On June 10, 2022, Illinois amended its Child Bereavement Leave Act (“CBLA”) to include unpaid leave for employees following an “unexpected lack of parenthood,” and deaths of other family members, including stepchildren, spouses, domestic partners, siblings, parents or stepparents, parents-in-law, grandchildren, or grandparents. The new legislation is known as the Family Bereavement Leave Act (“FBLA”).
Continue Reading Illinois’ Family Bereavement Leave Act: What Employers Can Learn from the Prairie State.

While diversity, equity, and inclusion have slowly made their way to the forefront of many employers’ minds, two dimensions of diversity are often overlooked in these discussions –neurodiversity and ability diversity. More than 1 billion people, 15% of the global population, live with a disability. Thus, employers must ensure that neurodiversity and employees and applicants with disabilities are properly represented in DEI initiatives.
Continue Reading Creating Inclusive Workplaces for Neurodivergent and Employees with Disabilities

While many employers maintain “Professional Dress and Hygiene” policies in their Employee Handbooks – or as stand-alone policies – managers, supervisors, and human resources personnel are rarely trained on how to implement those policies. The common result is, unfortunately, that these policies are applied unfairly or more strictly toward Black and other racially diverse employees. Very seldom do we see policies that specifically prohibit braids, dreads, locks, twists, or knots anymore. Instead, these policies often state that employee hairstyles must be “professional” (very helpful),“neat,” and well-managed,” for example. Keeping your policy language broad can be helpful by giving your managers, supervisors, and HR personnel deference, but it can also result in disparate treatment if the decision-maker has conscious or unconscious biases about what is viewed as “professional” and make determinations under the policy relying on those unfair biases.
Continue Reading Hair Discrimination – Does Your “Professional Dress and Hygiene” Policy Make the Cut?

As anticipated, Governor Polis signed into law last week Colorado’s new limitations on restrictive covenants, which includes noncompetition, nonsolicitation, and confidentiality covenants.  Our Colorado employment team has already issued a legal alert that provides detail about the bill.  FAQs:  Colorado Further Limits Restrictive Covenants.
Continue Reading Colorado Cracks Down on Restrictive Covenants

Predictability and fairness are typical pillars of employment law. Where predictability allows both employers and workers to understand and navigate the rules and regulations that are applicable to them, fairness provides a constant level of security to all parties. Recently, the Texas Supreme Court used an unpredictable procedure to reach what it calls a “rule of fairness and right.”
Continue Reading Conditioning Payment on Continued Employment: Texas Supreme Court Rules Company Owed Fired Executive Commissions

Not surprisingly, simple solutions to complex issues are often elusive. Yet on rare occasions, the solution is in plain sight. Doubtful? For employers struggling with the issue of a remote employee’s eligibility for job-protected leave under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), there is a very simple answer. And, unlike the analysis we discussed in our commentary about wage and hour issues for remote employees, the answer does not depend on the location of the remote employee.
Continue Reading Employer Compliance Guidance: Remote Worker Eligibility for FMLA Benefits

On Tuesday, April 19, the American Bar Association’s Labor and Employment Law Section hosted the panel “Navigating the New Normal: Accommodations in the Pandemic Era.” The panel members were Alex Breland of CDK Global in Chicago, IL; Pamela Devi Chandran of the Washington State Nurses Association in Seattle, WA; and Jackie Gessner of Barnes & Thornburg LLP in Indianapolis, IN. Carolyn Wheeler of Katz, Marshall, & Banks LLP in Washington, DC served as moderator. Their consensus was that, although vaccines have (thankfully) lowered Covid-19 infection and death rates, workplace challenges related to Covid have not gone away. They have only changed.
Continue Reading COVID-19 Employment Accommodations: Three Tips for Adapting to Circumstances