WIRTW #497 (the “love” edition)

For the past 496 Fridays (plus a few off here and there) I have shared my list of what I read this week.

Implicit in each share is my recommendation that among those links are a few that you should read, too.

This week, however, there is only one thing you should (must) read.

Kevin Love, all-star power forward for the Cleveland Cavaliers, wrote about his life-long mental health issues.

6th Circuit is the latest court to conclude that Title VII expressly prohibits LGBT discrimination

Photo by Sharon McCutcheon on Unsplash

Yesterday, the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals joined a growing number of federal appellate courts to hold that Title VII’s prohibition against sex discrimination expressly covers LGBT employees.

The claimant in EEOC v. R.G. &. G.R. Harris Funeral Homes [pdf], Aimee Stevens (formerly known as Anthony Stephens) was born biologically male, and presented as such when hired. The funeral home’s owner and operator, Thomas Rost, fired her shortly after she informed him that she intended to transition from male to female and would represent herself and dress as a woman while at work.

“Measure twice, cut once," and, for the love of God, don’t email porn to everyone on your company’s contact list

Photo by Wes Hicks on Unsplash

In what may be the greatest (or, depending on your perspective, worst) employee mistake of all time, the Utah State Bar emailed a photo of a topless woman to more than 11,000 of its members.

For its part, the Bar has apologized, and has said it is investigating how the incident occurred and will publicize its findings.

Speculation on the cause of the unfortunate email ranges from hackers to a disgruntled employee.

It’s neither.

Readers, let me break this case for you.

The legal implications of employee tracking devices

Photo by N. on Unsplash

I once knew of company (not a client) at which its CEO would sit in his office all day and watch a bank of monitors connected to cameras all over the workplace so that he could track the productivity of his employees. He even had one outside the bathrooms to record how frequently, and for how long, his employees were taking potty breaks. Needless to say, morale among his employees was not great.

Monitoring of employees has gone even more high tech. The Chicago Tribune reports that Amazon has developed wristbands to track worker hand movements as they fill and ship orders in its warehouses and distribution centers.

A lesson on how to terminate an employee, care of David Brent.

In my opinion, the original British version of The Office is far superior to its American counterpart, in large part because David Brent is so much more cringe-worthy than Michael Scott.

I thought I’d start the week off with a little humor (and a little lesson), care of David Brent, via one of the most awkward employee terminations ever.

WIRTW #496 (the “troll” edition)

Troll:

“One who posts a deliberately provocative message to a newsgroup or message board with the intention of causing maximum disruption and argument.”

– Urban Dictionary

Trolls are a sad an unfortunate part of life on the internet. I put myself out there on a daily basis, and there will be idiots in the comments below, or on LinkedIn, Twitter, or Facebook, who will feel the need to have their ignorant say.

Courtney Barnett feels my pain, and crafted, via song, the perfect response:

Don’t you have anything better to do?
I wish that someone could hug you
Must be lonely
Being angry
Feeling over-looked
You sit alone at home in the darkness
With all the pent-up rage that you harness
I’m real sorry
’Bout whatever happened to you

 

Thanks CB!

Here’s what I read this week:

Save money on overtime payments with the fluctuating work week

Photo by rawpixel.com on Unsplash

In my never-ending quest to show you how many different ways you can screw up paying your employees under the federal wage and hour laws, today I am going to talk about how to properly calculate overtime payments for salaried, non-exempt employees.

An employer has two choices in how to pay overtime to a salaried non-exempt employee: by a fixed work week or by a fluctuating work week.

For reasons that will be illustrated below, the latter is a much more cost-effective option, and is your best way to save money overtime payments for this class of employees.

Spoiler alert: there is some math involved.