Practical HR Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
Democrats introduced a new bill yesterday that would make it easier for employees to win age discrimination lawsuits under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA). Three congressional committee chairmen — Representative George Miller (D-California), Senator Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), and Senator Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont) — introduced the Protecting Older Workers Against Discrimination Act, a bill […]
How far does harassment have to go before it’s illegal? "You don’t care," says Attorney Jonathan Segal, "because long before it’s illegal it’s inappropriate, and you want to stop it there." Segal, a partner in the Philadelphia law office of Duane Morris LLP, offered his remarks at the recent SHRM conference in New Orleans. In […]
Update Dec. 21, 2009: President signs bill including COBRA subsidy extension by Ashley Gillihan In February, President Barack Obama enacted the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA). Among other things, the ARRA provided a temporary (up to nine months), 65 percent, federally funded, COBRA premium subsidy to any qualified beneficiary who became or becomes eligible […]
Teens tend to be especially vulnerable to sexual harassment. They are new to the ways of the workplace and they are reluctant to report wrongdoing. However, although they may not be sure what their rights are, judges and juries surely will be. We turned to The HR Red Book® by BLR® for guidance. "Because of […]
BusinessWeek magazine ranks the 10 best selling hardcover and paperback business books for October 2009 and gives a short summary. 1. The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius and Betrayal by Ben Mezrich. An unflattering portrait of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg. 2. A Colossal Failure of Common Sense: The […]
Should employees receive benefits coverage for time off due to cosmetic surgery? At least two Canadian labor arbitrators think so. In the most recent decision on point, North Bay General Hospital v. Ontario Nurses’ Assn. [2009] OLAA No. 47, 181 LAC (4th) 179 (Stephens), an employee was awarded sick pay coverage for time off while […]
Many companies are making major decisions about their compensation programs without even running their plans by HR, says Attorney Lisa Van Fleet. You can’t let the financial people make those decisions, she adds. Yesterday’s Advisor featured Van Fleet’s advice for dealing with deferred compensation changes. Today we’ll get her specific recommendations about compensation decisions, and […]
This week (Oct. 5-9) is Customer Service Week, a time to thank those with an often-thankless job.
“Every day,” says attorney Lisa Van Fleet, “we get asked things like, ‘How can we eliminate our match? What if we change our benefits program midyear? How do we manage a reduction in force? How do we put together severance pay packages?’” Times have changed for every company. Since the economic downturn, not surprisingly, most […]
The other day a friend of mine suggested I type “excellence vs. perfection” into the Google search box and see what came up. When I got back to my office, I did exactly as he had suggested. The very top organic search result was a link to the site www.boodrow.com/boodrow4/perfection.htm, which had a list that […]