Never have there been so many tools for Imperial Valley employment lawyers to help people recently fired to win damages for discrimination, to seek a better severance package, including not only a longer period of pay benefits, but also other items, most important of which can be a longer period of health insurance benefits following the termination, or even to save the employee’s job.

If you’ve been fired from your job as a result of discrimination or retaliation, been harassed or the victim of a hostile work environment, or paid less than a person of the opposite sex for the same work for no other valid reason, visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com and call us at any of the numbers easily found on our website.

In Imperial Valley and throughout California where private employers and government offices have laid off people in the hundreds and thousands, sometimes on a weekly basis there is substantial fear among those who have recently been terminated and those who are in fear that they could be next to be let go. In areas such as the Imperial Valley area where unemployment and foreclosures are at their highest in the state, many employees who have been discriminated against or fired in retaliation for complaints of harassment and who previously feared making any complaint, now feel they have nothing to lose.

Some employees are filing class action lawsuits based on everything from age and sex discrimination to discrimination against veterans. Individual claims are being made for overtime pay that the employees never received and retaliation for whistle blowing or reporting harassment.

One of the best tools for Imperial Valley employment lawyers is often the employee’s company manual and other memos of the company which often lay out glowing descriptions of how fair the company will be in their employment practices. Such manuals often describe all of the types of actions which the company claims they will not tolerate including the various forms of harassment and how the company will never take a retaliatory action against anyone blowing the whistle on harassment at the company.

Such manuals provide a powerful tool to the employee and the employment lawyer to show the company exactly how they violated not only the law, but also the company’s own employment guidelines. Faced with such violations of the principles the company itself laid down and promised to their employees, it is difficult for such companies to argue that they didn’t realize how they were supposed to respond to an employee’s reports of harassment or that they didn’t know they couldn’t fire someone for making such reports.

Employees must keep in mind that under California law, complaints alleging discrimination or retaliation must be filed with the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement in California within six months of the alleged discriminatory or retaliatory action by an employer, except in certain circumstances.

Some of the laws enforced by the Labor Commissioner in the State of California which prohibit discrimination and retaliation include discrimination or retaliation for threatening to file a complaint with the Labor Commissioner, for taking time off to serve as a juror, be a witness in court or to attend judicial proceedings related to being a victim of a crime or related to a victim, for discharging victims of domestic violence, for taking time off to seek medical or psychological treatment related to domestic violence or a sexual assault, for taking time off to go to a child’s school at the request of a teacher, for disclosing his or her wages, for engaging in political activity, for being a whistle blower (not the real whistles), for being paid less than employees of a different sex for the same work unless based on a bona fide factor other than sex, or for complaining about safety or health conditions.

For Imperial Valley Employment Lawyers such as myself who are also Women’s Rights Lawyers, when President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 in late January, he remedied a great injustice and provided employment and women’s rights attorneys with yet another tool in our arsenal to fight for employee’s and women’s rights.

Now women in California and the rest of the nation have a law that gives them the ability to redress the wrong suffered upon them by society in allowing men to receive more money for the same work from an employer and limiting the rights of women to bring a claim for pay discrimination.

In the past, women were required to file suit within 180 days after first being paid unfairly, even if the discrimination of being paid less than male workers in the same jobs continued. And if a woman failed to discover that male workers were being paid more for the same work, a woman still could not hold her employer accountable if she didn’t learn of the unfairness and take action within 180 days of first being paid the lesser rate.

Under the Fair Pay Act of 2009 signed into law by President Obama, the statute of limitations of 180 days starts with each discriminatory paycheck, rather than when the employer starts to discriminate. So long as a woman in CA files her claim within 180 days of receiving any discriminatory paycheck, not just the first one, she is considered timely in bringing her claim.

An important aspect of the Act is that the effective date of the Act is retroactively set at May 28, 2007, which will allow it to apply to all compensation discrimination claims that have been filed on or after that date.

Women can sue for back pay awards for up to two years before she files her employment discrimination claim under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Fair Pay Act of 2009 does not change the two-year back pay limit.

