Practical HR Tips, News & Advice. Updated Daily.
The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) is complicated. So, the best way to learn is by posing a question, deconstructing the issues, and then answering them. Facts An employee works in a sprawling facility. She gets a 30-minute unpaid meal period. It takes between five and 10 minutes to walk to her car, same upon […]
On July 22, 2026, the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) issued a new opinion letter analyzing whether travel time between an employee’s home and work would be considered compensable under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) as hours worked. Travel before and after vs. travel during Specifically, in FLSA2026-9 opinion letter, the employer’s inquiry centered […]
Private employers sometimes have questions about firearms at work. Can a private employer prohibit employees from carrying firearms and other weapons on its premises, including those with a valid concealed-carry permit? And are there any legal or privacy concerns with requiring employees who are carrying to disclose this information to management? Questions about whether an […]
A serious workplace incident rarely ends with the incident itself. For many employers, the next challenge arrives when the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) begins asking questions. The steps taken during the first 24 hours often shape the course of the agency’s investigation and can affect the company’s position in any resulting enforcement action […]
On June 25, 2026, the United States Supreme Court issued its decision in Mullin v. Doe, in which the Court allowed the Trump administration to proceed with the termination of temporary protected status (TPS) designations for Haiti and Syria. Under the TPS statute, which was enacted in 1990, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary […]
Artificial intelligence can make recruiting faster, but legal responsibility does not disappear when technology enters the hiring process. That point is being tested in Mobley v. Workday, Inc., Case No. 3:23-cv-00770- RFL (N.D. Cal. 2023), a federal lawsuit pending in the Northern District of California, in which job applicants allege that Workday’s AI-based applicant-screening tools […]
You read the headline right: Despite 27 workplace violations, a three-judge panel from the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals (the federal appeals court for Texas) decided the employee still gets to take her Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) claims to trial. Yes, it was by a 2-to-1 […]
Disability accommodation claims have long been among the most common workplace discrimination claims, but the recent increase has been unusually sharp. One major driver is telework as a requested reasonable accommodation. For employers managing return-to-office expectations, the practical question is whether there are lawful ways to evaluate, limit, modify, or deny telework requests when appropriate. […]
HR leaders should watch an unexpected source of practical AI policy: collective bargaining agreements. A July 2026 Axios review found that the NewsGuild-CWA had roughly 85 to 90 contracts with explicit AI provisions. Those workplace AI rules matter beyond unionized employers because they show how employee participation can become part of deployment rather than a […]
On July 21, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) voted to approve a draft notice of proposed rulemaking that would rescind the EEO-1 report and related demographic data reporting requirements, ending an obligation that has been a fixture of federal employment compliance for six decades. While the proposal must still navigate the notice-and-comment process […]