Image Credit: danielle_blue on Flickr (https://www.flickr.com/photos/82705783@N00/101958911) CC BY-SA 2.0, Link Okayyyyyy! Oh, hold up. Not that Holy Grail. Back in September, the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals gift-wrapped an FMLA opinion for local employers. I blogged about it here. In Severson v. Heartland Woodcraft, Inc. (here), the Seventh Circuit held that “a multimonth…
Articles Posted in Discrimination and Unlawful Harassment
What makes for good headlines isn’t necessarily unlawful harassment
Image Credit: Photofunia.com Last week, I was debating whether to do an Aziz Ansari post. But, then I read my buddy Robin Shea’s post at Employment & Labor Insider. She nailed it, of course. So, I’m going to take a different angle on something that’s not workplace harassment either. Before I…
New Jersey’s new governor wastes no time going after equal pay and gender equity issues.
Image Credit: www.publicdomainpictures.net (License: CC0 Public Domain) Well, that sure was fast. [Cue music] On Tuesday, Phil Murphy assumed the office of Governor of the State of New Jersey. My first official act as governor would have been making sure that all of the washrooms in Office of the Governor…
89,000 reasons to take a more holistic approach to workplace accommodations
Image Credit: photofunia.com Here’s a reminder from the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for employers to think twice about setting a deadline on an employee’s accommodation request. For example, last week the EEOC announced that it had settled a religious accommodation lawsuit against a North Carolina hospital. According to the…
What does it take to be individually liable for discrimination? A lot.
Image Credit: Photofunia.com Most discrimination lawsuits involve a single, individual plaintiff and, on the other side of the “v,” a company as the sole defendant. But, sometimes, that plaintiff will name additional individual defendants too, such as a manager, supervisor, or even someone from Human Resources. When that happens, what…
Dear Handbook: Is it cool if I spray air fresheners to mask my co-worker’s obnoxious chronic body odor?
Image Credit: Photofunia.com For Amber Bridges, a former City of Indianapolis employee, it allegedly got her fired. But, that didn’t stop her from filing an Americans with Disabilities Act lawsuit. Now, I know what you’re thinking, “Spraying air fresheners around a co-worker with body odor seems a bit passive-aggressive.” “What…
Dude, where’s my car?
Image Credit: Photofunia.com The title of this blog post is somewhat misleading. Yes, this post combines cars and employment law. But, more than anything, it was just an excuse to use this cool image, play The Cars – a song called “Drive,” no less – and say, “Dude, where’s my…
Lawsuit: Google discriminates against male, white, and conservative employees.
Image Credit: Photofunia.com Remember that male Google software engineer who got fired last year after posting a 3,300-word criticism of Google’s diversity policies on the company’s internal website. If you don’t check this out. Well, guess what? Dude just filed this class-action lawsuit against Google. Among other things, he and the other…
What might changes to sexual-harassment laws look like?
Image Credit: Pixabay.com The heck are you asking me for? Oh, right. The whole employment lawyer thing. ***cracks knuckles; adjusts sash*** Let’s do this… I’m going to skip the whole “unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past few months” schtick and fast forward to this past Tuesday. It…
What do a pizza-delivery driver, a gynecologist, and an employment-law blog have in common?
You were expecting a different start to 2018 at The Employer Handbook? “‘Black-hearted’ mum gets Pizza Hut employee fired for saucy joke written in box.” I adore that subheader. But, I can’t take credit for it. It comes from a UK tabloid. (We may have won the Revolutionary War, but the…