When FLSA Retaliation Reaches Beyond the Direct Employer
&n b s p; Most people assume FLSA retaliation claims start and end with the employer on the worker’s...
Category: Employer Handbook
When Is a “Religious Belief” Actually Religious? A New Federal Case Helps Employers Draw the Line
&n bs p; Some accommodation requests are straightforward. Others arrive wrapped in spiritual language but turn out to be...
Hostile Work Environment Claims After Muldrow: What Changed, What Didn’t, and Why Courts Are Drawing the Line
S everal readers of this blog have floated the idea that Muldrow v. City of St. Louis — the...
🦃 Welcome to the The Employer Handbook Annual Thanksgiving Food Poll: 2025 Edition
Millions of Americans will sit down tomorrow and pretend that every dish on the table is: cooked through (optimistically),...
When Pro-American Bias Violates Title VII: The EEOC’s New National Origin Materials Cut Both Ways
&n b sp ; The EEOC just refreshed its national origin educational materials. They focus on anti-American discrimination....
When the Documentation Is Rock Solid, Pretext Claims Don’t Stand a Chance
&n b s p; Some lawsuits keep you guessing. This one did not. When a court reviews missed deadlines,...
When “Good Times Bad Times” Still Trigger ADA Coverage
&n b sp; https://youtube.com/watch?v=TA9Rec1qAFQ&feature=oembed Led Zeppelin was decades ahead of the ADA, but “good times, bad times”...
😲 Wait… THIS Didn’t Count as a Hostile Work Environment?
&n b s p; Employees and supervisors often assume that any inappropriate physical contact is automatically a hostile work...
When an employee says “I need to get home,” you may already be in FMLA territory
Sometimes a routine overtime disput e turns into an FMLA problem because no one stops to ask the right...
Congress Wants Employers to Report How Many Jobs AI Is Creating… and Killing
&n b s p; Artificial intelligence is changing everything from hiring to customer service, and now Congress wants to...
Back to Basics: The FMLA Doesn’t Protect Poor Performance
&n b s p; When an employee on FMLA leave also happens to be a problem employee, HR can...
🏠 Employee Refused to Return to the Office Over “Mold.” The Court’s Response? Breathe Deep and Report Back to Work.
A Detroit nonprofit employee said the air in her office made her sick after a flood. She claimed the...
A Potential New Roadmap for Religious-Accommodation Requests
A new Fourth Circuit decision applying the Supreme Court’s Groff v. DeJoy standard shows that “undue hardship” still has...
The Unicorn of Accommodation Cases: The Disabled Worker Who Refused to Telework
Most accommodation cases start with an employee asking to stay home.This one features the rare unicorn: a disabled worker...
No posting, no application, still a lawsuit: Age bias and quiet promotions
Sometimes promotions move quietly t hrough the ranks.No job posting, no formal applications, just a quiet internal decision. A...
Halloween Harassment: The Case Decided on Halloween Itself
&n bs p; Sometimes the timing writes the headline for you. On October 31, a federal court in New...