Under the Act, an unlawful practice occurs when a discriminatory compensation decision or other practice is adopted, when a person becomes subject to the decision or practice, or when a person is affected by the decision or practice, including each time wages, benefits or other compensation is paid.

California also has it’s own version of the Federal WARN Act which in certain circumstances requires 60 days warning before laying off workers. Under the 2003 California version of the Act, the requirement of 60 days warning applies to establishments with 75 or more employees who have been employed for at least 6 of the previous 12 months, who layoff or relocated 50 or more employees within a 30-day period. There are also various exceptions to the rule.

For the elderly employee laid off, an important ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court has given added protection to older workers. Elderly persons who file employment discrimination lawsuits no longer need to prove that an employer acted intentionally. It is enough that the employee can prove that the layoffs had a disparate effect on the elderly workers.

Layoffs of caregivers providing care to sick family members may also violate federal law.

And all of these tools are still in addition to the tools Imperial Valley employment lawyers have against employers who practice discrimination based on sex, religion, race, age, or sexual orientation, or who subject their workers to a workplace that constitutes a hostile environment.

Visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com and call us if you have been discriminated against or are the victim of retaliation by an employer in Imperial Valley or if you have been receiving less pay than a person of the opposite sex for the same work by your employer for no other valid reason.

It is thus imperative that an employee being laid off who is provided with a separation agreement and release of all claims against his employer consult with an employment attorney to determine if there weren’t violations of any of these laws and others that can assist the employee and his or her attorney to negotiate a larger severance package.

If you have recently been fired, are in fear of losing your job or if you have been presented with a separation agreement or severance package and have been discriminated against, harassed or are the victim of retaliation in Imperial Valley by your employer, we invite you to call our office.

Visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com if you are the victim of employment discrimination, retaliation or of discriminatory compensation in California. We have the knowledge and resources to be your Imperial Valley Employment Lawyer and Imperial Valley Employment Attorney anywhere in Southern California from Imperial Valley to Orange County, and Los Angeles to Palm Springs and all points in between, including Irvine, Huntington Beach, Anaheim, Santa Barbara, Oceanside, Newport Beach, San Diego, Santa Ana, Riverside, Ontario and Palm Desert.

I have this coworker who makes a hostile workplace….?

We are both supervisors but her job is threatened by me because I do my job correctly. She talks shit about every other employee to everyone. She is loud and takes over all the meeting time so no one else has a chance to speak. She makes people call out sick with migraines and makes the workplace stressful. No one wants to work wit her. She gives coworkers dirty looks and is rude to everyone. What would be the right thing to do? Go to superior and complain of harrassment?

Answer
Document, document, document. Keep a journal and log of everything you witness first hand of her behavior. Then when you have a decent amount of reaccuring themes and practices (i’d say 3-6 months). Go to a superior and just lay down what you have witnessed. It is possible that you won’t be the only one laying down complaints against her, but if you have documented backup that goes a long way.

Never have there been so many tools for California employment lawyers to help people recently fired to win damages for discrimination, to seek a better severance package, including not only a longer period of pay benefits, but also other items, most important of which can be a longer period of health insurance benefits following the termination, or even to save the employee’s job.

If you’ve been fired from your job as a result of discrimination or retaliation, been harassed or the victim of a hostile work environment, or paid less than a person of the opposite sex for the same work for no other valid reason, visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com and call us at any of the numbers easily found on our website.

In California where private employers and government offices have laid off people by thousands, sometimes on a weekly basis there is substantial fear among those who have recently been terminated and those who are in fear that they could be next to be let go. In the areas of California where unemployment and foreclosures are at their highest in the state, many employees who have been discriminated against or fired in retaliation for complaints of harassment and who previously feared making any complaint, now feel they have nothing to lose.

Some employees are filing class action lawsuits based on everything from age and sex discrimination to discrimination against veterans. Individual claims are being made for overtime pay that the employees never received and retaliation for whistle blowing or reporting harassment.

One of the best tools for California employment lawyers is often the employee’s company manual and other memos of the company which often lay out glowing descriptions of how fair the company will be in their employment practices. Such manuals often describe all of the types of actions which the company claims they will not tolerate including the various forms of harassment and how the company will never take a retaliatory action against anyone blowing the whistle on harassment at the company.

