HR Self-Audit Virtual Summit Agenda

Session 1: 9:45 a.m. - 10:30 a.m. (All Times Central)
Start the Audit: Finding Holes in Your Hiring Practices
When planning an audit of your HR policies, where should you start? At the beginning! We’ll explain how to review your employment practices for potential legal liability at the very beginning of the employment relationship -- hiring. You’ll benefit from an overview of key areas where policies and practices might very well be out of compliance, including:

• Job descriptions: Making sure they are complete, consistent, and up-to-date
• Interviewing: Are your interviewers asking forbidden questions? How can you know?
• Background checks: When you should and shouldn’t, and to what extent
• Pre-employment testing: Tests you can and should conduct, and when
• Work eligibility: Latest details on compliance with I-9 and E-Verify
  

Break: 10:30 a.m. - 10:45 a.m.

Session 2: 10:45 a.m. - 11:30 a.m.
Fortifying Your Defenses Against Workplace Discrimination
Discrimination, for employment law purposes, is any workplace action (such as hiring, firing, demoting, and promoting) based on a prejudice of some kind that results in the unfair treatment of employees. With some notable exceptions, such as affirmative action and bona fide occupational qualifications, discrimination is strictly prohibited by a myriad of federal laws and state laws. In this segment, we’ll discuss key areas where your HR policies, if not stated and practiced properly, can lead to difficult and expensive discrimination claims, including:

• Title VII: Uncovering potential violations
• Americans with Disabilities Act: Reviewing policies for the most recent changes
• Age Discrimination in Employment Act: Determining if practices unintentionally benefit younger workers at the expense of those in a protected class
• Military status: Your obligations to employee service members
• Other areas: Are you running the risk of sparking a discrimination claim for sexual orientation, gender identity, genetic information… even gun ownership?
  

Session 3: 11:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m.
Compensation Crackdown: 10 Things to Double-Check Now
Now that you’ve hired the right people, will you be among the astounding 70 percent of employers who fail to correctly compensate them under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA)? In this rapid-fire session, you’ll learn how to audit 10 policy areas that often trip up employers, including:

• Independent contractors
• Exempt employees
• Temps
• Accounting for breaks, travel time, preparatory activities, and employee training
• Employees working “on call” or off the clock
• Paying appropriate state, federal, and local minimum, living, or prevailing wages
• Properly compensating tipped employees
• Accounting for and compensating for overtime hours
• Deductions for absences or workplace misconduct
  

Extended Conference Break: 12:15 p.m. - 1:15 p.m.

Session 4: 1:15 p.m. - 2:00 p.m.
Documentation Dilemmas: What Records to Keep…Store…Toss
Have you reviewed your organization’s policy regarding employee documents? Unless you have the luxuries of unlimited storage, impeccable organizational skills, and voluminous amounts of time in which to maintain those records, you need to determine which employee records you wish, and need, to keep.
Learn:

• General recordkeeping dos and don’ts
• Protected health information: Keeping data properly separated from other files
• Time limits: How long to keep payroll records, resumes, and performance evaluations
• Electronic files: Which records to store electronically, and how to keep systems secure
• Employee access: When to allow employees access to their personnel files
  

Session 5: 2:00 p.m. - 3:00 p.m.
Health Care & Retirement Benefits: Staying Complaint with Future Changes
Health care benefits have been under the microscope. Learn how to adjust your benefits policies to remain in compliance. This area is rife with challenges, and a periodic audit of your policies and practices is crucial. In this session, our speakers will give their best guidance on several key benefits areas, including:

• Health Care Update: Compliance with recent legislative changes on mental health parity, Michelle’s Law, CHIPRA special enrollment
• COBRA: Providing the proper documentation and coverage to current and former employees and their family members
• Complying with the new COBRA rules in the stimulus bill
• Auditing policies regarding an employee-benefit plan covered by ERISA
• HIPAA: Keeping policies compliant with the privacy, portability, and non-discrimination provisions
• Compliance with the changes made by the HiTech Act
• Retirement Plan ABCs and 123s: Managing your 401(k), 403(b), or 457(b)
  

Session 6: 3:00 p.m. - 3:45 p.m.
Are Your Firing Practices A Breeding Ground for Lawsuits?
Whether through termination, voluntary separation, or a reduction in force, at some point you’re going to lose employees. Solid, detailed policies and procedures for handling employee terminations can serve as an invaluable roadmap during what may be an extremely stressful, even emotionally charged time. Make sure that your policies aren’t steering you on the wrong course. In this segment, we’ll cover:

• Voluntary separations: Ensuring that voluntary resignations are truly voluntary, rather than a breeding ground for future litigation
• Auditing policies on nondisclosure, noncompete, or similar agreements
• Reductions in force: Policies to prevent discriminatory selection for layoff and compliance with state and federal WARN Acts, if necessary
• Benefits related issues in severance and voluntary separate arrangements -- how tax and other rules impact such arrangements
• Exit interviews
• Complying with COBRA, state unemployment laws, and other post-employment requirements
  

Session 7: 3:45 p.m. - 4:30 p.m.
HR Land of the Lost: The (Forgotten) Workplace Policies That You Must Get Right
If you’ve thoroughly planned for every employment-related eventuality with a comprehensive workplace policy, how can you ensure that these policies are also fair and legal? This session will show how to audit specific rules and requirements relating to:

• How EFCA would impact monitoring the improper conduct of both unions and employers during the organizing process
• How EFCA would preclude employers from exercising their free speech rights under the NLRA to communicate with employees before they make a final decision on the issue of unionization
• How to lawfully respond to union communications in the workplace, including posters and organizing meetings on company property by non-employees
• How far you can go in limiting employee organizing on company property
• What to do if employees are using company e-mail to organize
• How to avoid unfair labor practice claims
• What employers can do to dispute and fight unfair labor practice claims
• How to respond when mistakes are made

Session 8: 4:30 p.m. - 5:00 p.m.
Get Your Tough Questions Answered Live by an Expert Panel

Your Workshop Leaders...

Attorney Stacie L. Caraway with Miller & Martin concentrates her practice in the areas of labor and employment. She advises national franchises and other companies concerning general employment and labor law issues. Ms. Caraway develops, reviews, and updates human resource policies, supporting contracts and materials; and represents clients in labor arbitrations, EEOC and state human rights commission investigations, settlement mediations and lawsuits.

Attorney Ashley Gillihan with Alston & Bird focuses his practice exclusively on health and welfare employee benefit compliance and litigation issues for employers, health plan administrators, and other health and welfare benefit plan service providers. He also has extensive experience assisting financial institutions and insurance companies who serve as Health Savings Account trustees or custodians.

Attorney John B. Phillips with Miller & Martin served as Vice President and Deputy General Counsel for Labor & Employment with Coca-Cola Enterprises Inc. He has coordinated comprehensive employment audits for companies with nationwide facilities, and he coordinated significant downsizings of major corporations which included preparation of severance agreements for key employees.

Attorney Bradd N. Siegel with Porter Wright Morris & Arthur LLP has defended management clients against claims brought under state and federal employment discrimination statutes, ERISA, Section 301 of the LMRA, and state wrongful discharge law. Named to The Best Lawyers in America® for the past 20 years, Mr. Siegel was elected a Fellow of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers in 1999.