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obama.jpegWe’re just a few months away from the Presidential election. That means that the debates are right around the corner.

Back in 2008, around this time, employment-law blogger Daniel Schwartz at the Connecticut Employment Law Blog rounded up some other bloggers to pose hypothetical debate questions to the ’08 candidates for President and Vice President.

Four years later, Dan has resurrected this successful series and asked yours truly to join in. Today, the question goes to President Obama:

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Much has been written lately in the blawgosphere about telecommuting as a reasonable accommodation under the Americans with Disabilities Act for qualifying disabled employees.

Last month, Jon Hyman posted (here) about this case, in which a federal court in Ohio held that telecommuting may be a reasonable accommodation based on the unique facts concerning the employee and the workplace — and that issue was up to a jury to determine.

Earlier this month, I came across another case (EEOC v. Ford Motor Co.), in which a Michigan federal court also recognized that telecommuting may be a reasonable accommodation. However, unlike the prior Ohio decision, the Michigan court recognized that there are some telecommuting arrangements that are just so impractical that no jury would conclude that telecommuting is a reasonable accommodation.

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It’s been a while since I’ve addressed social media policies and the National Labor Relations Act on this blog. Longer than Kim K’s marriage to what’s his name? Indeed. Methinks things at the National Labor Relations Board have been quiet lately. Maybe a little too quiet.

And then…

Click..click…BOOM! [Cue music]

Earlier this month, for the first…time…evah, the NLRB weighed in on the validity of an employer’s social media policy.

I know. I know. Sit down, catch your breath. This is big stuff! Big stuff!!! Mmmm…double stuf. And speaking of Oreos, have you seen these bad-boys? Who wants to send me a package for Halloween?

Wait! What were we talking about again? Was it fantasy football? Should I start Martellus Bennett tonight? 

No, it was NLRB. Dang! What did the NLRB decide about social media policies? WHAT OF SOCIAL MEDIA POLICIES!?!? I won’t keep you in suspense any longer. Hit the jump and find out!

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Back in July, I blogged here about a federal appellate court recently emphasizing just how broad the subpoena power of the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission really is. [Editor’s Note: the technical legal term is “crazazy broad”]

Last Friday, as I was hosting the weekly dip-spit distance shot organizing my office, I saw this opinion from the Third Circuit Court of Appeals which further underscored just how far and deep the EEOC’s outstretched hand can go into your business.

Yeah, you, dude! The one who is not accused of discriminating against anyone, but who may have information relating to a pending EEOC investigation.

What’s in store if you are on the receiving end of that subpoena? Find out after the jump…

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You’ve got an anti-harassment policy. All managers and employees have copies and you just completed training on the policy for your entire workforce.

Sweet!

But is your policy bulletproof? I mean really bulletproof?

And if an employee claims that a harasser lurks in your workplace, if sued, will a court agree that the steps you have taken were reasonably designed to end the harassment?

Just how confident are you?

After the jump, some not so obvious pitfalls from a recent federal-appellate-court decision and six ways (5 from the court; 1 from me) to help you stay legal and out of the courtroom.

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Today we have a guest blogger at The Employer Handbook. It’s Lauren Bailey. Lauren is a freelance writer currently writing for bestcollegesonline.com. Among her preferred topics to cover, Lauren loves to write about higher education, tech in the classroom, and the college experience in general. Feel free to email her some comments!

(Want to guest blog at The Employer Handbook? Email me.)

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Penn State Kicker Sam Ficken probably had a pretty bad week. Last Saturday, he missed one extra point and four field goals in Penn State’s 17-16 loss to Virginia. After the game, he was deluged with online insults.

Thankfully, his coach, Bill O’Brien, came to his defense.

Obviously, I think it’s absolutely ridiculous. Not just because it’s a 19-year-old college kid. It’s just because, I mean, it’s anonymous in some ways, and in other ways it’s not. But at the end of the day, you know, these guys are really playing hard, giving great effort for us,” O’Brien said. “To go on whatever, Spacebook [sic] or Tweeter [sic], or whatever [and] put stuff on there is just absolutely ridiculous to me and very cowardly, to be honest with you. But that’s just my opinion . . . I don’t know what type of people do that.

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Maybe it’s the luck of the draw, but most of the discrimination cases I defend are hostile work environment cases, where an alleged harasser supposedly has made an employee-victim’s life miserable with certain comments, jokes, gestures, touchings, you name it.

Far less often do I encounter disparate-treatment claims. A disparate-treatment claim is one where an employee claims that another similarly-situated employee in another class was treated more favorably because of his/her protected class. For example, a female employee claims that similarly-situated male employees are paid more because they are men.

Sounds like the facts of a recent case decided right in my backyard in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. This case provides a great opportunity to go back to school on what it means to be similarly-situated…after the jump…

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Last month, in this post, I addressed a recent opinion in which the court held that the words “Emergency Room,” when uttered by an employee to his employer are enough to put the employer on notice — at least initially — that the employee needs leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act to care for a parent with a serious health condition.

In another recent opinion (here), the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals examined inquiry notice under the FMLA to determine whether causal conversation about a loved one’s health — without mentioning the letters FMLA — is enough to alert an employer to the seriousness of a health condition so as to trigger the need for FMLA leave.

The Court held that it did not:

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Many times on this blog (e.g., here, here, and here), I’ve discussed the discovery of a plaintiff’s social media information in pending litigation. More often than not, these issues arise in personal injury actions where the defendant believes that the plaintiff’s injury isn’t as a severe as he claims it to be. So, it seeks access to plaintiff’s Facebook information where it believes it will find pictures of the plaintiff boozing or frolicking or what-have-you.

Although less common in employment discrimination cases, from time-to-time, social media discovery issues do crop up. I’ll discuss a new one decided late last month and offer some related tips for employers after the jump…

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