Such manuals provide a powerful tool to the employee and the employment lawyer to show the company exactly how they violated not only the law, but also the company’s own employment guidelines. Faced with such violations of the principles the company itself laid down and promised to their employees, it is difficult for such companies to argue that they didn’t realize how they were supposed to respond to an employee’s reports of harassment or that they didn’t know they couldn’t fire someone for making such reports.

Employees must keep in mind that under California law, complaints alleging discrimination or retaliation must be filed with the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement in California within six months of the alleged discriminatory or retaliatory action by an employer, except in certain circumstances.

Some of the laws enforced by the Labor Commissioner in the State of California which prohibit discrimination and retaliation include discrimination or retaliation for threatening to file a complaint with the Labor Commissioner, for taking time off to serve as a juror, be a witness in court or to attend judicial proceedings related to being a victim of a crime or related to a victim, for discharging victims of domestic violence, for taking time off to seek medical or psychological treatment related to domestic violence or a sexual assault, for taking time off to go to a child’s school at the request of a teacher, for disclosing his or her wages, for engaging in political activity, for being a whistle blower (not the real whistles), for being paid less than employees of a different sex for the same work unless based on a bona fide factor other than sex, or for complaining about safety or health conditions.

For California Employment Lawyers such as myself who are also Women’s Rights Lawyers, when President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 in late January, he remedied a great injustice and provided employment and women’s rights attorneys with yet another tool in our arsenal to fight for employee’s and women’s rights.

Now women in California and the rest of the nation have a law that gives them the ability to redress the wrong suffered upon them by society in allowing men to receive more money for the same work from an employer and limiting the rights of women to bring a claim for pay discrimination.

In the past, women were required to file suit within 180 days after first being paid unfairly, even if the discrimination of being paid less than male workers in the same jobs continued. And if a woman failed to discover that male workers were being paid more for the same work, a woman still could not hold her employer accountable if she didn’t learn of the unfairness and take action within 180 days of first being paid the lesser rate.

Under the Fair Pay Act of 2009 signed into law by President Obama, the statute of limitations of 180 days starts with each discriminatory paycheck, rather than when the employer starts to discriminate. So long as a woman in CA files her claim within 180 days of receiving any discriminatory paycheck, not just the first one, she is considered timely in bringing her claim.

An important aspect of the Act is that the effective date of the Act is retroactively set at May 28, 2007, which will allow it to apply to all compensation discrimination claims that have been filed on or after that date.

Women can sue for back pay awards for up to two years before she files her employment discrimination claim under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Fair Pay Act of 2009 does not change the two-year back pay limit.

Under the Act, an unlawful practice occurs when a discriminatory compensation decision or other practice is adopted, when a person becomes subject to the decision or practice, or when a person is affected by the decision or practice, including each time wages, benefits or other compensation is paid.

California also has it’s own version of the Federal WARN Act which in certain circumstances requires 60 days warning before laying off workers. Under the 2003 California version of the Act, the requirement of 60 days warning applies to establishments with 75 or more employees who have been employed for at least 6 of the previous 12 months, who layoff or relocated 50 or more employees within a 30-day period. There are also various exceptions to the rule.

For the elderly employee laid off, an important ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court has given added protection to older workers. Elderly persons who file employment discrimination lawsuits no longer need to prove that an employer acted intentionally. It is enough that the employee can prove that the layoffs had a disparate effect on the elderly workers.

Layoffs of caregivers providing care to sick family members may also violate federal law.

And all of these tools are still in addition to the tools California employment lawyers have against employers who practice discrimination based on sex, religion, race, age, or sexual orientation, or who subject their workers to a workplace that constitutes a hostile environment.

Visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com and call us if you have been discriminated against or are the victim of retaliation by an employer in California or if you have been receiving less pay than a person of the opposite sex for the same work by your employer for no other valid reason.

It is thus imperative that an employee being laid off who is provided with a separation agreement and release of all claims against his employer consult with an employment attorney to determine if there weren’t violations of any of these laws and others that can assist the employee and his or her attorney to negotiate a larger severance package.

