discussions, including a book group held at her home with neighbors from academic and nonacademic backgrounds.
That public-facing approach reflects Ecklund’s work at Rice’s Boniuk Institute, where researchers study religious discrimination, violence, tolerance and pluralism across social settings. Workplaces are an important part of that broader landscape because they bring together people with different beliefs under shared institutional rules. The institute’s research considers how societies can move beyond merely tolerating religious difference toward building conditions in which people can participate without suppressing important parts of their identities. In this framework, workplace inclusion is not simply a matter of adding more holidays to a calendar. It involves examining language, leadership, scheduling, accommodation procedures, recruitment, conflict resolution and the informal expectations that determine who feels accepted.
The book recently received the 2026 Outstanding Applied Research Award from the Religious Research Association, an international organization that recognizes innovative and publicly meaningful scholarship on religion. The award committee cited the authors’ ability to convert rigorous research into an accessible resource for a broad audience. Ecklund said the recognition was unexpected and especially meaningful because it came from peers in the field. The award will be presented at the association’s annual meeting in Denver this fall. The research was funded by Lilly Endowment Inc. under grant 2017-0021. For organizations confronting increasingly diverse workforces, the central message is direct: avoiding conversations about religion does not make religious difference disappear. It only makes its effects harder to see, measure and address.
Subject of Research: Religion, religious diversity and inclusion in the workplace
Article Title: “Working for Better: A New Approach to Faith at Work”
Web References: Rice University Boniuk Institute for the Study and Advancement of Religious Tolerance; Religious Research Association Outstanding Applied Research Award
References: Elaine Howard Ecklund and Denise Daniels, “Working for Better: A New Approach to Faith at Work”; research funded by Lilly Endowment Inc. (2017-0021)
Keywords: religion at work, workplace diversity, religious inclusion, faith and employment, organizational culture, religious discrimination, spirituality, sociology, social science, workplace ethics
