CPEhr presents a complimentary on-demand webinar on human resources outsourcing, one of fastest growing sectors of the outsourcing industry.

From Obamacare and Workers’ Compensation, to harassment, discrimination and fair-pay regulations, the volume of employment-related laws has skyrocketed in the past 20 years, the firm says on its website. Small employers with little or no spare resources to focus on these matters are understandably overwhelmed.

This 60 minute webinar discusses the challenges facing employers in today’s economy, and how outsourcing various human resource functions can significantly help alleviate those challenges.

Watch the on-demand webinar.

Exari presents a free on-demand webinar discussing how document automation can alleviate the burden of creating HR documents.

The webinar also includes a demonstration of Exari’s Document Assembly and Contract Management products from an HR perspective.

Topics include how document automation can transform HR, if automation is right for your organization, and the most common types of HR documents to automate.

Watch the on-demand webinar.

The U.S. Supreme Court appears likely to review whether the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission must seek conciliation with employers before suing them for violating federal law, reports Business Insurance.

The high court heard oral arguments last week in a case in which a three-judge panel of the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago ruled unanimously in 2013 that employers cannot use the EEOC’s failure to seek conciliation as a defense, the site reports.

The EEOC had alleged in EEOC v. Mach Mining L.L.C. that the company discriminated against women in its hiring practices.

Read the story.

This is a time to accept the nature of the energy industry, realistically evaluate current job viability and create an action plan, writes Kelli Lauletta in OilOnline.

“As the energy industry deals with below $50 a barrel oil, how can employees at oil & gas companies proactively and calmly navigate the bumpy road ahead? In a recent webinar, “The Bottom of the Barrel: Developing During a Downturn”, Pink Petro, the social channel for women in energy, offered up enlightening career-survival advice for both women and men in oil & gas.” she writes.  “Their advice focused on getting in the driver’s seat and taking the wheel, rather than passively sitting in the passenger seat. As companies announce plans to downsize, it is not time to panic.  Rather, it is a time to accept the nature of the industry, realistically evaluate your current job viability and create an action plan.”

Read the article.

Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, facing gender-bias claims by ex-partner Ellen Pao, may not get access to her performance reviews, complaints about her and other personnel records it sought from her other employers in a case that has focused attention on discrimination in Silicon Valley, reports Bloomberg News.

The report says Pao asked a state court judge in San Francisco to block demands Kleiner sent to social media company Reddit Inc. for those records and documents relating to an anonymous letter Kleiner’s lawyers said urged them to question Reddit workers about run-ins with Pao.

In a tentative ruling Jan. 20, Judge Charles Geerhart said the firm’s subpoenas targeting records at Reddit, where Pao works now, and BEA Systems Inc., where she was before joining Kleiner, were overbroad or not relevant to the case. Pao’s lawsuit is scheduled for trial on Feb 17, Bloomberg News reports.

Read the story.

K&L Gates will present a webinar discussing Fair Labor Standards Act compliance and highlighting common violations found in the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) enforcement initiative in the Marcellus Shale, which involved back wage payments of nearly $4.5 million for oil and gas workers in Pennsylvania and West Virginia.

The one-hour webinar will be Wednesday, Feb. 18, at 12:30 p.m. Eastern time.

On its website, the firm says K&L Gates lawyers Amy L. Groff and Michael A. Pavlick will provide an overview of how employers in the oil and gas industry can comply with Fair Labor Standards Act requirements and avoid common wage and hour violations.

Register for the webinar.

McDonald Hopkins presents a complimentary on-demand webinar giving advice on the proper steps to take when an employer terminates a worker’s employment.

Faced with aggressive governmental agencies and increasingly knowledgeable employees, employers must be prepared with effective offensive and defensive strategies for addressing employment-related issues, the firm says on its website.

The webinar covers such topics as insufficient and/or inaccurate investigations and documentation, not recognizing when severance is an option, failing to properly handle reductions in force, and proper exiting procedures.

Watch the on-demand webinar.

Imperative Information Group has prepared a free on-demand webinar designed to walk employers through the process of preparing a background screening policy that helps ensure a safe and productive workforce while staying out of regulators’ and plaintiffs’ attorneys’ crosshairs.

The presentation covers such topics as the legal and safety reasons employers conduct thorough background checks, employers’ responsibilities under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, considerations in developing a background check and due diligence policy,Title VII of The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and its application to background checks, and state-specific laws governing background checks.Watch the on-demand webinar.

DLA Piper has posted a paper about a $185 million punitive damages award won by a plaintiff in a pregnancy discrimination suit.

Joseph Domenick Guarino and Kevin Connelly wrote that Rosario Juarez began as a retail salesperson in San Diego at AutoZone in 2000. She was promoted to Parts Sales Manager but was unsuccessful in seeking advancement to store manager until she complained of discrimination and threatened a lawsuit. Her career became even more difficult after she became pregnant in 2005.

After she gave birth, she was demoted and later fired.

At trial, a jury set punitive damages at $185 million, more than 200 times the compensatory damages award and $25 million more than Juarez’s attorney asked the jury to grant in punitive damages

Read the paper.

Susan K. Hatmaker, Esq. of Hatmaker Law Group will present a free webinar discussing steps to take now to avoid employment claims in 2015.

The event will be Wednesday, Jan. 21, beginning at noon Pacific time.

Participants can join this webinar in their office or conference room with colleagues.

Hatmaker Law Group’s webinar serve as educational opportunities for employers, owners, managers, accountants, attorneys and human resource professionals to stay current with up-to-date information on important California employment law issues.

