Employers with nonunionized workforces once went about their business without giving much thought to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). But with union membership in decline, a more activist Board is branching out, and now even nonunion employers need to be on guard.
As union membership dwindles, the NLRB is emphasizing that the National Labor [...]

Raise your hand if your business has not been disrupted by the weather in 2011.
In the past two months, large parts of the Southeast and Midwest have been reeling from record numbers of devastating tornadoes; the West Coast had tsunami warnings following the earthquake in Japan; and the Mississippi River and its tributaries have reached [...]

Let’s say you’re an employer that maintains unencrypted employee information on a laptop computer and the computer gets stolen. Could you be liable for the possible harm that could come to employees if their personal information were disclosed? In a recent decision, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals held that affected employees might have [...]

by Robert A. Berry
Business is tough. It’s even harder in today’s climate — and that’s assuming all of your employees are working for the good of the business. Unfortunately, that’s not always the case. It may be a valued and trusted employee with many years of dedicated service, or it may be someone new or [...]

by Joseph C. Pettygrove
Employers are increasingly looking at the feasibility of scanning hard copies of various types of employment documents and retaining only the electronic copies in the routine course of business. Generally speaking, you are allowed to do that if you ensure that your electronic record maintenance systems are secure, accurate, reliable, and accessible [...]

by John Vering
A recent national survey found that 59 percent of employees who quit or were laid off or terminated in the last 12 months admitted to stealing company data, and 67 percent admitted to using their former employer’s confidential data to find a new job. Read on to learn what you can do to [...]

Over the last several years, social networking websites like Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, and Twitter have evolved to the point where most employees use at least one, if not several, of them throughout each day. Social networking sites provide an easily accessible medium for individuals to stay in contact with friends, colleagues, clients, prospective clients, and [...]

by David Kaufman
In April, a Connecticut teenager downloaded the billionth application from Apple’s iTune App Store. An “app” is an application or program that allows a user to play a game, surf the Web better, keep track of caloric intake, or tens of thousands of other things. In just nine months, Apple has created [...]

by David Micah Kaufman
Like many of us, several of my friends have recently suffered vocational dislocation (no matter what we name it, losing a job is still a tragedy). One of these friends called me a few weeks ago and told me he had landed a position as a independent contractor for a financial services [...]

by Margaret DiBianca
Hints of the holiday season are tucked away in every corner of the workplace. Cards from customers and vendors are tacked up in cubicles. Uneaten candy canes and tin canisters filled with chocolate-drizzled caramel popcorn continue to make appearances in the break room. The office-party circuit seems endless and, of course, requires a [...]