If you have recently been fired, are in fear of losing your job or if you have been presented with a separation agreement or severance package and have been discriminated against, harassed or are the victim of retaliation in California by your employer, we invite you to call our office.

Visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com if you are the victim of employment discrimination, retaliation or of discriminatory compensation in California. We have the knowledge and resources to be your California Employment Lawyer and California Employment Attorney anywhere in Southern California from San Diego to Orange County, and Santa Barbara to Palm Springs and all points in between, including Irvine, Huntington Beach, Anaheim, Ventura, Newport Beach, San Luis Obispo, Temecula, Santa Ana, Riverside, Ontario and Palm Desert.

How do, or would, YOU handle being Childfree in the workplace?

I know of 9 voluntarily childfree people that work where I do.

Well let me qualify that 9. Two are gay, and therefore childfree by default. That leaves seven that are normal heterosexuals that have chosen not to have children. Four of the seven are “closet” childfree. That means they post pictures of other peoples kids in their cubes so nobody will bother them about it. If someone asks about the kids, they usually change the subject.

I used to be very proud to be Childfree, but the workplace has become hostile toward us. Gays are protected under the law. Those of us that are Childfree and not gay are not protected.

I will be changing jobs soon. How should I address my political stance on having children? People will ask. People will gossip.
I don’t mean to say anything negative about gay people. My collage lab partner was gay. That does not bother me at all.

What I am calling hostile is those who make statements like, “You should just quit because some family man needs your job!” or “You are going to burn in Hell of you don’t have kids!”, or. I retaliated with, “Just think, I can just kick all those child molesting Priests in the crotch for eternity”. Needless to say, I was sent to “sensitivity training”. She was not. She has since been downsized, but there are a few others of the “Catholic majority” that talk that way.

My cube-mate is Childfree, and she tells them, “Good I don’t want to go to Heaven because you will be there!”
Almost everyone here is Catholic. I have been forced to work holidays that other got off. When I was in the military, I was the only childfree person in the entire work center. I was scheduled to work all holidays. For example I worked mostly by myself on the week of Christmas, but was given the following week off.

Answer
Tell them you don’t feel right bringing children into the world the way it is. Or you could say you tried to have children but couldn’t. They just don’t need to know the reason you couldn’t is because you don’t want to. Don’t feel bad about your choice.

Never have there been so many tools for Southern California employment lawyers to help people recently fired to win damages for discrimination, to seek a better severance package, including not only a longer period of pay benefits, but also other items, most important of which can be a longer period of health insurance benefits following the termination, or even to save the employee’s job.

If you’ve been fired from your job as a result of discrimination or retaliation, been harassed or the victim of a hostile work environment, or paid less than a person of the opposite sex for the same work for no other valid reason, visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com and call us at any of the numbers easily found on our website.

In Southern California where private employers and government offices have laid off people by thousands, sometimes on a weekly basis there is substantial fear among those who have recently been terminated and those who are in fear that they could be next to be let go. In the areas of Southern California where unemployment and foreclosures are at their highest in the state, many employees who have been discriminated against or fired in retaliation for complaints of harassment and who previously feared making any complaint, now feel they have nothing to lose.

Some employees are filing class action lawsuits based on everything from age and sex discrimination to discrimination against veterans. Individual claims are being made for overtime pay that the employees never received and retaliation for whistle blowing or reporting harassment.

One of the best tools for Southern California employment lawyers is often the employee’s company manual and other memos of the company which often lay out glowing descriptions of how fair the company will be in their employment practices. Such manuals often describe all of the types of actions which the company claims they will not tolerate including the various forms of harassment and how the company will never take a retaliatory action against anyone blowing the whistle on harassment at the company.

Such manuals provide a powerful tool to the employee and the employment lawyer to show the company exactly how they violated not only the law, but also the company’s own employment guidelines. Faced with such violations of the principles the company itself laid down and promised to their employees, it is difficult for such companies to argue that they didn’t realize how they were supposed to respond to an employee’s reports of harassment or that they didn’t know they couldn’t fire someone for making such reports.

