By Andrea Nicholl
Border City employers got a lesson in employment law, and learned how to protect themselves and their businesses against potential employment-related lawsuits.
This month’s EARN breakfast emphasized the importance of legal protection in relation to human resources and the workplace. Guest speaker, Colin Fetter, lawyer and partner of Brownlee LLP, spoke to EARN members about proactive ways to avoid legal problems before they begin.
“Typically, a lawyer is going to be of much more use to you in a proactive way, to help you set up your workplace to prevent problems from happening, and at the very least to give you tools to minimize the consequences of those problems that do arise,” said Fetter.
He emphasized the top 10 proactive ways to prevent legal complications that may arise in dealings with hiring, employee disputes and discrimination, and referenced preventable ways to avoid lawsuits in relation to fixed term contracts, probationary periods, discipline, severance/notice clauses, disabled employees, human rights and drug/alcohol testing, among others.
“Overall, your best technique in terms of HR, is to have a healthy, happy workplace so that people can enjoy coming to work,” said Fetter. “I don’t want that to get lost in some of the proactive protect-ourself techniques.”