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Policies / Handbooks

The rules of company blogging: Avoiding employee misuse and abuse

09/12/2008

Spend any time scanning the world’s 112 million blogs and you’ll find plenty of employees discussing their work. Sometimes that spells legal trouble for employers. By implementing an effective company blogging policy, you may avoid many of the pitfalls …

Use seniority to assign tasks and take bias off the table

09/10/2008
Employees who sue for race and many other forms of discrimination must prove they were treated differently than a similarly situated co-worker who doesn’t belong to the same protected class. But when employers adopt and follow a seniority system to assign tasks, employees who try to claim discrimination have a tough time finding someone similarly situated to compare …

Don’t make handbook promises you’re not prepared to keep

09/10/2008
Drafting employee handbook language can be tricky. You don’t want the whole handbook to become a binding contract, but you do want employees to understand they have to follow the rules. But you may want some sections of the handbook to be binding—such as an agreement to arbitrate any employment disputes. So what’s the best approach? …

Muslim corrections officer keeps beard, gets fired, sues

09/10/2008
Abal Zaidi, a former corrections officer in Geneva, has sued the Kane County Sheriff’s Department, claiming he was fired for refusing to shave his beard …

HR Must Referee Employees’ McCain-Obama Debates: Know the Law

09/09/2008
John McCain and Barack Obama aren’t the only people embroiled in political debates this fall. So are some of your employees. And their water-cooler conversations may turn especially heated in the next few weeks. How HR handles political speech may spell the difference between workplace civility and civil war.

Take action to prevent customers from harassing employees

09/09/2008
Employees are entitled to work in a harassment-free environment—and that includes more than freedom from harassment by supervisors and co-workers. Employers also have to take reasonable steps to protect workers from harassment by customers, clients and others over which the employer has some control …

You can’t ignore—or excuse—Offensive cultural symbols

09/09/2008
There’s no excuse for ignorance when it comes to racially hostile symbols and speech in the workplace. Employers that ignore harassing co-workers—hiding their heads in the sand or relying solely on handbooks that tell employees how to complain—may be setting themselves up for a losing lawsuit …

Restaurant makes good after religious discrimination slip-up

09/09/2008
Maryam Abdi, a 16-year-old who was denied a job at an Old Country Buffet restaurant because of her Islamic headscarf, has been hired for the position she sought. Abdi applied for a part-time cashier position at the company’s Fridley restaurant in July. The manager who interviewed her reportedly asked whether she would be willing to remove her headscarf to comply with the restaurant’s uniform policy …

Publix sexual harassment reporting policy holds up in court

09/08/2008
The Publix supermarket chain has won a partial victory in a sexual harassment case that spotlighted “nauseating” behavior by a store manager. The only bright spot for the grocer: The victim’s failure to properly report harassment means Publix may be liable only for retaliation …

Disney revises gun policy

09/08/2008
After firing one employee in a showdown over Florida’s new guns-at-work law, Disney has taken a small step back. It released a revised policy in August that allows employees who don’t work at Walt Disney World Resort to keep guns in their cars, in accordance with state law …