Employees must keep in mind that under California law, complaints alleging discrimination or retaliation must be filed with the Division of Labor Standards Enforcement in California within six months of the alleged discriminatory or retaliatory action by an employer, except in certain circumstances.

Some of the laws enforced by the Labor Commissioner in the State of California which prohibit discrimination and retaliation include discrimination or retaliation for threatening to file a complaint with the Labor Commissioner, for taking time off to serve as a juror, be a witness in court or to attend judicial proceedings related to being a victim of a crime or related to a victim, for discharging victims of domestic violence, for taking time off to seek medical or psychological treatment related to domestic violence or a sexual assault, for taking time off to go to a child’s school at the request of a teacher, for disclosing his or her wages, for engaging in political activity, for being a whistle blower (not the real whistles), for being paid less than employees of a different sex for the same work unless based on a bona fide factor other than sex, or for complaining about safety or health conditions.

For Southern California Employment Lawyers such as myself who are also Women’s Rights Lawyers, when President Obama signed the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009 in late January, he remedied a great injustice and provided employment and women’s rights attorneys with yet another tool in our arsenal to fight for employee’s and women’s rights.

Now women in Southern California and the rest of the nation have a law that gives them the ability to redress the wrong suffered upon them by society in allowing men to receive more money for the same work from an employer and limiting the rights of women to bring a claim for pay discrimination.

In the past, women were required to file suit within 180 days after first being paid unfairly, even if the discrimination of being paid less than male workers in the same jobs continued. And if a woman failed to discover that male workers were being paid more for the same work, a woman still could not hold her employer accountable if she didn’t learn of the unfairness and take action within 180 days of first being paid the lesser rate.

Under the Fair Pay Act of 2009 signed into law by President Obama, the statute of limitations of 180 days starts with each discriminatory paycheck, rather than when the employer starts to discriminate. So long as a woman in CA files her claim within 180 days of receiving any discriminatory paycheck, not just the first one, she is considered timely in bringing her claim.

An important aspect of the Act is that the effective date of the Act is retroactively set at May 28, 2007, which will allow it to apply to all compensation discrimination claims that have been filed on or after that date.

Women can sue for back pay awards for up to two years before she files her employment discrimination claim under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The Fair Pay Act of 2009 does not change the two-year back pay limit.

Under the Act, an unlawful practice occurs when a discriminatory compensation decision or other practice is adopted, when a person becomes subject to the decision or practice, or when a person is affected by the decision or practice, including each time wages, benefits or other compensation is paid.

California also has it’s own version of the Federal WARN Act which in certain circumstances requires 60 days warning before laying off workers. Under the 2003 California version of the Act, the requirement of 60 days warning applies to establishments with 75 or more employees who have been employed for at least 6 of the previous 12 months, who layoff or relocated 50 or more employees within a 30-day period. There are also various exceptions to the rule.

For the elderly employee laid off, an important ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court has given added protection to older workers. Elderly persons who file employment discrimination lawsuits no longer need to prove that an employer acted intentionally. It is enough that the employee can prove that the layoffs had a disparate effect on the elderly workers.

Layoffs of caregivers providing care to sick family members may also violate federal law.

And all of these tools are still in addition to the tools Southern California employment lawyers have against employers who practice discrimination based on sex, religion, race, age, or sexual orientation, or who subject their workers to a workplace that constitutes a hostile environment.

Visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com and call us if you have been discriminated against or are the victim of retaliation by an employer in Southern California or if you have been receiving less pay than a person of the opposite sex for the same work by your employer for no other valid reason.

It is thus imperative that an employee being laid off who is provided with a separation agreement and release of all claims against his employer consult with an employment attorney to determine if there weren’t violations of any of these laws and others that can assist the employee and his or her attorney to negotiate a larger severance package.

If you have recently been fired, are in fear of losing your job or if you have been presented with a separation agreement or severance package and have been discriminated against, harassed or are the victim of retaliation in Southern California by your employer, we invite you to call our office.