Register for the webinar.

Susan K. Hatmaker, Esq. of Hatmaker Law Group along with Alan Thaxter, Senior Client Consultant of Arthur J. Gallagher & Co., will present a free webinar covering an update for 2015 on the Affordable Care Act.

The one-hour event will be Wednesday, Feb. 18, beginning at noon Pacific time.

Hatmaker Law Group’s webinars serve as educational opportunities for employers, owners, managers, accountants, attorneys and human resource professionals to stay current on up-to-date information on important California employment law issues, the firm said in a release about the upcoming event..

For more information contact Laura Dakin at (559) 374-0077 or email laura@hatmakerlaw.com or go to hatmakerlaw.com/events/

Ex-employees are leaving behind orphan 401(k) accounts with abandon, and employers are dumping the funds into forced Individual Retirement Accounts with conservative default investments and high fees, where they whittle down to nothing, according to a new Government Accountability Office Report, 401(K) Plans: Greater Protections Needed for Forced Transfers and Inactive Accounts.

Forbes reports that , at one IRA provider the GAO studied, an unclaimed $1,000 account would be reduced to zero in just 9 years (to blame: a $50 one-time account set-up fee, a $50 annual fee, and a $65 annual address search fee, combined with an 0.11 percent investment return).

Read the story.

American Apparel Inc. has strengthened rules to prevent sexual harassment among its employees, just one month after firing controversial founder Dov Charney as chief executive officer for alleged misconduct, Bloomberg reports.

Managers and subordinates are now prohibited from having romantic relationships, including dating casually, according to the new ethics code on the Los Angeles-based company’s website. At about 6,200 words, the new code is more than four times as long as its predecessor.

Bloomberg reports that American Apparel is working to get a fresh start after officially firing Charney on Dec. 16, ending a six-month saga that began when the board suspended him in June for misconduct. In removing Charney, the directors said he violated the chain’s sexual-harassment policies and improperly bought travel for family members with company funds. While Charney declined to comment to Bloomberg, his lawyer has called the allegations “baseless.”

Read the story.

Les Rosen of Employment Screening Resources offers expert tips for more effective employee background screening in a complimentary on-demand audio recording.

Among this year’s top trends, he says, are the new momentum for the ‘ban the box’ movement to eliminate criminal history questions from job applications, compliance with updated EEOC guidance and controversy over the use of commercial criminal databases.

In an interview about risk management and the latest screening trends, Rosen discusses:

• Highlights of the latest report;
• New views on the relevance of past criminal records;
• Emerging legal and compliance implications of background screening.

Listen to the audio or read the transcript.

The National Labor Relations Board’s General Counsel’s Office has again signaled its commitment to expanding the scope of the current test for joint employment, reports Orrick’s Employment Law and Litigation Blog.

In a move that could have implications for a broad array of franchise relationships, on Dec. 19, 2014, the General Counsel of the NLRB announced that it has issued complaints against both McDonald’s franchisees and McDonald’s USA, the franchisor, as a joint employer.

The decision to name McDonald’s as a respondent is consistent with the General Counsel’s recent advocacy that the current joint employment standard is too narrow, the blog reports.

Read the story.

Gordon & Rees has posted a free on-demand webinar providing practical tips to prevent your company from being sued and practical strategies for how to respond when the government and disgruntled employees come knocking on your company’s door.

The webinar discusses claims before administrative agencies and courts which include alleged violations of discrimination laws, whistleblower statutes, contract disputes and a failure to accommodate disabled workers. It also covers the NLRB’s foray into the determining validity of class action waivers in arbitration and employers’ social network policies.

On its website, the firm says the webinar walks attendees through best practices to keep the agencies away from the corporate doorstep and employees from walking up the courthouse steps.

Watch the on-demand webinar.

A former president of Baltimore-based First Mariner’s mortgage division has sued his ex-employer, seeking compensation totaling more than $1 million.

Edward Perry’s suit alleges he was fired without cause Aug. 19 and immediately escorted out of First Mariner, reports The Baltimore Business Journal. The plaintiff also claims the bank didn’t pay him 30 days’ worth of his $325,000 salary promised in a series of employment agreements he signed. The suit also claims he has been denied a full success bonus of up to $750,000.

The Business Journal reports:

In addition, Perry’s suit says he has effectively been banned from working in his field since his dismissal. His employment agreements with First Mariner included two-year, 100-mile non-compete clauses. The bank has refused to certify him able to take a new job with two other companies that offered him positions, it says.

Read the story.

Massachusetts-based cybersecurity firm Veracode will increase its headcount from by about 100 employees during 2015 to deal with a surge in demand for companies fighting online threats. The new hires will include a new general counsel.

The company also is preparing for an initial public offering.

The Boston Business Journal reports the hiring of general counsel Dean Breda, who was formerly general counsel for Cambridge-based Zipcar, which went public in 2011 before being acquired by Avis in 2013. Veracode would be Breda’s fourth IPO, CEO Bob Brennan said. Prior to Zipcar, Breda was general counsel at Burlington-based Demandware.

Read the story.

A North Carolina employment case before a federal appeals court illustrates the significant amount of time and money an employer had to invest to stave off post-trial issues driven by the former employee’s request for attorneys’ fees, reports HR.BLR.com.

The case was in the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals, which covers Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia.

The suit was based on a North Carlina case in which a woman sued her employer, claiming she was denied a promotion because of her gender. The case bounced back and forth from lower to higher courts. The lesson, HR.BLR.com explains in its report, lies in the expense and difficulty of defending the case, even with an eventual  favorable decision.

Read the story.