​​​​​​​​​​​​​On-Demand Webinars: Employment Law

Here, we outline Canadian law on employer responsibility for holiday functions and provide brief guidelines that employers should carefully consider in order to create a fun-filled holiday celebration, while avoiding legal liability.

Get an overview of police records and its impact on employment. The program will cover recent legal changes to police record checks in Ontario, as well as best practices around the use of record checks in hiring and volunteer screening. Topics covered include: background information on police and criminal records; the law governing police record checks; laws relevant to employer obligations (screening, privacy, human rights, etc.); evidence regarding the utility of police record checks as screening tools; evidence of the broader social impact of police record checks; best practice tips to ensure that human resource policies and practices are evidence-based and compliant with privacy rights and human rights.

This program will discuss how the two go hand-in-hand and how an employer can make meaningful inquiries of an employee before they can accommodate.

There are numerous considerations to determine appropriate severance for employees. Aside from the traditional factors (age, length of service, position, market), judges have considered dozens of other non-traditional reasons for finding different notice periods. This program is designed to underscore some of the more important considerations when determining an appropriate notice period.

Employers across Ontario collectively have a billion-dollar unfunded liability, in the form of unpaid overtime. Worst of all, many of them don’t even know about it – or have substantial misconceptions about how it works. This webcast explores that enormous potential exposure and how it can be addressed.

This webinar will cover the difference between the federal employment standards legislation (the Canada Labour Code) and Ontario’s provincial legislation (the Employment Standards Act, 2000)

Ever since employees obtained greater protections from workplace harassment pursuant to the Occupational Health and Safety Act in 2010, employers have been faced with the task of responding to a greater number of harassment complaints. This program instructs employers on what is involved in properly investigating a complaint and meeting the statutory duties owed to their employees.

In a capitalist society, it is common to believe workers all are all essentially “free agents”, able to sell their skills and time to the highest bidder. While this is generally true as a default statement, companies and individuals are also free to draw up and agree to contracts. Those contracts may include terms and conditions that lean more towards company-friendly and worker-friendly

This program will teach you what it means to be a fiduciary, how to determine which employees are fiduciaries, specific considerations when a fiduciary is leaving your company, and best practices for dealing with incoming and departing fiduciaries.

In this session, a legal expert will walk you through understanding Bill 148, the recent changes to the legislation and employer obligations, and discuss best practices to prepare for these upcoming shifts and stay in compliance.

In this webcast, learn about the most critical legislative developments of the past 12 months, and receive insights from a legal expert on how best to prepare for 2019.

This webcast is designed to provide attendees an overview of the ESA and its recent and proposed changes, as well as practical tips on how to navigate this changing time.

The session will discuss details of who is entitled to family status accommodations, when accommodations may be required, how to handle the accommodation process effectively and the consequences of mishandling that process.

This program will provide a general overview of the most common mistakes and issues in drafting employment agreements, and set forward best practices for drafting a strong employment agreement.

In this one-hour webinar, you will learn how to identify and mitigate any potential factors that may lead to a constructive dismissal claim.

This session is designed to guide employers through their legal obligations with respect to freedom of religion in the workplace and accommodating religious needs of employees.

This program is designed to help attendees understand the law as it relates to terminating employees for cause.

This program is designed to present a broad overview of the most commonly misunderstood sections of the Act, in particular the more important and esoteric areas. The objective is to give a rough guideline for compliance, which may be buffered by day-to-day legal advice.

In this session, you will learn precisely when a resignation occurs, and specifically what duties flow from the resignation.

This program will cover the manner in which federally regulated employees can challenge their terminations, who the provisions of the CLC apply to, the remedies available to employees under the CLC and recent case law establishing what constitutes ‘just cause’ for dismissal in the federal context.

This program is designed to cover basic legal concepts around resignations, including what is sufficient to qualify as a resignation, how much notice various categories of employees needs to provide, what the consequences are when employees don’t give sufficient notice and whether employers have to keep paying the employee if they want their employment to end immediately.

It is all too easy for an employer to ask or say something inappropriate during the interview process. In fact, certain types of questions could be considered a breach of the Ontario Human Rights Code. This program will discuss the most common types of inappropriate questions and statements during interviews, why these communications are problematic, and better ways to assess a candidate’s suitability for the role. This program will also made recommendations for discussing the open position in the interview in a way that is accurate and appropriate.