Visit our website at http://www.CaliforniaAttorneysLawyers.com if you are the victim of employment discrimination, retaliation or of discriminatory compensation in Southern California. We have the knowledge and resources to be your Southern California Employment Lawyer and Southern California Employment Attorney anywhere in Southern California from San Diego to Orange County, and Santa Barbara to Palm Springs and all points in between, including Irvine, Huntington Beach, Anaheim, Ventura, Newport Beach, San Luis Obispo, Temecula, Santa Ana, Riverside, Ontario and Palm Desert.

What can a 1-yr salaried employee do when a 10-yr union co-worker makes the workplace environment hostile?

This “union employee” seems to have all the right “connections” because their underperformance is NEVER questioned but every accusation that person makes against me is FULLY INVESTIGATED & RESEARCHED. All I want to do is come to work and do my job as part of the team, but this person does NOT take her work seriously and resents the fact that I do “above & beyond” on every task I am given, no matter how great or small. Should I seek legal counsel? I do not have the same resources as a Union has, and being there one year, I don’t have the “political allies & connections” the 10-year union employee has.

Answer
I’d seek legal council as well as talking to someone at the EEO. File a complaint with the union president, locally and nationally.

It is very common for employees of a large company to work in a large open space filled with cubicles. When working in a cubicle at times the cubicle may give the impression of privacy, but this could not be further from the truth. Your co workers can hear you, and usually see you as well. Here are some helpful tips that can stop you from looking foolish in front of your co workers and maybe even save your job.

Disturbing the Peace:

The biggest complaint in any office is usually people disturbing the peace and quiet in the office. People thing that because they are in a cubicle they can talk on their cell phones or play a radio and no one will hear them. I am here to tell you this could not be further from the truth. The people around you can hear every word of your phone calls and hear every note from your radio, and no matter how nice you think the music is the people around you may not think so. Try to keep personal calls to your break time or walk out of the office when you have to take a personal call, and if your boss allows you to listen to the radio use headphones so you do not disturb the other people in the office.

Office Rumors:

Every day people loose their jobs for talking about other people they work with and spreading rumors. When you work in an office anything you tell someone will eventually come back to you, and if you say something bad about another co worker they will eventually find out that you are the one who said it and if they complain it is called creating a hostile workplace and not only can you get fired but you and the company can get sued for it, even if what you said was the truth. If you hear something, keep it to yourself and you will not have any problems.

Communicating with the Real World

Bosses know that their workers are going to make and receive personal phone calls and emails when they should be working, but that does not mean it is acceptable to spend all day having conversations over email or constantly having to go outside to take phone calls. Some bosses actually expect you to do some work while they are paying you. It is also important receive large attachments at work. Receiving thinks like video clips can take up much of the offices bandwidth for the time it take to receive them. This means that the other people who may need to use the network resources may be denied because of your download and I can tell you from experience that this angers bosses.

Sit at you desk:

It is not uncommon to walk around the office to have a chat with another co-worker, very often you may have to talk to someone about some work this is perfectly acceptable, and to share pleasantries is expected but to spend 10 minutes talking about non work related subjects is a bit much. The more time you spend away from your desk on non business related things the more your boss may start to think how necessary you are to the company.

Lunch:

Eating at your desk is fairly common in a busy office, but try not to bring or order food that has a strong smell or is wrapped in a wrapper that makes too much noise when you open it.. As much as you may enjoy the smell of your food others may not. Try to bring in food that does not have any odor that someone else can smell. And loud wrappers can get on peoples nerves and can cause resentments that can come back to haunt you in the future.

Au Natural:

Before you put on that aftershave in the morning you may want to take a moment to think if it is really appropriate. It is not uncommon for some people to be bothered by colognes and perfumes in the office. This can cause headaches in some people and if you are the cause if this your job can quickly be in jeopardy especially if it is the boss who you are disturbing.

Pimp my Cubicle:

Many people want their cubicles to reflect their personality, and they will put up pictures and jokes and little knick knacks. The problem with this is that it does not look professional when outsiders visit the office, to have a few pictures on your desk is one thing but to have a small aquarium or collectables on your desk may be a bit much for any office. Before sprucing up your cubicle make sure to run it by the supervisor. You would not want to get a letter from human resources for having inappropriate items on your desk.

