The Good News: The Union Doesn’t Get to Attend Every Meeting

By Ann Boehm, March 15, 2022 One of the most frequent labor relations questions I get from supervisors is, “Does the union get to attend meetings between me and an individual bargaining unit employee?” The answer to that question is, “It depends.” And I would add,...

Q&A About Performance Demonstration Periods, Otherwise Known as PIPs

By Deborah J. Hopkins, March 15, 2022 As we eagerly await the first decisions from the newly seated MSPB quorum, we have also just passed the one-year anniversary of the Federal Circuit decision Santos v. NASA, that made us rethink everything we thought we knew about...

Non-Pecuniary Damages: How Much Is Enough?

By Michael Rhoads, March 15, 2022 Compensatory damages are available in cases of intentional discrimination under Title VII and the Rehabilitation Act, 42 USC 1981a(b), as well as the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA). While past pecuniary damages (do...

A Head-shaking Tale About Lack of Candor

By Barbara Haga, March 15, 2022 Last month, I wrote about the case of Freeland v. Department of Homeland Security, No. 2020-1344 (Fed. Cir. Aug. 7, 2020). Freeland was a supervisory human resources specialist who was hired by DHS after resigning from his Army job...

Supervisors: To Avoid a Hurdle, Think of Wordle

By Dan Gephart, March 15, 2022 If you’ve been on email, text, or social media in the past couple of months, you’ve undoubtedly seen those ubiquitous green, yellow, and black squares. Maybe someone you know is obsessed with Wordle or, maybe you’re the one obsessed. Or,...

Latest OWCP COVID-19 Guidance Tackles Continuation of Pay

By Frank Ferreri, March 15, 2022 As with just about everything employment-related, COVID-19 continues to have a shifting impact on the federal workers’ compensation landscape, with the Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs pivoting in its guidance to meet the...

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