March 2006
WIN AT WORK MONTHLY
A Community Service of SESSIONS & KIMBALL LLP, Employee Rights Attorneys
Win at Work	Employee Rights Update
WALK IN YOUR EMPLOYER'S MOCCASINS Have you walked in your employer’s moccasins lately? Dale Carnegie, in How to Win Friends and Influence People, taught that talking in terms of the other person’s interests is the key to good personal relations and influence. Professional mediators repeat or rephrase the detailed positions of each disputing party to ensure the message has been understood. Employees can use these same methods. Customize your resumé to the needs of important prospective employers. Explain how you can help them meet their goals, then negotiate your best employment deal. Regularly communicate with your boss concerning the changing needs of the business and describe how you can help achieve them. Before review time, submit a report of your contributions to the team goals. Upon your termination, remind them of their reasons for paying you money for your efforts on their behalf or for a release of liability. If you see things from their point of view, they’ll see things from yours.	OVERTIME CLASS ACTION Employers continue to make massive mistakes in correctly classifying their employees as exempt or non-exempt and appropriately paying overtime. One would think that employers would learn their lessons and go to appropriate employment law attorneys. Yet, we continue to see truly gargantuan class action cases based upon overtime violations. In a recent case that was just reported, the plaintiffs, a group of former and current claims adjusters, sued Allstate Insurance Company and recovered $125 million dollars. This amount was not a judgment subject to appeal but a mediated settlement. There will be no appeal. It would be far easier if employers would simply be realistic in their assessment of who is exempt or non-exempt from overtime rules. Perhaps some of them feel that it is cheaper to simply avoid the rules and save money in not paying overtime and suffer possible penalties later if they are caught. Actually, it would far easier to simply change their compensation system to comply with law.
Update on our attorneys: Don Sessions is quoted in the April issue of Inc Magazine. Heidi Hutchinson resolved a case on the eve of trial.
Look for our answers to employees’ questions in the “Life and Work Q & A” column of the Orange County Register’s "Business Monday" magazine. E-mail us at info@job-law.com to have your address added or removed from our monthly mailing list. For more employee rights information or for past issues of Win at Work Monthly, click here for our website, job-law.com; here to order our book, Employee Rights in California; or contact our office directly at 23456 Madero, Suite 170, Mission Viejo, CA 92691, (949) 380-0900, (800) 774-7494, info@job-law.com. The Win at Work portion of Win at Work Monthly is from our ongoing syndicated column, which appears in the Los Angeles Times’ “Career Builder Magazine” and elsewhere. Win at Work Monthly is intended for general information and should not be construed as legal advice or opinion. Readers in need of legal advice should promptly retain the services of an attorney. ©2006 by Sessions & Kimball LLP