On MLK Day, with a few of my co-workers and my four-year-old son, I performed community service. We went to a local center and spent a few hours making peanut butter sandwiches to feed the homeless.
Actually, we spent a half-hour or so making sandwiches. Most of us spent the remainder of the time continuing to make sandwiches, while my son ate peanut butter.
Win-win.
Today we have a guest blogger at The Employer Handbook. It’s Samantha Hopkins. Samantha is a law student who just received her big break.
She gets to guest blog at The Employer Handbook!
(Want to guest blog on an employment-law topic at The Employer Handbook? Email me).
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I give a lot of “respect in the workplace” trainings. And I generally tell the audience that, while a single offensive comment or act in the workplace is one incident too many, one instance generally does not create a winning lawsuit. That’s because a plaintiff must show that he/she was subjected to either severe (really, really bad) or pervasive (a lot of bad) behavior to establish a hostile work environment.
Now, there are some exceptions. New Jersey is one of the few states that has held that a single discriminatory comment can create an actionable hostile work environment claim.
But what if, instead of a slur, we have an assault; one which the plaintiff claims was not only unwelcome, but particularly disturbing?
That may be sugar coating it a bit.
A county employee, who applied for a lateral transfer, and ultimately received that transfer, was able to convince two judges on a federal appellate court that the transfer was discriminatory.
That’s right. An employee may have a discrimination claim for receiving the specific transfer he requested.
Today we have a guest blogger at The Employer Handbook. It’s Holly DePalma. Holly is Director, HR Services at MidAtlantic Employers’ Association, a single source for HR services, delivering responsive, practical solutions to its members.
(Want to guest blog on an employment-law topic at The Employer Handbook? Email me).
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“Dad, give me at least 24 hours out here before asking me to guest blog, would ya? Yeesh…”
“Last time, we gave you 200 words on Sesame Street, and you paid us in Cap’n Crunch. We’re calling the DOL. And organizing!”
According to a recent study soon to appear in the Journal of Management, not only is Facebook a horrible predictor of how younger recruits will perform for your business — there is absolutely zero correlation between Facebook activity and job performance — but those who rely upon Facebook to help judge potential younger recruits, are more likely to disqualify African-American and Hispanic candidates, in favor of Caucasian Facebook users.
Kashmir Hill details the study here in a recent article on Forbes.
So, if failing to meaningfully distinguish between younger job candidates, while increasing your odds of being sued for disparate-impact discrimination appeals to you, well then, have at it hoss!
Sorry, Aquaman. You’re SOL, son.
But Aquaman does love to get down to MGMT, I’m told. So here you go…
Same goes for the plaintiff in this case — the telepathy part, not MGMT — in which the employer had a leave policy which dictated that employees may take up to six months of leave if unable to perform his/her job with or without reasonable accommodation. After that, it’s sayonara, unless prohibited by law, or if the employee requests a leave extension.
Today, we have a guest blogger at The Employer Handbook. It’s Johanna Harris. Johanna has been a trial attorney with the U.S. Department of Labor and in-house labor counsel for two multinational corporations. She is currently the CEO of Hire Fire and Retire LLC. Her new book, USE PROTECTION: An Employee’s Guide to Advancement in the Workplace, is a basic primer on HR law and personnel policies.
Flexible work arrangements take many forms. Arranging flexible hours and schedules can be fairly straightforward and is often dictated by business needs. Flexibility of work location, however, is more difficult to manage. After the jump, this guest post addresses the issues raised by allowing employees to work at locations other than their assigned offices.
(Want to guest blog on an employment-law topic at The Employer Handbook? Email me).
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Back in September, 2013, I blogged here about a NY jury finding that a black plaintiff called the n-word — by her black boss — had been subjected to race discrimination.
Actually, her boss called her the n-word eight times!
“Well, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, that’s 103 fewer times than the ‘N’-word was used in Django Unchained,” is what the defense’s closing argument sounded like, I imagine.
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