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An employer violated employee’s labor rights by offering her a separation agreement that contained unlawful terms ruled a National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB”) administrative law judge (“ALJ”) in Baylor Univ. Med. Ctr., Case No. 16-CA-195335 (Fort Worth, TX, February 12, 2018) (“Baylor”).

This decision is one of the first ALJ rulings to apply the NLRB’s new standard for addressing the legality of facially neutral work rules applicable to union and non-union workplaces under The Boeing Company, 365 NLRB No. 154 (December 14, 2017) (“Boeing”). In Boeing, the new Republican NLRB majority overruled Lutheran Heritage Village-Livonia, 343 NLRB 646 (“Lutheran Heritage”) and announced a new standard it will follow when it evaluates a work rule that, when reasonably interpreted, could potentially interfere with union and other protected concerted activity under Section 7 of the NLRA (Section 7 conduct). Notwithstanding the new, more pro-business Boeing standard, the ALJ found that Baylor violated federal labor law when it offered a terminated employee $10,000 in exchange for signing a severance agreement and general release that included two unlawful provisions. The severance provisions at issue in the case were:
Continue Reading Considering Offering Severance Pay in Exchange for Certain Post-Employment Obligations? Think Again.

On the eve of Chairman Phillip Miscimarra’s departure from the NLRB, he gave one final gift to employers: the overturning of Specialty Healthcare & Rehabilitation Center of Mobile, 357 NLRB 934 (2011), an Obama-Era Board decision that allowed unions to organize “micro-units” of employees—drastically limiting any challenges employers could have to a petitioned-for unit before being forced to negotiate with fractured units of employees throughout its workforce. In PCC Structurals, Inc., 365 NLRB No. 160 (Dec. 15, 2017), the Board reinstated the traditional community of interest standard to be used when determining whether unions have included all necessary employees on a petition for union representation. The Board’s reversal is a welcomed relief to employers who have been forced to bargain with several small units of employees in one workplace, thereby preventing all employees at a worksite from exercising their rights to vote on union representation.
Continue Reading The End of Union-Dictated Micro-Units: NLRB Overturns Specialty Healthcare

In 2004, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued Lutheran Heritage Village-Livonia, 343 NLRB 646 (“Lutheran Heritage”), and held that the mere maintenance of a neutral work rule violated Section 8(a)(1) of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) if employees would reasonably construe the rule to prohibit union and other protected concerted activity (Section 7 conduct). For the purposes of this analysis, a neutral work rule is one that does not explicitly reference or restrict Section 7 conduct. In the ensuing years, primarily during the Obama administration, the Board relied on Lutheran Heritage’s “reasonably construe” standard to invalidate countless neutral work rules to the point that practically every employer in America was placed at risk of being found to be in violation of the NLRA by virtue of the wording found in their employment agreements, employee handbooks and work rules.
Continue Reading Striking A New Balance – The NLRB Abandons the Lutheran Heritage Test and Devises a New Standard for Assessing the Facial Validity of Neutral Work Rules

The NLRB announced yesterday, a Request for Information (“RFI”) on the Board’s 2014 “Quickie Election” representation regulations (at 29 CFR parts 101 and 102). The RFI seeks input on the amendments to representation case procedures, which drastically changed the process for NLRB conducted elections in which employees vote on whether they want to be represented by a union. The RFI was approved by Board Chairman Philip A. Miscimarra and Board Members Marvin E. Kaplan and William J. Emanuel. Board Members Mark Gaston Pearce and Lauren McFerran dissented.
Continue Reading New Labor Board May Kill “Quickie Election” Rule; Requests Public RFI

On November 8, 2017, Peter B. Robb was sworn in as the General Counsel (GC) of the NLRB for a four year term. Robb succeeds Richard Griffin, who has been the GC since November 2013. Robb wasted no time in taking initial steps to undo many of the NLRB’s more controversial recent decisions. On December 1, 2017, Robb issued Memorandum 18-02 directing the NLRB’s regional offices on which types of charges should be submitted to his Division of Advice and rescinding policy memoranda issued by the prior GCs.
Continue Reading New Labor Board GC Signals Overturning Obama-Era Rulings, But Anticipated Vacancies and Recusals Create Uncertainty

Senate Republicans recently confirmed William Emanuel, the second Trump nominee to the five-member National Labor Relations Board (the “Board”), giving the Board a Republican majority for the first time since 2007. Mr. Emanuel’s confirmation follows the September 25, 2017 appointment of Peter Robb, a management-side labor and employment lawyer, as General Counsel of the Board. Each of President Trump’s recent appointments are expected to advance the president’s pro-business and pro-employer policies. In particular, Mr. Robb’s replacement of the current General Counsel, Richard Griffin, is a crucial step towards upending the Board’s recent anti-employer rulings.
Continue Reading Labor Relations Update: New NLRB General Counsel Nominee Poised to Undo Obama-Era Precedents

On June 12, 2017, the U.S. Department of Labor’s (“DOL”) Office of Labor-Management Standards published a notice of proposed rulemaking regarding its intention to rescind the so-called “persuader rule,” moving the DOL one step closer to withdrawing the controversial regulation introduced by the Obama administration.
Continue Reading Department of Labor Moves To Rescind “Persuader Rule” with Notice of Proposed Rulemaking

On November 16, 2016, a federal district judge in Texas barred the Department of Labor (“DOL”) from enforcing its new so-called “Persuader Rule.”  The rule, which would have imposed broad disclosure requirements on employers responding to union-organizing campaigns, has been mired in controversy since it was proposed in 2011.  In April 2016, Sheppard Mullin wrote about the changes the final rule would have made; in June, we covered a proposed carve-out for legacy agreements between employers and third-party advisors.
Continue Reading Unpersuasive: Federal Judge Invalidates DOL’s New Persuader Rule

On March 24, 2016, the U.S. Department of Labor’s (“USDOL”) Office of Labor-Management Standards (“OLMS”) published its highly controversial “persuader” regulation, which requires employers and labor relations consultants, including legal counsel, to publicly disclose relationships that have traditionally been permitted to remain confidential under the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (“LMRDA”).  Although the new persuader regulations took effect on April 25, 2016, the new rule will not apply to agreements entered into before July 1, 2016.  This presents an invaluable opportunity for employers and their labor consultants to be “grandfathered” out of much of the required reporting under the new regulations.
Continue Reading Legacy and Grandfathered Agreements are Not Subject to Disclosure Requirements Under the Department of Labor’s New “Persuader” Regulations and Interpretation of the “Advice” Exemption

The U.S. Department of Labor’s Office of Labor-Management Standards (“OLMS”) recently issued its long-debated “persuader” regulations which, as of July 1, 2016, will require employers and their labor relations consultants, including legal counsel, to publicly disclose relationships which had long been permitted to remain confidential under the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (“LMRDA”).
Continue Reading Department of Labor’s Long-Debated “Persuader” Regulations Expand the Scope of the Consulting Relationships that Must be Reported Under the Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act