You are a leading management employment lawyer in the city of Absurdity in the s
ID: 455458 • Letter: Y
Question
You are a leading management employment lawyer in the city of Absurdity in the state of California. One of your clients is Curious Creatures (CC), a company that manufactures original and bizarre stuffed animals. CC, one of the few stuffed animal companies not to have moved its manufacturing operations to China, employs about 550 employees. All of the employees are non-union and no employees have a written contract. The President and CEO of CC, Yogi Baer, is very interested in employment matters and frequently calls you with employment law questions and somewhat strange human relations ideas. He expects a prompt and thorough response, in writing, which explains what liabilities he might face in any given situation and your recommendations concerning what actions he should take. He appreciates when you cite the applicable law and cases. Today he phoned you and related event that occurred last week. An employee in the accounting department, Roxy Rambo, is going through a bitter divorce with her abusive, militaristic husband, who has a long history of mental health problems. He threatened to “get her” wherever she went. After leaving him, Roxy sought and obtained a protective order from the Family Court in Absurdity. Roxy notified her supervisor about the protective order and, at Mr. Baer’s direction, CC hired In Your Face, LLC (“IYF”), a security company. IYF sent 12 uniformed, heavily armed, security personnel to protect the CC facility and its employees in the event Mr. Rambo showed up at the company. Roxy was pleased, but not all the employees had a positive reaction. Harvey Grunt was an Iraq war veteran who suffered from PTSD. At the sight of the heavily armed security guards at the workplace, Grunt suffered “flashbacks” and began freaking out. He was so disruptive that Mr. Baer fired him. Mr. Baer then cancelled the contract with IYF and hired a plain-clothes guard company, Undercover Heat. A clause in Undercover Heat’s contract prohibited CC’s management from disclosing that they were on the job or the identities of any of the guards. When the uniformed guards were removed and seemingly not replaced, animal stuffer Franny Faint was very upset and filed a complaint with Cal-OSHA, asserting that the workplace was unsafe due to the possibility of violence. When Mr. Baer heard “through the grapevine” that Franny complained to OSHA, he fired her. He also was growing weary of trying to make his factory safe from Roxy Rambo’s crazed, estranged husband, so he fired her. Now, he tells you that he thinks he may have gone too far. Analyze the legal issues presented and explain what you would advise Mr. Baer to do about the employee-related events.
Explanation / Answer
Mr Baer - as one of the senior personnel of the firm ,introduced all interventions and plans to ensure peace at the workplace ,there is no doubt all that he has undertaken is with a noble motive .However ,the one most important crucial factor he missed was seeking consultation with Human resource personnel which is the most appropriate department to provide guidelines on the employee relations .
To conusult a lawyer in undertsanding legal implications is fine , but that is more of a reactive approach , whereas consulting an HR department would have assisted him adapting a proactive approach and in understanding how employee under various situations would tend to react and how that can be mitigated or avoided through planned interventions
The scenario present showcase several attempts which are more of arriving at a solutions in reaction to the way circumstances unfold , this could be easily avoided if he had adopted a more planned approach and an expert opinion on talent management
The legal issues presented in the scenarios are as follows
Advise to Mr Baer :
Related Questions
Navigate
Integrity-first tutoring: explanations and feedback only — we do not complete graded work. Learn more.