Fearless Firing: Constructing a Strong Legal Defense for Your Termination Decisions

Employers have always avoided the termination either because it is not easy to terminate someone or because it can be difficult to defend any allegations of wrongful termination. Cases of wrongful termination have emerged and increased since the late 2000 year.

Employers need to be aware of the cost of these actions via litigation, fines & penalties and even criminal sanctions. Employers need to ask if they have the protections they need when they make decisions on termination, reduction in force, demotion, suspensions and disciplinary actions.

• Learn how employees should be terminated with dignity respect and within regulations
• Learn how to mitigate wrongful termination allegations before they happen
• Create a termination checklist that will reduce your risk when making a decision to terminate
• Gain knowledge of the EEOC regulations and guidelines to prevent allegations of discrimination or wrongful termination
• Create a policy that will assist managers in terminating employees without fear of retribution from the regulatory agencies and employees
• Use training of your managers to reduce your risk since you can be held liable for Managers/Supervisors with bad management and poor judgment in handling employees
• Teach Managers how to document performance issues in preparation for termination
• Develop a termination process that will ensure consistency, fairness, objectivity and reduce risks
• Learn what factors can be an obstacle in ensuring a worry free termination process
• Learn how to handle volatile terminations including employees who own weapons, have history of aggressive behavior, domestic violence, sexual assault or stalking, harassment, mental illness and other behavior issues that can pose a risk to Managers and employees
• Learn how Retaliation regulations need to be addressed before terminating an employee

• Termination regulations in different states
• Retaliation regulations and the impact in terminations
• Identification of Regulatory agencies and the enforcement focus on trending workplace regulations
• Critical reasons why managers should be trained on the termination best practices to ensure safety from potential violence
• How weapons can impact termination decisions
• How managers can be vicariously liable for actions or non-actions in the workplace and be fined instead of the employer in some termination decision
• Which regulations are more than likely to target employers on termination decisions

Research has identified the following factors in this increase:

• Employees more aware and knowledgeable of the workplace rights
• Employees taking chances in making "a killing" by charging discrimination
• Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) establishing increased awareness on how employees can make these charges
• New whistleblower protections for employees who turn in Employers
• More resources on websites by Department of Labor (DOL) providing employees with ways to confirm if Employers are violating current regulations

Because of these and other factors, Employers are now more than ever, at risk of litigation against termination decisions. The EEOC has established definitions and guidelines of what constitutes discrimination and what employees are part of "protected classes" and discrimination claims. Now that there have been additional protections under EEOC, Employers should consider these regulations and prepare for those potential Risks.

• All Employers interested in expanding Internationally
• Business Owners
• Company Leadership
• Small business owners
• Managers/Supervisors
• Compliance professionals
• HR professionals

Margie Faulk, PHR, SHRM-CP is a senior level human resources professional with over 14 years of HR management and compliance experience. A former Compliance Officer for a defense contracting technologies firm, Margie has worked as an HR and Compliance advisor for major corporations and small businesses in the small, large, private, public and Non-profit sectors. Margie is bilingual (Spanish) fluent and Bi-cultural. Margie’s focus is on multi-state, national, state and local workplace compliance. Additionally, Margie is working on International compliance initiatives like International Privacy Issues, Drafting & Implementing policies, Reviewing and Amending Global Employment Policies, Cross-Border Reductions in Force and Restructurings, Multi-jurisdictional employee investigations, Immigration, Global Diversity Programs, Expatriate Legal Issues and General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR). Margie has created and presented seminars/webinars for many compliance institutes. These national training providers, offer compliance training to professionals, business owners and companies interested in having their company compliant with workplace and industry regulations. Margie holds professional human resources certification (PHR) from the HR Certification Institution (HRCI) and SHRM-CP certification from Society for Human Resources Management. Margie has completed the Certified Compliance and Ethics Professional training and is a member of the Society of Corporate Compliance & Ethics (SCCE).