Watching the way you act and being courteous to your fellow workers can make a difference between having a career with the possibility of raises and promotions or a dead end job.

Ellie Schneider left a promising career in a large corporation to work with Online Casinos reviewing their Blackjack and other gambling software.

Hostile Workplace Environment?

I am a manager at a restaurant in the state of Alabama.
I have been told by the owner of the Franchise not to hire “blacks”
I have also been told that the only music permissible in the kitchen must be christian.
Must i really force my employees to listen something they don’t want to listen to?
I do believe that I have to put up with it in order to keep my job. If i get let go or i just get so tired of it i leave will i qualify for for unemployment?

Answer
You quit for this and no you will not qualify for unemployment.

Some leaders are born, while others are created. It’s often difficult, especially as a manager, to convince others to follow in our footsteps, but it is possible. Whether you’re a natural born leader or not, the following qualities can and should be nurtured in order to enhance your leadership abilities.

Vision

Do you have a vision and are you able to share that vision with your team? Having a vision means you know what path you want to take in order to achieve optimal end results. Your communication skills must be strong enough to effectively convince your followers that your path is the right choice given the current situation.

Dedication

Are you really dedicated to your work? Are you willing, if necessary, to spend extra long hours at the office to get the job done? Your dedication will inspire your team members to share the same level of enthusiasm.

Humility

Humility means being able to recognize that you are no better off than anyone else on your team, regardless of your salary or job title. You’re all human and you all make mistakes. Your job status doesn’t exempt you from error.

Fairness

A good leader needs to be able to make fair decisions regardless of how he or she may feel personally about a given situation. Fairness means looking at the facts, not each team member’s personal opinions about them, and then making an educated decision.

Humor

Let’s face it – laughter is the best medicine. People are happy when they are laughing, and laughter eases tension and increases productivity (in moderation, of course). Those stuck in a boring or hostile workplace won’t accomplish much. Put your sense of humor to work and keep the entire team happy.

These are, of course, only a few leadership qualities you should keep in mind but they offer you an excellent place to start. Take a look at your day to day interactions with your team and determine whether or not you need to tweak your leadership style. Good luck!

Download Sean McPheat’s free corporate training email course. Sean provides business training to small, medium and large businesses. Click here for further information about Sean’s management courses

Do employers with less than 10 employees have to follow laws regarding discrimination in the workplace?

I have a friend who is 50 years old and has been working for the same company for the past 4 years. He is the best employee the company has. The owners stepson has moved to the area and took over mostly. The owner and his stepson keep making comments to my friend about his age (aren’t you to old for this….aren’t you ready to retire yet….etc.) Well the owner is going on vacation next week and my fiend is convinced that the stepson will fire him while the boss is gone since he will be in charge. Ever since the stepson has moved to town the working environment has been horrible…very hostile to say the least. My friend used to be the “manager” but that is no more. Do no laws against this type of discrimination appy here. The company is a small family owned business with maybe 10 employees. Everything I find relates to businesses with 15 or more employees. What can he do???
The EEOC and Age Discrimination Act only apply to business with 15 or more employees. Therefore is it going to do ANY good to even contact the EEOC? Yes, by law they have to take the complaint but will anything be done??? I have searched the web up and down for info on small biz laws and can find nothing unless you employee 15 or more people. So does this mean people who only employee 5-10 people can do what they want in regard to their employees???

Answer
The laws of discrimination apply from small business to large business. I hope your friend took notes on what date and time those comments were made. If he does get fired for no particular reason I’m sure he can sue the company for age discrimination. He should contact a Labor attorney if he wants to pursue a lawsuit and get some advice.

The Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967 (ADEA) protects certain applicants and employees 40 years of age and older from discrimination on the basis of age in hiring, promotion, discharge, compensation, or terms, conditions or privileges of employment. The ADEA is enforced by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC).

He can contact the Dept. of Labor and probably get some assistance before he gets fired. Call them at 1-866-USA-DOL. They will be able to answer any questions.

To file a complaint you have to go to: http://eeoc.gov/charge/overview_charge_filing.html