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Firing

Pregnant poor performer: Can we fire her?

06/22/2009

Q. We have a pregnant employee who is planning to take maternity leave soon. Her performance has deteriorated badly during her pregnancy, but we don’t think her pregnancy has anything to do with it. Can we terminate?

Suspect FMLA leave abuse? Tread carefully

06/12/2009

Employees who take intermittent FMLA leave can often cause real problems for employers because they take time off so sporadically. But sometimes you may detect a pattern that indicates the employee might be abusing authorized intermittent leave. Can you fire him?

On-demand leave isn’t reasonable accommodation

06/12/2009

Some employees think that any disability that periodically acts up entitles them to unlimited time off. Sometimes, courts view extra time off as a reasonable accommodation, but there are limits.

Warn managers and supervisors: No negative talk about military service

06/12/2009

Here’s a good way to avoid litigation: Warn all your supervisors and managers that bad-mouthing an employee’s military service can spell trouble. That’s because any disciplinary action following such talk could be viewed as evidence military service was a factor in the decision.

Track all efforts to accommodate disabilities

06/11/2009

Employers have an obligation to engage with disabled employees in an interactive accommodations process. But exactly how do you go about proving you complied when the employee says you didn’t try to help? Your best approach is to track all your efforts to accommodate, including every contact with the employee, whether by phone, e-mail, memo or snail mail.

Make firing decisions locally so possible lawsuit can’t morph into something larger

06/11/2009

Here’s added incentive to handle terminations and other employment actions at the local level. When employees sue, their attorneys often look to expand the lawsuit beyond one person. They’re trying to find larger patterns of discrimination. This strategy can sometimes succeed if higher-ups in the company made the decision and based it on a common policy or framework.

Good news: Courts open to attorneys’ fees for employers

06/11/2009

Since employees get attorneys’ fees when a court determines employers violated their rights, it seems reasonable that employers should get attorneys’ fees when they have to waste time and money on frivolous litigation. It turns out some courts are beginning to entertain such requests.

Should we contest? Fired for poor work, former employee now wants unemployment

06/11/2009

Q. After repeatedly warning an employee about her poor performance, we recently terminated her. At the termination meeting, she complained for the first time that she felt she’d been held to higher standards based on her gender. She has now filed for unemployment benefits. While we don’t think she’s entitled to the benefits, we wonder whether it makes sense to fight her claim. What do you think?

How to handle habitually late workers

06/09/2009

Employers expect employees to get to work on time. Occasional problems with traffic or family issues sometimes make employees late. But chronic tardiness is another thing altogether. While most employers track tardiness occurrences, they should do more. How?

Asked to enforce civility, court demurs

06/08/2009

Courts don’t want to become micromanagers. Employers still get to decide how supervisors should treat subordinates, as long as they’re not biased and their behavior doesn’t cross the line into harassment.