Five things to consider in a difficult termination

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One of my recurring professional nightmares is advising a client on a termination that goes badly.

Not "this ends in a lawsuit" badly—but catastrophically badly. The kind that devolves into workplace violence, an active shooter situation, or some other despicable act that no one saw coming but everyone later says should have been anticipated.

That fear drives my mantra with clients: you can never be too careful. If there's even a whiff that something could go sideways—emotional volatility, erratic behavior, mental health concerns, escalating conduct—you take reasonable steps to make sure it doesn't. You plan. You slow down. You involve the right people. You treat the termination not as an HR task, but as a safety event.

Which brings me to former Michigan head football coach Sherrone Moore.

WIRTW #783: the 'Christmas movies' edition

What are the best Christmas movies of all time?

It's a debate as old as Christmas movies themselves. (And yes, this is absolutely the kind of important question a legal blog should tackle.)

Before we can answer this vital question, we first must examine what makes a Christmas movie "great." For the best Christmas movies aren't just holiday wallpaper, they must also check a few key boxes:

✨ They have heart. A good Christmas movie leaves you warmer than it found you.

🎄 They feel like the season. Lights, snow, music, awkward gatherings (families and otherwise). They indulge the full sensory experience.

😂 They make you laugh. Not mean-spirited humor, but that familiar, "yep, that's my family, too" kind of laughter.

❤️ They hit an emotional note. Reconciliation. Joy. Second chances. Belief.

🗣️ They are quotable. "You sit on a throne of lies." "I triple dog dare you!" (Fun fact: I went to Hebrew School with the actor who played Schwartz.) "Yippee-Ki-Yay, Mother…"

♻️ And most importantly: they're rewatchable. A great Christmas movie becomes part of your yearly ritual, and you never tire of the annual viewings.

With these criteria in mind, here's my list of the 5 best Christmas movies of all time, the ones I come back to year after year:

Elf — Pure joy. Will Ferrell at peak earnestness and silliness. A modern classic that earned its place fast.

National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation — The definitive portrait of holiday chaos. We've all lived some version of this movie.

A Christmas Story — Childhood nostalgia in cinematic form. It's impossible not to see a little of yourself in it.

Die Hard — Yes, it's a Christmas movie. No, I will not be taking questions at this time.

The Muppet Christmas Carol — The best Dickens adaptation ever made, and I'm prepared to die on this hill.

That's my list. Feel free to tell me why I'm wrong, and share your own. 'Tis the season for strong (and good-natured) opinions.

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Here's what I read and listened to this week that you should, too.

What does a font have to do with an employer's values? Apparently, a lot.

The State Department just ordered diplomats to ditch Calibri and return to Times New Roman as the required typeface in all official communications. Secretary Marco Rubio framed this change not as a typography choice, but as a way to "abolish yet another wasteful DEIA program."

Calibri, however, didn't become the State Department's font because someone wanted to score diversity points. It was chosen because disability and accessibility groups recommended it. Plenty of research shows that sans-serif fonts can be easier to read for people with certain visual impairments. That's not ideology. It's science + usability.

Imagine being so committed to rolling back inclusion that you turn fonts into a culture-war battlefield.

🚨 Vote for the Worst Employer of 2025 🚨

It's the most wonderful time of the year! I've made my list, checked it twice, and now it's time to determine who's been the naughtiest and not very nice. That's right—it's time to vote for The Worst Employer of 2025.

I've narrowed down my list of 12 nominees to the worst seven finalists.

Jury tags SHRM for $11.5 million in discrimination lawsuit

$11.5 million!

That's the number a jury needed to send a very loud, very clear message to the Society for Human Resource Management — the self-proclaimed standard-bearer of HR "best practices."

Last week's verdict against SHRM — $1.5 million in compensatory damages and a staggering $10 million in punitive damages — is not just a legal loss. It's an institutional indictment. When the organization that tells the rest of us how to run fair, lawful, ethical workplaces gets hit for racial discrimination and retaliation, the problem is bigger than one terminated instructional designer.

WIRTW #782: the 'lights' edition

I've always loved Christmas lights.

Maybe it’s because, growing up Jewish, we never decked out our house each December with strings of twinkling bulbs. So as an adult, one of my favorite nights of the entire year is the evening my family piles into the car and cruises around to take in the neighborhood displays. It's simple, it's cozy, and it never fails to make me smile.

Two houses just up the street from me perfectly capture the annual holiday condundrm:

🎄 Do you prefer "A" — the full Clark Griswold experience, with tens of thousands of lights, glowing inflatables, and enough wattage to be seen from the ISS?

🎄 Or "B" — the Hallmark Movie/Norman Rockwell classic, with warm white lights, clean lines, and understated charm?

While I absolutely appreciate the effort and awe of the Griswold approach (seriously, that's dedication!), my heart leans toward the quieter, timeless elegance of the Hallmark version.

So, I'm curious: which christmas-lights team are you on—A or B? And more importantly … why?

'Tis the season for strong opinions on holiday lighting. 

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Here's what I read this week that you should read, too.

Independent contractors and noncompete agreements do not mix

I've always believed that noncompetes and "independent contractor" status don't mix. Now I have an appellate opinion to back me up.

In Reliant Services v. Brown, a construction-staffing company tried to enforce a noncompete against a punch-list worker it had consistently called an independent contractor. Reliant wanted to stop him from doing the exact same punch-list work directly for Ryan Homes — the same work he'd been doing for decades before ever meeting Reliant.

Here's the problem: you can't call someone "independent," claim they run their own business, and then turn around and try to control where they work, who they can work for, and what they can do once they stop working for you. That's the very definition of control. And control is the dividing line between an employee and an independent contractor.