The year that the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) predicts will carry “the most sweeping HR-related changes in 30 years” starts with a bang this month as HR pros must adapt to important changes to two key employment laws: the FMLA and the ADA.

It’s a good idea to keep careful track of the reasons why employees take FMLA leave—especially if an employee takes leave on different occasions for different reasons.

Whether a work environment is actually sexually hostile depends on whether that’s how an average person would perceive it. A supersensitive person won’t get to sue for sexual harassment if an ordinary person would brush off the alleged harassment.

The 4th Circuit just made it easier for employees to sue for having to work in a hostile environment. The court said that unpleasant and offensive conduct aimed as one’s sex or race does not have to happen in the presence of the employee who winds up complaining. Conduct witnessed by other employees can be used as evidence ...

Surprise! Supervisors sometimes say dumb things. It may be entirely innocent—they simply don’t realize the impact their words may have. If that’s the case, and someone complains, it may be best to settle the case and move on.

Probationary university professors whose contracts aren’t renewed because they failed to achieve tenure status can’t use tenure denial alone as the basis of a suit alleging damage to their reputations. They must show that the decision was actually motivated by something like race or sex discrimination.

Sometimes, it’s unclear whether an employee’s medical bills are related to a workplace injury. Now there’s a bit of good news if you wind up having to cover those bills.

Sometimes, employees don’t have enough information to judge whether something they observe at work is discrimination—or a legitimate management action.

A retired Marine who is a civilian employee at Camp Lejeune is suing the Marine Corps base for demanding that he remove anti-Muslim stickers from his car. Officials asked Jesse Nieto, whose son was a victim of the 2000 bombing of the USS Cole in Yemen, to remove a decal...

The U.S. Department of Justice has filed a lawsuit accusing the North Carolina Administrative Office of the Courts and N.C. Superior Court Judge Jerry Braswell of violating former Magistrate James Myles’ rights under USERRA.

North Carolina, like many states, recognizes that employees owe a certain level of duty to their employers. However, the North Carolina Supreme Court has specifically rejected any independent liability for breaching such duty.

Q. Our company has an employee handbook. One of our employees has stated that this creates an employment contract and that he is no longer an at-will employee. Is this correct?

Q. If our employee has an accident while talking on a cell phone in a company car, is the company liable to the injured party?

Q. We do not believe that one of our employees is keeping accurate time records of her work. Can we pay her what we believe she worked instead of what her time records show?

The U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) has issued a new FMLA poster to go along with the new FMLA rules that will take effect Jan. 16. Don’t waste budget dollars buying new posters from HR vendors. You can download the official version for free right here.