Recently in Employment Category

In the global workplace where companies seek to bring in talent from outside the country as well as send employees on foreign assignments, a corporate legal department is often approached about immigration process and procedure.  Where does an in-house attorney go for accurate, accessible information? 

Here are a few resources to help you make sense of the immigration questions that come across your desk:

1. Working in the US (USCIS.gov) - Provides an overview of the occupations through which foreign workers can apply for work status in the U.S such as researchers, religious workers, engineers, scientists, athletes, and others.   It also reviews the three main types of worker status that are granted: temporary (nonimmigrant) worker, permanent (immigrant) worker, and students and exchange visitors.

The AmLaw Daily has an interview with Weldon Latham, head of Jackson Lewis' corporate diversity counseling group, in which Latham cautions companies to be especially cautious in their human resources decisions in these times of economic woe.

According to the piece, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission reported a 15 percent rise in workplace discrimination cases in 2008.  Latham suggests that a little proactive thinking could help companies avoid those kinds of lawsuits before they arise.

Latham says that he and his firm encourage "companies to set up a business-based-need plan, laying off the people who they need less," rather than engaging in a simpler, yet more dangerous, first-hired-first-fired system.

Legal departments should spread the word that HR departments need to come up with plans like these in order to minimize the risk of lawsuit, as well as maximize the business efficacy of the company's workforce.

Just make sure that your position is one the company needs before you do!

Yesterday I wrote about a recent survey that showed that in house counsel were generally quite satisfied with their careers.  That trend might change rapidly, however, given the results of a new study that reveals how corporate counsel compensation has cratered recently.

According to the post in the InHouse Insider Blog, companies have begun cutting benefits like 401k matching contributions and stock options.  Also on the chopping block are bonuses, which are tied for the most part to the company's performance.  In a down economy, that means that bonuses will be small or nonexistent. 

It's a lesson that Troy H. Ellis, former chief counsel for Invista, knows all too well, according to this article in the National Law Journal. 

Ellis was recently censured by the Supreme Court of Kansas after he was caught on film stealing food from Invista's onsite cafeteria.  The company claims on its website to be the world's largest producer of nylon and spandex.

Ellis tried to "stretch" his way out of the mess by claiming that the whole imbroglio occurred because he was working so hard that he simply forgot to pay for his meal.  He claims that he intended to cover the cost of the food after he returned from a business trip.

After Bank of America bought Merrill Lynch, the markets responded with a resounding rejection of the deal.

It's a sentiment that the financial institution's own legal department might soon share.

A post at the JD Journal states that lawyers in the combined legal department of the two companies - about 700 attorneys in all - are being asked to reapply for their own jobs.  As the post points out, this almost always leads to layoffs.

A number of sites are writing about Wells Fargo's partial confirmation of its plans to lay off some of its legal department.  The company said in a statement to Above the Law that the firings are a result of the Wachovia merger. 

Apparently there weren't enough chairs for everyone, and $3 billion in profit just doesn't go as far as it used to.

The question this really brings up, though, is how in house counsel at other firms are faring if Wells Fargo, one of the rare bright spots among corporations recently, is forced to layoff members of its legal department.