Workplace rules are back, baby!

The feds are talking about NLRB-EEOC coordination, an end to collection of compensation data, and an inflation-indexed salary test for the overtime exemption. Here's the scoop.

Must-see ConstangyTV! The September edition of ConstangyTV’s “Close-Up on Workplace Law” is on YouTube, and you will not want to miss it. Host Leigh Tyson talks with Jon Yarbrough about social media in the workplace, including social media horror stories and what employers can do about them, the restrictions that have been imposed on social media policies by the National Labor Relations Board, and how that might change now that we have a Republican majority on the Board. To save you a long, grueling trip to our YouTube site, here it is:

Trump’s 8 zillionth* travel ban: what employers need to know. President Trumpissued a new travel ban “proclamation” on Sunday, and the excellent Will Krasnow of our Boston Office has read it and explains it all for us in this Immigration Dispatch.

*I might be exaggerating.

Image Credit: From flickr, Creative Commons license, by Jelene Morris.

An article by Lauren Weber and Rachel Feintzeig in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal caught a lot of attention -- it was about companies that have made the decision to do without a Human Resources function.

The idea drew some positive response on Twitter:

HR stifles innovation and bogs down businesses with inefficient policies and processes. http://t.co/5cGRIwHaxR

— Mike Brice ...

The National Labor Relations Board has taken the position that many garden-variety employment policies violate the law. These rulings place employers in a “Catch 22”—if employers rescind the policies, they could have trouble defending themselves in unemployment cases, wrongful termination lawsuits, or before government agencies like the Equal Employment Opportunity ...

Well! OK!

It's been an interesting week, hasn't it? Congratulations to President Obama on winning a second term. My Election 2012 coverage would not be complete without some labor and employment prognostications for Obama Administration II.*

*Please do not read these again in 2016 to see how accurate I was. I don't want to be known as the Dick Morris of employment law bloggers.

If we don't laugh, we'll cry, right? In honor of Phyllis Diller, the queen of the one-liners, who died this week, and her counterpart, the great Henny Youngman, here is the latest labor and employment news - all in one-liners, of course.

"A bachelor is a guy who never made the same mistake once."

"Take my federal agencies -- please!" The National Labor Relations Board has taken the position ...

Wow! This story has it all.

Bullying!

Chick-fil-A!

Social media!

Was this guy's YouTube post "protected concerted activity"? You decide.

Adam Smith (no relation to that "invisible hand" guy), chief financial officer of biotech company Vante, went to a drive-through at a Tucson Chick-fil-A on Wednesday morning, ordered a free water, confronted the drive-through girl* about ...

The latest guidance on social media and protected concerted activity, issued last week by Lafe Solomon, Acting General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board, is for the most part an unrealistic, hair-splitting mess. ("But Robin, tell us how you really feel about it!") However, there is a somewhat happy ending that I'll talk about at the end of this post.

The first two ...

Fellow blogger Jon Hyman, among others, has already written an eloquent critique of the latest report from the Office of the General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board on social media and protected concerted activity, and Dan Schwartz has a good roundup of what labor lawyers are saying about it (and also a call for employers not to overreact). If you haven't read Jon and Dan, you ...