« Yale Law Meets Paris Hilton. | Main | Blawg Review #78: Justin Patten's Human Law »
October 09, 2006
SLM 14:"Retained dignity" in preventing employee suits.
A very fine post by Jay Shepherd at his new HR blog Gruntled Employees, called "New HR metric: 'retained dignity'", squares with my theory that most lawsuits brought by employees are triggered by unclassy firings. For years, we've told our clients that the average lawsuit against them by an at-will employee is legally insubstantial and probably groundless--but it still takes at least $50,000 in fees to make it go away on a motion to dismiss or for summary judgment. That lawsuit is fueled by anger and humilation, and lots of plaintiff's lawyers will take it on. If your HR practices and rank-and-file managers are dumb and insensitive enough, you'll get a lot of these. Those fees add up.
Posted by JD Hull at October 9, 2006 07:56 AM