This program will summarize key exemptions to the Employment Standards Act, and how employers can approach these exemptions in the workforce.

In this program, you will receive an overview of just cause for terminations. The program will discuss the meaning of just cause termination, types of just cause, the distinction between just cause and without cause terminations, and the notion of progressive discipline prior to termination.

In this session, learn best practices to ensure that unintentional discrimination does not go unchecked in your workplace.

This session will help you navigate those challenges, and will provide an explanation of different types of leaves of absence available to employees, an overview of the law regarding employee discipline, and a series of case studies and strategies for discussion.

This program will review the impact of restrictive covenants, such as non-competition and non-solicitation agreements, which are designed to minimize the risks in these situations. We will consider how they can be used to protect a business; the risks of engaging them vs. not engaging them; and how businesses can take steps to ensure they are enforceable. We will also review some notable court decisions from Ontario and across Canada considering these provisions in a variety of contexts.

This program will assist employers in developing and implementing dress code policies in a manner that is consistent with the law. It will provide a review of applicable statutory and jurisprudential rules pertaining to company dress code policies.

Do you know how to conduct police background checks for prospective employees? Do you know how to do it without breaching their privacy and human rights? This program will help employers to navigate these issues so that they can conduct reasonable and appropriate police record checks.

This program explores: the scope and nature of the employer’s duty to accommodate illness or disability; how to appropriately respond to requests for accommodation; how to handle return to work plans; and limits on requests for medical documentation from the employee.

There is a common misconception that terminated employees are entitled to a “severance package.” From a legal standpoint, this is simply not true. The purpose of this webcast is to describe precisely what a dismissed employee is in fact entitled to, and specifically how the possibility – or fact – of new work or other income impacts these entitlements. The concept is called “mitigation” of damages.

This webinar will outline an employer’s legal obligations in connection with workplace absences and provide strategies on what can be done to minimize unplanned time away from work. It will focus on managing your workforce’s planned and unplanned absences from work.

The purpose of this webcast is to explain the circumstances where family status claims may be found, how one might seek accommodations with respect to family status, and other legal considerations surrounding this type of human rights violation.

The purpose of this webcast is to explain the circumstances where family status claims may be found, how one might seek accommodations with respect to family status, and other legal considerations surrounding this type of human rights violation.

The purpose of this webinar is to explain the circumstances where constructive dismissal may be found, how one might avoid a finding of constructive dismissal in the future, and other legal considerations surrounding this type of dismissal

This program is designed to help you understand the positive and negative aspects of using employees from temporary help agencies, and some of the common problems that can arise.

​​The purpose of this webinar is to explain the circumstances where alleging cause for termination is acceptable, the best strategy to make it “stick”, and other legal consideratio​ns surrounding the practice.​

This session will cover the ins and outs of public holiday law under provincial and federal law, so you can learn how to ensure that your workplace is in compliance with applicable employment standards legislation.​

​There are prohibitions on discrimination on the basis of gender identity and gender expression, and while conceptually we all understand what that means, it is the practical effect of such prohibitions that warrants further discussion. This webinar discusses what happens on the ground and the difference between identity and expression.​

Rewarding underperformers with a generous severance package on termination is difficult to justify from a business perspective. This webinar focuses on ways to avoid this scenario by reviewing legally compliant ways to manage performance, documenting performance issues, the employer’s legal obligations when dealing with an underperforming employee, red flags to watch out for, in what circumstances an employer justify dismissing for cause and how to deal with employment references.​

​Ontario workplace regulations governing employment relations are complex and constantly evolving. Non-compliance with legal obligations exposes an employer to risk of both civil and statutory liability as well as harm to its corporate reputation. This webinar explores how conducting internal HR audits will identify areas of legal non-compliance as well as employer best-practices that will help reduce risks.​

Most companies would prefer to remain union free, but most employers do not know what they legally can say or do during a union organizing campaign. This webinar will focus on what signs to look for of a possible union campaign and how to conduct a legitimate and lawful union avoidance campaign.​

Learn how to manage an employee absence from start to finish. This webinar examines employer obligations and rights when an employee takes a leave of absence–including types of medical documentation a company is entitled to, the duty to accommodate and options when an employee does not return to work.

Be equipped and ready when harassment, violence, human rights infringements or other related issues rear their ugly heads in your workplace.