How to Train Managers on Employment Law Compliance

Any business faces significant employment law compliance risks, regardless of its size. Even one lawsuit, EEOC complaint, or regulatory action can destabilize your finances and tarnish your company’s reputation.

Managers who have direct, day-to-day contact with employees are the most likely to create situations that violate the law. By training managers in employment law, you can preserve your relationship with your workers, protect your company, and avoid costly investigations, lawsuits, and hearings.

Why Take the Time to Train Managers?

As an HR professional or business owner, you’re likely well informed about employment law compliance. However, this may not be true for your company’s managers. There are two primary reasons for this.

First, a manager’s main function is to guide employees in reaching specific goals. Whether the manager supervises an engineering project, operates a retail branch, or oversees office workers, their expertise lies in a field other than human resources and employment law.

Just as you would not be expected to design your company’s products without additional education, a manager cannot be expected to comply with labor regulations and statutes without training. Second, employment laws are not intuitive. They incorporate complex and ever-changing rules. Moreover, they are governed by regulations and statutes at the state and federal levels, as well as precedential court decisions. Even seasoned HR professionals must work to keep up with developments in the law.

The time to implement an employment law training program is not after an employee has already complained about a violation. Subsequent remedial measures are often inadmissible in court, but preexisting training programs and materials generally are.

Your actions could determine whether your employment defense attorney can direct the blame for a problem onto a single bad actor or whether your entire company faces liability for lax training.

Steps for Training Managers in Employment Law Compliance

Tailor your training program to your company’s unique circumstances. For example, if your company has regular management meetings, you could schedule your training sessions to coincide with these meetings, minimizing scheduling conflicts.

Likewise, if your company is geographically dispersed, you must decide whether to conduct your training online or in person during site visits.

Once you work out the logistics of your training sessions, the following steps can help you build an employment law compliance training program.

Step 1: Choose Your Topics

Federal employment law covers many areas, including the following:

• Civil Rights Act
• Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA)
• Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA)
• Fair Labor Standards Act

For managers located in California, you may also need to cover the following state laws and regulations:

• Overtime, wage, and hours laws
• Workplace Know Your Rights Act
• Minimum wage laws
• California Family Rights Act
• Anti-retaliation laws, particularly for Cal/OSHA and workers’ comp filings

As you select your topics, keep in mind your company’s specific needs. For example, if all of your employees are exempt from overtime, you can skip overtime law compliance. For most companies, however, overtime and hour training are essential.

Moreover, if you have workers in multiple states, you will need to consult an employment defense firm to determine the state-level regulations you should cover.

Step 2: Build Your Content

As you design your curriculum, keep your audience in mind. Managers do not have to be labor lawyers. Instead, training should accomplish two goals.

First, give managers enough information to prevent them from inadvertently breaking the law. Thus, your curriculum should focus on common compliance violations, like failing to pay overtime properly or denying family leave.

Second, managers are your first line of defense against employment law violations. Teach them to spot possible legal issues before they arise. For example, a manager should know when offensive jokes or teasing can create a hostile work environment and how to intervene and contact you.

Review all content with legal before your training session. You should thoroughly understand the subject matter in order to teach it. Moreover, remember that any instructional materials and sessions could be used as evidence in a lawsuit or regulatory hearing. Clarity and careful adherence to the law are critical.

Step 3: Conduct the Compliance Training Program

Most managers are not HR professionals. In fact, you should assume that they have no prior training and are not particularly interested in HR. They are subject-matter experts in their fields, not your field.

This is another reason not to get too deep into the legal details. Avoid lengthy, dry lectures about laws and regulations. Instead, use interactive techniques, like role-plays, hypothetical case studies, and question-and-answer sessions.

Consider breaking up your material into digestible segments. Do not have a two-day, all-day boot camp for your managers. Instead, have a one-hour session per month, with each session covering a different topic.

Step 4: Enable an Ongoing Conversation

Ensure that managers leave each training session with your contact information. Review your reporting process so that managers can take action when they identify potential employment law compliance issues. Additionally, make it clear what managers are empowered to do and what they cannot do without higher approval.

Consider bringing in your in-house counsel or outside employer defense firm to meet with your managers. Discuss when and how managers can reach out to your legal team with questions about compliance.

Step 5: Repeat

Make training a routine part of your managers’ duties. They are less likely to resist training if your sessions are regularly scheduled. Moreover, regular sessions make it easier to train new hires and update all of your managers about legal developments and company policy changes.

Using Management Training as Proactively Following Employment Laws and Compliance

In most cases, the company as a whole does not violate employment laws. Instead, individuals violate these laws, and their employer takes the blame due to a lack of training and supervision. You can significantly reduce your legal exposure by training your managers to comply with employment laws and spot problems before they arise.

Your company’s in-house counsel and outside employment law firm can help you prepare for compliance training sessions. Use these resources to ensure that your courses provide the greatest benefits for your employer.