Don't quit your current job!
Bloomberg Law had a good article yesterday by Jo Constantz about AI-conducted job interviews. (Paid subscription may be required to access.) According to the article, many companies are now...more
5/30/2025
/ Algorithms ,
Anti-Discrimination Policies ,
Artificial Intelligence ,
Automated Decision Systems (ADS) ,
Bots ,
Employment Litigation ,
Employment Policies ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Human Resources Professionals ,
Interviews ,
Job Applicants ,
Legal Technology ,
Litigation Strategies ,
Machine Learning ,
Wage and Hour
Dad-of-seven will go to jury on religious discrimination.
This sounds like the kind of thing that might happen to a woman, but this time it (allegedly) happened to a man.
A devout Catholic man (we'll call him "Dad") was...more
At least one court says yes.
True confession: When I was a little future lawyer, I was sometimes a pain. (So, Robin, you’re saying your personality hasn't changed in all these years?) When I was being especially “high...more
4/17/2025
/ Adverse Employment Action ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Employees ,
Employer Responsibilities ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Employment Litigation ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Performance Reviews ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Tenure ,
Title VII ,
Universities
Then again, you might.
Jocelyn Samuels was initially appointed to be a Commissioner on the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission by President Trump, and then she was reappointed by President Biden. Not long after...more
The Board has a quorum again . . . for now.
In one of his first acts after taking office, President Trump fired Gwynne Wilcox, a Democratic member of the National Labor Relations Board and former Chairman....more
Everything's enjoined! Almost.
It's been a tough week for President Trump, but he doesn't seem to be letting the bad news get him down.
To avoid ruining the Valentine's Day mood, I'll keep this week's update...more
2/14/2025
/ Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Employee Benefits ,
Employee Rights ,
Employment Policies ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Employees ,
Final Rules ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Labor Reform ,
Nominations ,
Presidential Nominations ,
TRO ,
Trump Administration ,
Unions
Resistance is building. In his third week in office, President Trump is beginning to meet with resistance to some of his initiatives. Here is the latest.
Court blocks voluntary separation program -- at least, until Monday....more
2/7/2025
/ Citizenship ,
Collective Bargaining ,
Constitutional Challenges ,
Employment Litigation ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Executive Orders ,
Federal Employees ,
Hiring & Firing ,
NLRA ,
NLRB ,
NLRB General Counsel ,
Preliminary Injunctions ,
Regulatory Agenda ,
Regulatory Reform ,
Trump Administration ,
Wage and Hour
I've been asking this a lot lately.
President Trump’s first week of his second term in office was action-packed, as I posted last week. If you thought things would slow down for Week 2, you were mistaken.
You may remember...more
1/31/2025
/ Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Department of Labor (DOL) ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Federal Employees ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Military Service Members ,
NLRA ,
NLRB General Counsel ,
Reinstatement ,
Title VII ,
Trump Administration ,
Vaccinations ,
Wage and Hour
Employer going to trial in age discrimination case. We had a blizzard last Friday (in North Carolina, 2 inches is a blizzard), and we still have ice and snow on the ground a week later.
Anyway, I've had enough of winter now...more
1/22/2025
/ Age Discrimination ,
Corporate Counsel ,
Discrimination ,
Diversity and Inclusion Standards (D&I) ,
Documentation ,
Employee Rights ,
Employee Training ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Employment Litigation ,
Employment Policies ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Human Resources Professionals ,
Performance Reviews ,
Summary Judgment ,
Termination ,
Title VII ,
Wage and Hour ,
Wrongful Termination
A (not so) perfect cluster. Happy new year, everybody. During the holidays, a federal judge in Wisconsin ruled that an employee’s pregnancy discrimination claim will go to a jury. The plaintiff (we’ll call her “Katy”) was...more
You can't make this stuff up.
I hope everybody had a good Thanksgiving.
A federal judge just down the road from me ruled this week that a woman’s retaliation case should go to a jury, even though her sexual harassment...more
Here are the four things the employer did right. I hope everyone had a fun Halloween last night.
And before Halloween gets too far into the distant past, check out this scary HR story: A full-time adjunct instructor at the...more
11/1/2024
/ Adjunct Faculty ,
Documentation ,
Employment Contract ,
Ethics ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Investigations ,
Religious Discrimination ,
Retaliation ,
Termination ,
Title VII ,
Wage and Hour
Learn from a real employer's mistakes. Imagine this scenario: You are advertising for an open position. You get three applicants:
•Applicant 1 meets or exceeds all of your requirements.
•Applicant 2 fails to meet your...more
Just a little harm will do. On Wednesday, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that Title VII does not require a plaintiff to show that a discriminatory transfer to another position caused her to suffer “significant” or...more
4/19/2024
/ Adverse Employment Action ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Employee Transfers ,
Employer Liability Issues ,
Employment Litigation ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Lateral Transfers ,
Muldrow v City of St Louis ,
SCOTUS ,
Sex Discrimination ,
Title VII
What's good for the goose . . . A person who is discriminated against for not being transgender can have a valid claim under Title VII for “sex” (really, gender identity) discrimination.
In McCreary v. Adult World, Inc., a...more
These steps could help keep you out of trouble.
An employee in a safety-sensitive job who has been diagnosed with cancer is selected for a random drug test. The test result comes back positive for TCHA...more
2/9/2024
/ Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) ,
Cannabis Products ,
Civil Rights Act ,
Department of Transportation (DOT) ,
Documentation ,
Drug Testing ,
Employment Policies ,
Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Marijuana ,
Medical Marijuana ,
Reasonable Accommodation ,
THC ,
Wage and Hour
Don't shoot from the hip.
Let's say you have an employee who is in Week Six of "employee's own serious health condition" leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act.
Her co-worker comes to you and tells you that the...more
With some help from Charles Dickens.
Marlie was dead: to begin with. There is no doubt whatever about that. The register of her burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge...more
12/22/2023
/ CFOs ,
Exempt-Employees ,
Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) ,
Federal Labor Laws ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Hostile Environment ,
Human Resources Professionals ,
Sexual Harassment ,
Threshold Requirements ,
Wage and Hour ,
Willful Violations ,
Working Time Regulations
You won't want to miss this!!! You all probably read respectable news sources. I subscribe to a number of "sober" mainstream publications, but have a sick attraction to the Daily Mail and the New York Post....more
12/8/2023
/ Age Discrimination ,
Complaint Procedures ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Employment Policies ,
Harassment ,
Hiring & Firing ,
Job Applicants ,
Performance Reviews ,
Performance Standards ,
Protected Class ,
Recruitment Policies ,
Termination ,
Wage and Hour
Better to have the courage of your convictions.
I'm sure you've heard of "quiet quitting," when an unhappy employee does the bare minimum to get by and keep drawing a paycheck, but doesn't care much about the job beyond...more
These six will get the EEOC's attention in 2024-28.
Last week, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission released its Strategic Enforcement Plan for 2024-28. Strategic Enforcement Plans provide a helpful preview of...more
9/29/2023
/ Algorithms ,
Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) ,
Anti-Harassment Policies ,
Artificial Intelligence ,
Bias ,
Coronavirus/COVID-19 ,
Employment Discrimination ,
Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) ,
Equal Pay ,
Harassment ,
Hiring & Firing ,
LGBTQ ,
Pregnancy ,
Retaliation ,
Salary/Wage History ,
Strategic Enforcement Plan ,
Vulnerable Victims
It's the law. Did you know that this Monday, August 21, is National Senior Citizens' Day? Neither did I. But it is!
How are you going to spend National Senior Citizens' Day? I was thinking about playing shuffleboard,...more
Then again, it may have been that "FU" text I sent the boss.
You can't make this stuff up.
For those of you who think I'm too hard on employers, today is your day. There was an excellent pro-employer decision recently...more
People, it doesn't work.
There was a court decision last week from my home state of North Carolina that left me shaking my head.
A social worker sued her ex-employer, a non-profit, claiming (among other things) that she...more
Employers, don't be too rigid about employee notice requirements.
Weird case from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
Imagine this: You're the HR manager at a manufacturing facility. An hourly employee has...more