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Park, Play, Eat

By Elaine Quayle Did you ever think you’d equate your company parking lot with its wellness program? Think again. Parking lots have morphed into multitasking facilities. Companies across the country are looking at parking lots in a positive new light—for cultural and social impact—to create opportunities for exercise, fun, and recreation, according to MIT Professor […]

Want to add diversity by hiring veterans? Make sure policies don’t get in the way

This month’s celebration of Veterans Day may have sparked interest among employers to recruit and hire veterans. After all, many employers tout the diversity of thought and skills employees with military experience bring to the workforce. Too often, though, policies and a lack of understanding throw up barriers to bringing veterans on board.  State licensing […]

California Employers Face State Rules that Exceed ADA

Employers in California must comply with a new set of rules that go above and beyond what the federal Americans with Disabilities Act requires. While ADA and its regulations do not explicitly require employers to participate in the interactive process of finding an appropriate accommodation for an employee with a disability, a failure to do […]

For Long-Term Medical Leaves, Communication Is Key

You must be careful when you craft and enforce policies addressing prolonged absences. Even when an employee has exhausted her statutorily protected leave, you should consider offering additional leave as a reasonable accommodation unless you can demonstrate that you would suffer an undue hardship because of the continuing absence.

DSLE Manual Quickly Updated to Reflect Brinker

Just days after a California appeals court issued the Brinker Restaurant Corp. ruling on meal and rest periods (see our story on the new case on p. 1), the California Division of Labor Standards Enforcement (DLSE) updated its Enforcement Policies and Interpretations Manual to reflect the new legal interpretations the court provided. It remains to […]

Mother Knows Best

Last week, I wrote about the decline of civility in our world. It seemed to me that if we all would reflect on what we were taught as children by our mothers, we’d treat one another a whole lot better. That got me to thinking about the impact my mother has had on my life […]

Hiring Foreign Nationals: A Visa Programs Primer

When the answer to a skills shortage is bringing in workers from other lands, do it legally by choosing the right visa program. Here’s what you need to know. A few years ago, the rock band U2 wrote a song called “These Are the Hands that Built America.” It spoke of how, over history, our […]

EEOC’s use of ‘race raters’ against Kaplan University gets failing grade

by Judith E. Kramer On January 28, a federal court ruled in favor of Kaplan Higher Learning Education Corp. and Kaplan University in a lawsuit filed by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC). The EEOC had alleged that Kaplan’s use of credit history reports in making hiring decisions violated certain provisions of Title VII of […]

DOL’s Renewed Focus: Wage and Hour Enforcement

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently released a report and congressional testimony concerning its investigation of the U.S. Department of Labor’s (DOL) Wage and Hour Division (WHD). The GAO concluded that the “WHD frequently responded inadequately to complaints, leaving low wage workers vulnerable to wage theft.” This article summarizes the GAO’s report, DOL Secretary Hilda […]