Workforce Bulletin

Our colleagues Lauri F. Rasnick and Jonathan L. Shapiro, attorneys at Epstein Becker Green, have a post on the Financial Services Employment Law blog that will be of interest to many of our readers: “Policies Prohibiting 'Insubordination or Other Disrespectful Conduct' and 'Boisterous or Disruptive Activity in the Workplace' Struck Down by NLRB Majority.”

Following is an excerpt:

Once again seemingly appropriate work rules have been under attack by the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”). In a recent decision (Component Bar Products, Inc. and James R. Stout, Case ...

Once again seemingly appropriate work rules have been under attack by the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”). In a recent decision (Component Bar Products, Inc. and James R. Stout, Case 14-CA-145064), two members of a three-member NLRB panel upheld an August 7, 2015 decision by an Administrative Law Judge (“ALJ”) finding that an employer violated the National Labor Relations Act (“NLRA” or the “Act”) by maintaining overly broad handbook rules and terminating an employee who was engaged in “protected, concerted activity” when he called another ...

It is Employment Law 101 – employment in the United States is generally at-will.  Equally elementary to HR professionals and employment counsel is the use of a good, strong at-will policy and/or agreement.  So common is the use of at-will policies and agreements that you would be hard pressed to find an employment handbook or an employer that does not make some use of them.

Notwithstanding this universal use, the National Labor Relations Board is poised to target non-union employers which maintain at-will policies or agreements.  Although the NLRB has taken several steps to ease the ...