When an employee's complaint ends up in court, HR professionals often end up getting blamed for not preventing litigation—sometimes even more so than the manager or executive who took a discriminatory or retaliatory action. What's more, employee lawsuits increasingly have focused on companies' failure to follow their own policies, a trend that has resulted in more HR professionals testifying at trial about what they did (or didn't do) to enforce an employer's policies. As with Watergate, a bad response may cause more legal damage than the initial "crime." This session will identify the five most common HR mistakes that could land your company—and you—in court, and then offer practical advice on how to avoid each of them. The presenter is an employee-side lawyer who previously advised employers, so this is a rare chance to hear from someone with inside experience on both sides of the conflict.

Learning Objectives:

• Learn how to recognize (and avoid) the HR responses that are most likely to result in employees seeking the advice of an employment lawyer.
• Discover three simple actions that will convince even the unhappiest employees that HR is not their adversary.
• Gain best practices for limiting the legal damage that can occur after an employee's initial complaint.
• Understand the legal importance of your organization’s policy manual—and how it can be used as a weapon against you in court.
• Learn the value of encouraging internal whistleblowing.