Practical HR Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
Eliminating a participant option to switch to a defined benefit plan from a defined contribution offering does not violate ERISA anti-cutback provisions, even if participants’ accrued — but unclaimed — benefits are reduced. The recent ruling in Andersen v. DHL Retirement Pension Plan (Case No. 2:12-cv-00439-MJP WL 5389141, U.S. Dist., Western District of Washington Nov. […]
Resources for Humans managing editor Celeste Blackburn reviews Geoff Smart and Randy Street’s book Who: The A Method for Hiring. According to a study by Recruiting Roundtable, a division of the Corporate Executive Board, employers or their new hires regret their decisions half the time. The bad hiring decisions cost the average organization millions in lower […]
The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals decided that an insurance certificate was an official plan document that overrode the plan’s summary plan description. It shows that plans are vulnerable when they attempt to set out plan terms in the SPD only without corresponding language in the official plan document. For stronger plan design, the […]
Whenever someone with a disability applies for a job, you must consider whether a reasonable accommodation would permit the person to do the work. Unfortunately, it’s not always easy to know when you’ve done enough and when you should do more. And while going the extra mile to accommodate a disabled applicant can benefit everyone, […]
Hiring even one new employee invokes no fewer than seven federal laws and probably a few state laws as well, says attorney Stephen R. Woods. How does an employer navigate this legal minefield? Woods offers five easy rules. Woods, a shareholder with the national law firm of Ogletree Deakins, made his suggestions at the recent […]
By BLR Founder and CEO Bob Brady Several years ago, the HR department of the city of New Haven, Connecticut, was presented with a very difficult choice: It could accept the results of a recent promotion exam and risk the ire of the majority of city residents, or ignore them and risk a lawsuit by […]
To be victorious in the “talent wars,” use what Marketing uses to win customers: segmentation. If you’re having trouble recruiting the employees you need these days, the solution might just lie in your Marketing department, says consultant Eileen Levitt, founder of HR Team in Baltimore. “Can you attract all your desired customers using one sales […]
By Lorene Novakowski and Brandon Wiebe On November 15, 2013, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that a union’s right to collect, use, and disclose personal information for legitimate labor relations purposes outweighs an individual’s right to privacy. In so doing, it declared Alberta’s Personal Information Protection Act (PIPA) unconstitutional but suspended the declaration for […]
As the debate over gender identity discrimination rages within the halls of state and federal governments, employers are left to wonder how the controversy will play out in the workplace. One high-profile aspect of the issue centers on North Carolina’s House Bill 2, which Governor Pat McCrory signed into law on March 23. The law […]
Sending a COBRA election notice shortly after an employee began military duty was not evidence that an employer fired the employee due to his military status in violation of the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act, a federal district court in Arkansas held. In generally rejecting the USERRA claims, the court indicated, among other […]