The COVID-19 pandemic placed a spotlight on the challenge of juggling work and personal obligations, including coordinating the demands of virtual learning, school closures, and other scheduling issues. Even as the...
Employment Law Letter
For decades, American employers have relied on judicial precedent and the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) to enforce predispute mandatory arbitration agreements, which are signed before any known conflict arises between...
Retaliation continues to be at the top of the federal government’s priority list. In March 2022, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued a new field assistance bulletin titled Protecting Workers from Retaliation, which...
With Proposition 207’s passage in November 2020, Arizona joined the growing list of states legalizing adult recreational marijuana use. As the legalization and decriminalization trend continues (including with recent...
Sadly, in the past 12 months, I have been hired to investigate or assist in investigating employee embezzlement more times than in the past 15 years combined. Embezzlement is the theft or misappropriation of funds or...
As summer approaches, many employers are looking to hire student interns. The benefits of summer internships are mutual: Companies create an accessible group of potential future hires, while interns obtain real-world...
In years past, employees who requested remote working arrangements were often met with strong resistance from managers, who viewed such requests as excuses to shirk responsibilities. Holding firm to a “face time”...
Governor Jay Inslee signed the Silenced No More Act (Engrossed Substitute House Bill 1795) into law on March 24, 2022, making Washington the second state in the nation after California to prohibit employers from using...
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis recently signed House Bill (HB) 7, the Stop the Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees (WOKE) Act. The measure applies to employers with 15 or more employees and aims to restrict how businesses...
What can spy movies teach us about collecting biometrics from employees in the workplace? Fortunately, the technology has come a long way, but the laws in many states are struggling to keep up with the developments. A...
In the first quarter of 2022, unions filed more than 550 election petitions in the United States, compared with only 290 in the first quarter of 2021. It’s the largest first-quarter number filed in the past seven years...
Misunderstandings over an office birthday party recently taught a Kentucky employer an expensive lesson about disability discrimination. A jury awarded $450,000 to the affected employee who didn’t want the party and...
The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) is seeking injunctions against Starbucks Coffee Company that, if granted, would transform its employees who support a union into “sacred cows.” The injunctions would require the...
On May 7, 2022, a new law governing electronic monitoring in the workplace went into effect. Since many companies have policies that allow them to monitor an employee’s company e-mails, computer usage, or phone calls...
Many industries, including the financial sector, now routinely use artificial intelligence (AI) to make business decisions. Employers, employment agencies, and human resource vendors have used tools or applications that...