Looking ahead to 2021 after volatile election season

The employment law landscape has undergone massive shifts in 2020. Here are some thoughts on the big picture and what employers may be able to learn from the embattled year of COVID-19, economic stress, and racial divisions.

A message from the coronavirus quarantine

Our law firm has been working remotely since March 16. In the past six months, I visited my downtown Charlotte office only three times. On each occasion, I was there for only a few hours, not the full day.

Fortunately, I’ve had the luxury of working and serving clients from my home, and it has gone well. We’ve been able to talk and strategize the same way we would if I had been downtown on the 37th floor of a high rise. In other words, despite occasional interruptions from my spouse working her own job, business has carried on as usual.

Many of you, however, don’t have the same opportunity. Your business needs employees to be on-site and not working remotely. For companies like yours, this has been a true challenge. In addition to making your workplaces safer, you’ve had to deal with:

• Employees who fear coming back into the facility; and
• Others who engage in high-risk behavior and represent a potential danger to coworkers.

At the same time the pandemic has been progressing, the cry for social justice has never been louder.

Steps you can take

We don’t pretend to have all the answers, but with this environment, here are some thoughts to consider as we move through the next months together: