Employment law lessons are everywhere.

Previously on the Blawg, we’ve discussed valuable legal training you can glean from such unexpected sources as The Office, Dilbert, March Madness, Mr. Rogers, Simon & Garfunkel and – occasionally – even lawyers.

Today, we offer up some deep employment law thoughts inspired by the season finales of two of the nation’s most-loved TV shows: LOST and American Idol.

LOST

If you’ve never seen the show, here’s the basic set-up: a plane crashes on a remote island and a small pack of survivors tries to get rescued before they all kill each other. Basically, it’s Gilligan’s Island with lots of guns.

The show revolves around the intense interpersonal conflict that results when people work together to tackle seemingly impossible problems under seemingly insurmountable odds. Sounds a bit like the modern American workplace, doesn’t it?

With that in mind, here are my Top 3 Lost Employment Law Lessons from the past season:

1. You’re truly LOST without a team.  The very best way to avoid needless disputes that can bring down an entire enterprise is to foster an environment that puts the team above the individual.  The mantra “live together or die alone” is repeated by someone on the show every 27 seconds or so. That’s great advice.
2. Be careful whom you follow.  Don’t make alliances with bad people — you could end up in a bad place. Headlines from the past year featured several prominent HR execs getting hauled into court or even jail after they went along with various questionable schemes. There’s an old saying: “Bad company corrupts good character.” Don’t let that happen to you.
3. Adversity = opportunity. LOST’s characters are in near-constant peril. The good ones see each challenge as an opportunity: they rise to the occasion and grow as leaders and as human beings. That’s a great lesson for today’s trying times. Don’t sit around whining about the economy or other things beyond your control. Seize each day and make the most of it.

AMERICAN IDOL

The setting: three all-powerful judges help America decide who gets a career in music and who doesn’t.  Sort of the ultimate talent-evaluation exercise.

Frankly, as a native of Milwaukee, I’m still clinically depressed over the fact that fellow Milwaukeean Danny Gokey (who attended my kids’ school) got voted off. That said, here are my Top 3 American Idol Employment Law Lessons:

1. Pursue honesty (even if it gets you booed). Simon is the only judge who actually seems to tell the truth, which usually isn’t very popular with the crowd. However, in my humble opinion, honesty is always the best assessment policy. Needlessly sugarcoating talent assessments or performance evaluations only leads to trouble in the end.
2. Don’t intentionally inflict emotional distress. On the other hand, you might want to consider being just a tad less harsh than Simon. Managers who routinely fill their performance evaluations with words like ”hideous,” “pathetic,” ”terrible” and “awful” are just begging for emotional distress claims.
3. Humility and creativity are key. This year’s finalists offer a stark contrast. It’s down to super-humble Kris and ultra-creative Adam. The business book classic Good to Great found that humility at the top is the absolute #1 key to a “great” enterprise. Other studies confirm that fostering creativity in an organization is the key to innovation and staying ahead of the competition. You need both to win in today’s world of work.

Employment law lessons are everywhere.

Previously on the Blawg, we’ve discussed valuable legal training you can glean from such unexpected sources as The Office, Dilbert, March Madness, Mr. Rogers, Simon & Garfunkel and – occasionally – even lawyers.

Today, we offer up some deep employment law thoughts inspired by the season finales of two of the nation’s most-loved TV shows:  Lost and American Idol.

LOST

If you’ve never seen the show, here’s the basic set-up:  a plane crashes on a remote island and a small pack of survivors tries to get rescued before they all kill each other.  Basically, it’s Gilligan’s Island with lots of guns.

The show revolves around the intense interpersonal conflict that results when people work together to tackle seemingly impossible problems under seemingly insurmountable odds.  Sounds a bit like the modern American workplace, doesn’t it?

With that in mind, here are my Top 3 Lost Employment Law Lessons from the past season:

1. You’re truly lost without a team.  The very best way to avoid needless disputes that can bring down an entire enterprise is to foster an environment that puts the team above the individual.  Jack, the leader of the pack, says this approximately every 27 seconds:  “live together or die alone.”  That’s a great mantra.
2. Facts, not emotion.  Here’s an excellent quote from last night’s show:  “Sometimes good command decisions get compromised by bad emotional responses.”  The show’s main bad guy (Ben) said that just as his own emotional overreaction to a situation resulted in several people getting blown up.  As we’ve often said here on the Blawg, one of the quickest ways to get into legal hot water is to react out of emotion.  Get all the facts before you act.
3. Be careful whom you follow.  Last, don’t make alliances with bad people.  You could end up in a very bad place.  Headlines from the past year featured several prominent HR execs going to jail after they went along with various fraudulent schemes.  There’s an old saying:  “Bad company corrupts good character.”  Don’t let that happen to you.

AMERICAN IDOL

The setting:  three all-powerful judges help America decide who gets a career in music and who doesn’t.  Sort of the ultimate talent-evaluation exercise.

Frankly, I could only force myself to watch this year’s season in tiny little doses.  With that caveat, here are my Top 3 American Idol Employment Law Lessons:

1. Pursue honesty (even if it gets you booed).  Simon is the only judge who actually seems to tell the truth, which usually isn’t very popular with the crowd.  However, in my humble opinion, honesty is always the best assessment policy.  Needlessly sugarcoating talent assessments or performance evaluations only leads to trouble in the end.
2. Don’t intentionally inflict emotional distress.  On the other hand, you might want to consider being just a tad less harsh than Simon.  Managers who routinely fill their performance evaluations with words like ”hideous,” “pathetic,” ”terrible” and “awful” are just begging for an emotional distress claim.
3. Be careful when hanging out with your employees.  Without going into any needlessly salacious details, let’s just say that the show offers lots of excellent examples of the risks inherent in “off-duty” fraternization.  Unfortunately, co-workers say and do things when they’re together outside the workplace that they would never say or do at the office.  If you’re going to hang with your employees outside of work, please, please, please be very, very, very careful.

For even more on these subjects, you may want to check out the links below, passed along by some diligent Blawg visitors:

http://www.hrworld.com/features/lessons-managers-learn-lost-051508/

http://www.hrcapitalist.com/2008/05/10-things-every.html