plant-paprika-pepper-grow-82728We’re still got about a month and a half to go, and the list of notable sexual harassers (allegedly) is growing faster than my youngest can eat her peas.

Often, when we hire high-level executives, we resort to employment agreements. And in those employment agreements, we include provisions requiring the new hire to affirm that working for the new company will not cause that person to violate any restrictive covenants or other pre-existing agreements.

So, I have a question for you. Continue reading

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When a company has an employee who is approved for leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act, sometimes that employer get nervous about parsing FMLA-qualifying absences from other sick days that have nothing whatsoever to do with the employee’s underlying serious health condition. The end result is an employee who gets not only FMLA leave but extra leave that exceeds his or her bank of time off.

Those employers, well, they’re shook!

Let’s see how one employer handled it the right way.
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Image Credit: YouTube.com (screenshot)

Juli Briskman was out riding her bicycle when she was passed on the road by Donald Trump’s motorcade. So, she showed ’em the middle finger.

And, it was at that precise moment that a White House photographer traveling with the president as he left one of his golf courses happened to catch the one-finger salute on film. Ms. Briskman a viral star on social media.

Who knew that she would lose her job for it so quickly? Continue reading

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“There’s Little Evidence Sexual Harassment Trainings Work,” wrote Madison Pauly in this article at Mother Jones.

Ms. Pauly notes that the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission received over 162,000 EEOC Charges of Discrimination between 2010 and 2015. Plus, she cites a University of Oregon associate law professor’s study, which concluded that trainings are “too often ‘a hollow exercise in corporate compliance’ that tend to emphasize that harassment is bad for workplace productivity while glossing over the point that harassment is a kind of discrimination—which she believes could serve a ‘moral anchor’ to make the trainings more convincing.”

Is Ms. Pauly’s article on point? Maybe. Actually, before I commit, let me google “moral anchor.”

Ah, nuts to that. Here’s my hot take on five more reasons why your workplace anti-harassment training is ineffective. Continue reading

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Image Credit: Pixabay.com (https://pixabay.com/en/wave-water-sea-tsunami-giant-wave-11061/)

And here you thought you were so smart by getting all of your employees to agree to class-action waivers and binding arbitration of all employment-related claims.

Maybe not so much. Continue reading

Webster County, Nebraska courthouse courtroom 3Suppose that your former employee files a Charge of Discrimination with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. After an investigation, the EEOC concludes that there is probable cause that your company violated one or more of the federal anti-discrimination laws that the agency is tasked with enforcing.

So, your employee decides to the file a lawsuit in federal court. And, those claims get all the way to a jury.

Can the employee-plaintiff introduce evidence that the EEOC already determined that the employer-defendant probably discriminated against the plaintiff?

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Tomorrow is Halloween.

Slacking this year, my family made our last-minute trip to the farm on Saturday for pumpkins. The kids held it together for the most part, except when it was every boy and girl for himself/herself in the “cornbox.” Fortunately, there were plenty of cider donuts available to encourage good behavior and a well-timed crash right before bedtime. 😉

Fortunately, we did not procrastinate on other Halloween preparations. Continue reading

“Doing What’s Right – Not Just What’s Legal”
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