After taking a few days off and rocking out in Seattle, I’m back to blogging about employment law. 🤘🤘🤘
Today, we pull back the curtain and reveal how the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission will address failure-to-accommodate claims under the Supreme Court’s new religious accommodation standard established last year in Groff v. DeJoy. Continue reading
Suppose an employee gets fired after complaining about sexual harassment at work. If that person later claims retaliation, they will have to establish a nexus between the two events, and the complaint also arises to the level of what we call a “protected activity.” Continue reading
A recent federal appellate court decision is an important reminder to confirm early—not later—whether the employee suing your business signed an arbitration agreement. Continue reading
I’m going to tell you about a transgender man who worked for three years as a sergeant for a state prison. While working at the prison, he began the process of medically and socially transitioning to align with his gender identity. He underwent hormone replacement therapy, obtained a legal name change, and decided to live openly as a man.
Since he had to disclose his gender identity at work, the employee contacted Human Resources. On a phone call with the HR director, during which the employer inquired if he “had the surgery,” the employee could hear people laughing.
As others learned about the man’s transition, he endured what the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals described as “constant and humiliating harassment.”
Imagine being an employer-defendant and reading that sentence as the lede in a court’s summary judgment opinion.
Ouch! Continue reading
In a recent Fourth Circuit decision, the plaintiff learned this lesson the hard way. Continue reading
“Miscarriages can be personally devastating. No one should have to choose between getting the pregnancy care they need and losing a job.” Continue reading
Earlier this year, I wrote about a white employee in Colorado who claimed his former employer subjected him to a hostile work environment by requiring him to attend anti-harassment training.
Employment lawyers and human resources professionals regularly preach that managers must document employee performance issues as a best practice so that if/when that manager wants to terminate the employee, the company has the “receipts” to justify the decision. Continue reading
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