June, 2014

Black man claims a paint company’s paint is racist and he was fired for complaining

June 30, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

The Benjamin Moore color gallery contains, among others, Clinton Brown and Tucker Chocolate.

My virgin ears! I mean, how racist can you get?!? Or, so says Clinton Tucker, a former Benjamin Moore employee, who filed a complaint in New Jersey state court in which he alleges that these paint names are hella-racist.

According to Courthouse News Service (here), Tucker says that “being a black man named Clinton Tucker, the plaintiff found this to be extremely racially offensive.”

Supreme Court: President Obama botched those NLRB recess appointments

June 27, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Thumbnail image for Thumbnail image for Supreme Court.jpg In a unanimous opinion delivered yesterday (here) in NLRB v. Noel Canning, the Supreme Court concluded that President Obama’s so-called “recess appointments” of three of the five members of the National Labor Relations Board between the Senate’s January 3 and January 6 pro forma sessions were unconstitutional.

Amy Howe from SCOTUSblog.com summarized the decision “in plain english”:

“[A]ny recess that is shorter than three days is not long enough to make a recess appointment necessary. And a recess that is longer than three days but shorter than ten days will, in the normal case, also be too short to necessitate a recess appointment.”

Score? US Men’s Soccer’s permission slip so your employees can miss work today

June 26, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

I remember a high school classmate of mine who had his mom send in a permission slip to excuse him from missing school for the Philadelphia Phillies’ home opener. Mom’s note indicated that her son was suffering from “Vernal Flu.”

Get it? Vernal Flu = Spring Fever.

Pretty creative, huh?

#SHRM14 updates from the best of the bloggerati

June 25, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Sorry for the late past today, gang. I had planned on putting something together last night, but, two words: sushi coma.

So, here for your enjoyment, whether you’re attending the 2014 SHRM Annual Conference and Expo this year, like I am, or whether you’ve been following along online, is a collection of recent blog posts tracking the event:

“Dispatches from #SHRM14 Day Two: Keynotes, Conversations & Cultural Sensitivity” from John Nykolaiszyn

Nooses, n-words, and confederate flags, but no discrimination #shrm14

June 24, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Over the weekend, I read this opinion in a race-discrimination with facts so egregious, they’d make David Duke blush.

Let me set the scene for you. This is a workplace where, allegedly, several of the white employees displayed Confederate flag paraphernalia. I’ll spare you a verbatim review of the racial graffiti and epithets — you can view it here — but, it was pretty darn bad. And what about multiple nooses in the workplace — eight in total.

[Sidebar: I once attended a deposition of an Ivy League-educated HR Manager who testified that there was a time when she did not understand how a hangman’s noose in the workplace would offend a black employee. Hubba-what?!? Folks, just so we’re clear here, a hangman’s noose is the single worst symbol of racial hate. Period. So eight of ’em is hella-bad!]

What HR should know about same-sex marriage and the FMLA #SHRM14

June 23, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Folks, I get the feeling you may be inundated with extra blog posts over the next few days.

That is, I’m punching this post out from the airport, as I await my flight to Orlando, where I’ll be attending the Gathering of the Juggalos 2014 SHRM Annual Conference and Expo.

Two speaking gigs for me and lot of other conference time to listen, learn, and blog.

Survey reveals the top workplace productivity killers (Hint: one rhymes with “mocial sedia”)

June 20, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

And most of them revolve around technology.

According to a CareerBuilder survey, here are the top ten:

#SHRM14: Let’s grab coffee (you’re buying)

June 19, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

And by coffee, I mean turkey legs and frozen blueberry-mango rum lemonade.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down…

You see that badge over there? You know what I had to do to get that badge?
~~Buy the full version of Photoshop~~
~~Spike the Kool-Aid of everyone on the SHRM Annual Conference Speaker Selection Committee~~
I beat out thousands (trillions?) of other speaker submissions to be selected as a SHRM 2014 Annual Conference & Exposition speaker.

3d Cir: No FMLA interference where employee receives all leave requested

June 18, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Now, before I get to the FMLA, let me talk about another recent decision from the New Jersey Supreme Court. On Monday, the high court ruled (here) that:

Claims asserted under the “improper quality of patient care” provision of New Jersey’s Conscientious Employee Protection Act “must be premised upon a reasonable belief that the employer has violated a law, rule, regulation, declaratory ruling adopted pursuant to law, or a professional code of ethics that governs the employer and differentiates between acceptable and unacceptable conduct in the employer’s delivery of patient care.”

A plaintiff asserting that his or her employer’s conduct is incompatible with a “clear mandate of public policy concerning the public health” must, at a minimum, identify authority that applies to the “activity, policy or practice” of the employer.

President Obama to ban LGBT discrimination by federal contractors — eventually

June 17, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Share the news: President Obama will prohibit federal contractors from discriminating on the basis of sexual orientation or gender identity.

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) June 16, 2014

The White House announced the news yesterday via Twitter.