Record EEOC claims. Rising litigation. Soaring damage awards. It’s a simple formula: economy down = lawsuits up. Or so the experts say.

Each quarter, we check to see what our loyal Blawg visitors are experiencing. At our most recent webinar, we asked our 1,822 attendees:

Are you seeing an increase in employment law claims?

Here are the official results:

• Yes, substantial increase: 5%
• Yes, modest increase: 31%
• No change: 60%
• No, modest decrease: 1%
• No, substantial decrease: 0%

These results show a slight uptick from last quarter. Overall, 36% reported an increase (up 9% from last quarter’s 33%). Only 1% reported a decrease. The majority are still in the “no change” category (60% this quarter versus 64% last quarter).

 Click here, here and here for more on this topic. As always, thanks for your participation!

At our most recent webinar, we wanted to find out what our loyal Blawg visitors do to save money on outside lawyers. One of the questions we asked our 1,500+ attendees was:

Does your company require your law firms to set and meet a budget for each lawsuit?

The results? Exactly one-third (33%) responded “no.”

Yikes. Think of all the budgeting you do at work and at home. Shouldn’t lawyers be held to a similar standard?

While litigation costs can be difficult to forecast, requiring budgets can be a useful tool to help (1) set expectations, (2) foster communication throughout the suit, (3) hold lawyers accountable and, ultimately, (4) reduce costs.

When I was at a law firm, some of my more sophisticated clients required budgets. While forcing myself to estimate costs beforehand and be held accountable was somewhat painful, overall I really believe that the process helped me provide better service and build better relationships with my clients.

Click here for our free suite of tools designed to help you manage your outside lawyers. In addition to budgets and rigorous (but fair) billing guidelines, you’ll find scorecards and a handy RFP process.

Hope you find them helpful.

Record EEOC claims. Rising litigation. Soaring damage awards. It’s a simple formula: economy down = lawsuits up. Or so the experts say.

We wanted to see what our loyal Blawg visitors are experiencing.  At our most recent webinar, we asked our more than 1,500 attendees:

Are you seeing an increase in employment law claims?

Looks like the experts are right. A whopping 0% of our audience reported a decrease in claims. 100% are either seeing an increase or no change. Interestingly, though, only 5% reported a substantial increase.

Here are the full results:

• Yes, substantial increase — 5%
• Yes, modest increase — 28%
• No change — 64%
• No, modest decrease — 0%
• No, substantial decrease — 0%

Click here, here and here for more on this topic. As always, thanks for your participation!

Here are the results for our most recent questions . . .

WHAT ARE THE ODDS THAT EFCA WILL BE SIGNED INTO LAW?

a.  100% (11% of the votes)

b.  75% (21% of the votes)

c.  50% (17% of the votes)

d.  25% (15% of the votes)

e.  0% as proposed — the “no secret ballot” provision will be compromised away in favor of faster elections and mandatory arbitration (29% of the votes)

f.  0% — EFCA in any form will never pass (7% of the votes)

The winner?  The #1 vote-getter by a slight margin was “e.”  That said, 49% of you feel that EFCA has a 50% or better chance of passing as currently proposed.  Only 7% feel that EFCA in any form will never pass. 

Stay tuned to see how this plays out.

WHAT SHOULD OUR NEXT VIDEO BE?

a.  How NOT to Investigate (41%)

b.  How NOT to Terminate (59%)

Thanks for expressing yourselves.  We’ll get to work on it right away!

We conducted a recent poll to determine what employment law issues are scaring you most.  Here’s the question we asked, along with your responses in order of popularity (based on 603 answers).

What is the #1 most frightening employment law issue you’re facing right now?

1.  Terminations (26%)
2.  Discrimination (13%)
3.  Medical issues (10%)
4.  Harassment (9%)
5.  (Tie) Wage and hour (8%) and Benefits (8%)
7.  Hiring (7%)
8.  RIFs (6%)
9.  Unions (3%)

We’ll keep this data in mind as we create new tools and tips on the Blawg.  As always, thanks for your participation!

In light of all the economic turmoil and job losses, we conducted a poll to see how employers are approaching severance.  Here are the results (based on 632 responses) in order of popularity:

How does your company currently approach severance?

