Library
July 25, 2018
Elizabeth “Lizzy” Seeberg passed away on September 10, 2010. She was a 19-year old freshman at St. Mary’s College. Lizzy committed suicide ten days after reporting she was sexually assaulted by a Notre Dame football player. During those ten days, she received several text messages from members of the football team including, “Don’t do anything you would regret.” and “Messing with Notre Dame football is a bad idea.” And in her last ten days, Lizzy was interviewed several times by campus police as were several witnesses. However, the accused student was not interviewed until after Lizzy’s death. Six months after […]
June 27, 2018
Federal, state and local governments as well as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) are all talking about sexual harassment. The federal government is focused on settlement disclosures, arbitration agreements and tax deduction denial. States are proposing restricting nondisclosure agreements and requiring anti-sexual harassment training and policies. The EEOC proposed new enforcement guidance outlining legally protected characteristics and liability standards for employers as well as a threshold for hostile workplace and training considerations. Like the EEOC guidance most of these initiatives have yet to be enacted. Along comes the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) decision in the Boeing Co., 365 […]
May 30, 2018
Political beliefs are personal. Chances are slim that anyone can change our minds about our political views. Yet some people debate and argue about politics with their family, friends and coworkers. Because people spend so much of their time at work it makes sense that conversations about beliefs, sports, religion or politics arise. Political discussions frequently happen during the election cycle, but for the past few years these discussions haven’t slowed down. During the recent Workplace Strategies conference, Ogletree Deakins provided participants a checklist for employers to evaluate political expression. There are two sides of the coin; the employees’ and […]
April 25, 2018
Peter Drucker coined the term knowledge worker in 1959 anticipating an age when people would generate value with their minds more than their muscle. As early as 1954, Drucker encouraged leaders to push decision making down through the organization. Drucker said, “Knowledge workers have to manage themselves. They have to have autonomy.” Today most of us are knowledge workers. And as knowledge workers, we often know more about our tasks than anyone including our managers. Managers have to accept this and their new role; to establish an overall direction and allow the knowledge worker to figure out how to get […]