The Employer Handbook Blog

What LeBron’s return teaches employers about accommodating the Mark of the Beast

July 14, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

I’ll save the “Five Workplace Lessons From LeBron James’s Return to Cleveland” post for the other bloggers.

Here’s one — one which I guarantee you don’t find anywhere else:

If during his time in Miami, LeBron James became a Fundamentalist Christian, and, upon filling out his new-employee paperwork with the Cleveland Cavaliers, refused to provide a social security number because it would cause him to have the “Mark of the Beast,” the Cavaliers would not have to provide him with a religious accommodation.

Survey reveals the top social media faux pas that doom job applicants

July 11, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Call it a cheap way to increase my SEO — Kim Kardashian Justin Bieber love child — but I’m ending the week the way I started it: with another social media post.

Come you moths to my social media flame.

Ha Ha! Made you listen to The Bangles! Good luck getting that song out of your head. Maybe this will help. #Sike

Court: Pregnancy discrimination can still occur four months after childbirth

July 10, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Last night, having come across this wacky Family Show gif, I couldn’t decide whether to binge watch the first season of Amish Mafia. Again. For the third time.

(And, by third, I mean eighth).

Or dip my English toe into the Breaking Amish pool.

Six degrees of Kevin Bacon, err, social media and the workplace

July 9, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Work with me here folks:

Late last month, I had intended to blog about this Idaho case, in which a nurse was denied unemployment compensation benefits because of a threatening Facebook post. But, Molly DiBianca at the Delaware Employment Law Blog beat me to it. You can check out her post here.

Speaking of Idaho, that’s right next to Montana, where you’ll find the City of Bozeman. Ah yes, the City of Bozeman, the poster child for why states have enacted laws protecting employees from having to disclose social media logins and passwords. And the latest state to do so is Rhode Island. You — yeah, you there in Providence — can view a copy of the new law here.

All that for a bag of chips: Walgreens pays $180K to settle ADA claim

July 8, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

A few months ago, I blogged about a California federal court decision, which recognized that Walgreens may have an obligation under the Americans with Disabilities Act to accommodate one of its cashiers who opened a $1.39 bag of chips (without having paid for it first) because she was suffering from an attack of hypoglycemia (low blood sugar).

That post was entitled “The ADA may require companies to accommodate employee theft. Yep, stealing.“

Unfortunately, definitive guidance on that will have to spring from another lawsuit. That is, Walgreens settled for $180,000 last week. A copy of the consent decree is embedded below (and can also be found here).

Why employee use of social media “off the clock” may still impact your workplace

July 7, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

A few weeks, ago I was speaking about social media and the workplace to a fabulous audience at the 2014 SHRM Annual Conference and Expo. (Email me if you want a copy of my slidedeck).

One of my session themes was that there is no such thing as employees using social media “off the clock.” That is, even if an individual tweets or updates her Facebook status outside of the four walls of the workplace, that communication can still impact the workplace.

Dan Davis at IBM Social Business recently blogged about this, and another Twitter user described it as the “24/7 social media conundrum” Two recent incidents described below bear this out.

The importance of communication during FMLA leave

July 3, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

How many times has an employee provided you with an incomplete Family and Medical Leave Act certification? Oh, I don’t know, maybe a missing return date…

If the FMLA leave is foreseeable, then the employee must provide the employer with the anticipated timing and duration of the leave. However, where the FMLA leave is unforeseeable — think, car crash — then that information can wait if the employee herself doesn’t know her return date.

But that doesn’t mean you — yeah, you employer — should let it go.

Dating app maker Tinder sued for, you guessed it, sexual harassment

July 2, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

I’m often asked, “Eric, where do you find this stuff?”

Why TMZ, of course. Break ’em off TMZ:

“Whitney Wolfe claims in a new lawsuit — obtained by TMZ — she was mercilessly brutalized by the other execs who wanted to remove her title because no one would take a site like Tinder seriously if they knew it was founded by a 24-year-old chick.

3 ways the #HobbyLobby decision affects your workplace

July 1, 2014 | by Eric B. Meyer

Mid-morning yesterday, the Internet broke shortly after the Supreme Court issued its 5-4 decision in HHS v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc..

Jeez, I’m still cleaning out my Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook feeds.

In case your wifi, 4G, 3G, dial-up, TV, radio, and other electronics picked the wrong day to quit sniffing glue, the long and short of yesterday’s Supreme Court decision is this: Smaller, closely-held (think: family-owned) companies don’t have to provide Obamacare access to birth control if doing so would conflict with an employer’s religious beliefs.

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.”