1.  We have no policy but pay severance on a case-by-case basis (45%)
2.  We have a policy and pay one week per service year (22%)
3.  We never pay severance unless required by an employment agreement (18%)
4.  We have a policy and pay two weeks per service year (9%)
5.  We have a policy and pay less than one week per service year (3%)

So, the biggest chunk of our audience has no policy but pays severance on a case-by-case basis.  Of those with formal policies, most pay one week per service year, with a few paying two weeks per year and even fewer paying less than one week per year.  About one in five never pay severance unless it’s required by contract.

Hope you find this information helpful.  As always, thanks for your participation!

To help reduce potential fistfights, riots and other forms of workplace violence, in our latest poll we sought a peaceful resolution to a highly controversial question that inevitably pops up at this time of year.  We asked:

What is the best holiday movie of all time?

The votes are in.  And the winner is . . . 

A Christmas Story, with 30% of the votes.  The first runner-up was It’s a Wonderful Life (25%), followed by Miracle on 34th Street (14%).

Here are the complete results:

1.  A Christmas Story (30%)
2.  It’s a Wonderful Life (25%)
3.  Miracle On 34th Street (14%)
4.  (Tie) A Charlie Brown Christmas, How the Grinch Stole Christmas (7%)
6.  National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation (5%)
7.  The Santa Clause (4%)
8.  (Tie) Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer, Elf, White Christmas (3%)
11. (Tie) Frosty the Snowman, Bad Santa, Santa Claus Conquers the Martians (1%)

Given the potentially hazardous activities depicted in our winner, I feel compelled to make the following recommendations:

• Exercise extreme caution when handling firearms over the holidays so as not to “shoot your eye out.”
• Avoid placing your tongue on metal objects while outdoors.
• Refrain from bringing scantily clad leg-shaped lamps into the workplace to reduce potential claims of harassment and/or bad taste.

HAVE A JOYFUL AND PEACEFUL HOLIDAY SEASON!

In preparation for my upcoming October 30 Halloween webinar, entitled Answers to the World’s Scariest Employment Law Questions, I conducted a survey of the finest employment lawyers in the country to get their answers to the following question:

What are the top ten employment law issues most likely to wake you up screaming in the middle of the night?

Here are the answers . . .

1. Inadequate knowledge of employment law basics
2. Executive misconduct
3. Any form of discrimination
4. Wage and hour violations
5. Retaliation
6. Inadequate investigation
7. Failure to follow policies
8. Bad documentation/communication
9. Emotional rather than fact-based decisions
10. Inconsistency

Over the next few weeks leading up to the webinar, we’ll give you our recommendations for reducing the scream-inducing capacity of each of these truly frightening items.

In the meantime, I suggest using this list as a sort of self-audit priority list.  Start with #1, assess your company’s risk, and then take steps to fix it.  Then move on to #2 and repeat.  If you get all the way through #10, you (and your lawyers) should be able to sleep a whole lot better.

More to follow.

At our most recent webinar, we let the audience select the topic of our July 30 webinar.  The winner:  Every Employment Law in 60 Minutes or Less.

To help make sure I give you what you want, we asked the following question:

With which employment law do you struggle the most?

The top three vote-getters were:

• Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) (33%)
• Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) (24%)
• Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) (12%)

Next up, with 5% each were:

• Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA)
• Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA)
• Immigration Reform and Control Act (IRCA)
• Title VII

Only 2% of you voted for each of the following: 

• Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA)
• Health Insurance Portabilitie and Accountability Act (HIPAA)
• Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA)
• Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Act (USERRA)
• Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN)

Somewhat surprisingly, neither the National Labor Relations Act nor COBRA got a single vote.

We’ll keep this data in mind as we design the webinar.  Our next Question of the Week will be coming your way soon.

Thanks for your participation!

In yesterday’s How to Fire Without Getting Fired webinar, we asked our 1,700 or so participants the following question:

What is your single biggest fear when it comes to employee terminations?

Their answer:  Basically, everything.

Specific fears mentioned included “getting sued” (20%), “lack of good documentation” (16%), “potential retaliation/violence” (7%), “saying something wrong” (7%), “not having all the facts” (5%) and “feeling guilty” (2%).

But the #1 most popular answer was “all of the above” (40%).  “None of the above” was selected by a grand total of 0%.

Just for a little context, this was an audience experienced at handling terminations.  When we asked how many terminations they had handled, the #1 answer was “more than I can possibly count” (31%).  More than 50% of our audience reported handling at least 10 terminations.  Only 7% said they had never fired anyone.

To help you overcome your termination fears, we prepared a suite of handy tools to guide every aspect of the termination process.  They can be accessed here or by clicking on  “Termination Tools” to the left under “Tools & Tips.”