San Jose Employment Attorney

Disability Discrimination

The Americans with Disabilities Act protects the rights of individuals with disabilities in employment matters involving hiring, termination, promotion, training, opportunity, and compensation. Additionally, the ADA preserves the rights of workers to request reasonable accommodations related to their disabilities. Generally speaking, employers are required to provide reasonable accommodations unless doing so would cause the employer’s operations undue harm.

If you have been discriminated against, retaliated against, or insufficiently supported in regards to a request for reasonable accommodation, please connect with our experienced legal team to explore your legal options in a confidential, free, no-obligation setting. Chances are that if you’re experiencing discrimination in your workplace, others are as well. Speaking up on your own behalf may allow you to seek justice and to better ensure that others aren’t mistreated in similar ways.

Harassment in the Workplace

Multiple federal and state laws safeguard workers against harassment while they are on the job. Generally speaking, unwelcome and offensive conduct based on protected characteristics – including pregnancy, gender identity, sex, sexual orientation, race, religion, national origin, age, genetics, and/or disability – may be classified as unlawful workplace harassment when specific legal criteria are met. These criteria generally include that either enduring the offensive and unwanted conduct becomes a condition of maintaining employment or that the conduct is so severe and/or pervasive that it creates (per the perceptions of reasonable people) a hostile work environment.

Similarly, workplace harassment can also be rooted in retaliatory behavior aimed at workers who have engaged in legally-protected activities. When a worker is intimidated, subjected to hostile working conditions, and/or victimized due to retaliatory behavior, this scenario may also be considered unlawful workplace harassment. Each of the words used to describe this legal issue is “loaded” in that each is specifically defined under the law and subject to context that doesn’t always “match” the ways in which these words are used in everyday conversation. Therefore, if you believe that you may be navigating harassment in the workplace, please speak up in a confidential, free, and risk-free consultation with our team. Even if you’re not sure of whether you have grounds to file legal action, you may be entitled to significant compensation as a result of the way you’re being treated while you’re on the job.

Hostile Work Environment

When ongoing discriminatory or retaliatory behavior in the workplace creates a hostile environment to the extent that it distracts employees from being able to work effectively, affected employees may have a cause of action against their employers. Employers are required to rectify hostile work conditions should they arise. In the event that employers fail in this duty and/or fail to provide workers with proper relief after being exposed to hostile working conditions, they may bear liability for the environment that has been created. If a hostile work environment inspires affected workers to quit or otherwise resign from their positions, they may be entitled to constructive damages as a result of the harm that they have suffered.

The concept of a hostile work environment is one that is defined by law, not perception. For example, you may feel that you’re operating in a hostile work environment after a single, isolated incident has made you profoundly uncomfortable. Usually, ongoing behavior is a requirement for a hostile work environment claim. However, your situation may be an exception to this rule or you may have grounds for an alternative discrimination or retaliation-related claim. Because this area of law is so complex and context-specific, allow our experienced legal team to evaluate the details of your situation before you make any assumptions about your legal options. Depending on your circumstances, you may have significant opportunities for legal recourse available to you at this time.

Leave of Absence

Workers are human. Due to the dynamic nature of human experience, workers cannot be expected to show up for work all day, every day, for years on end without potentially needing to take a leave of absence for a legally protected reason. Workers get sick and injured. Workers need to care for loved ones who have become ill or sustained injuries. They often require time off from work to care for newly born or adopted children, to grieve the loss of closely-related loved ones, to vote, to serve on juries, and to serve in the military. Federal and California law both honor the rights of workers to take leave when a specific reason for taking leave is protected under the law. If you have been denied a legitimate request for legally-protected leave or you have been retaliated against for taking legally-protected leave, you have options available to you at this time. Connect with our firm to learn about those options in a free consultation setting. In the event that you choose to exercise your rights, we will build the strongest case possible on your behalf.

Pay and Compensation Discrimination

California’s Equal Pay Act is more generous than the federal government’s Equal Pay Act. As a result, California workers are not only entitled to equal pay for equal work, they are entitled to equal compensation and benefits for substantially similar work as that work applies to skill, responsibility, and experience. It isn’t always easy to identify when workers are being paid an inequitable amount of compensation and benefits when compared to their coworkers who possess similar skills, responsibilities, and experience. However, our firm has extensive experience managing pay discrimination cases. As a result, we understand what questions to ask and how to go about uncovering the truth. Whether you suspect that you’re being discriminated against in re: compensation and/or benefits as a result of your gender, race, or national origin, California law and the experienced legal team at our firm has your back.

Similarly, if you’re being denied the minimum wages, overtime, and/or breaks to which you’re entitled by law, please alert our team to this fact as soon as you’re able to do so. Finally, if you believe that you may have been intentionally or unintentionally misclassified as an independent contractor, you may benefit from scheduling a no-cost, confidential, risk-free consultation with our team. In either case, you may be entitled to significant compensation as a result of the harm that denial of proper compensation and/or misclassification has cost you.

Severance Agreements

A severance agreement (which may also be referred to as a separation agreement) is a contract offered by an employer to an employee upon that employee’s termination. Most of the time, severance agreements offer the employee being terminated a “severance package” in exchange for releasing specific legal rights – most notably, the right to sue the employer. The severance package offered may contain compensation and may extend some of the employee’s benefits for a specified length of time. The details of the severance package will usually be influenced by the amount of time that the employee in question has worked with the company and their rate of pay. In California, there is no requirement that an employer must offer an employee a severance agreement upon termination. These offers are usually extended when an employer has concerns about being sued for wrongful termination.

If you are being terminated and your employer has offered you a severance agreement, it is important to avoid signing that agreement until you’ve had an experienced employment law attorney review its terms. If you fail to seek legal guidance before you sign a severance agreement, you may unintentionally accept terms that are undervalued, unfair, and/or unenforceable. Signing a severance agreement usually requires you to sign away many of your rights as a worker. Don’t commit to a contractual agreement of this kind until a lawyer has confirmed that its terms are fair to you.

Wrongful Termination

Regardless of whether an employee has been classified as “at-will” or not, that employee cannot be lawfully laid-off or terminated for unlawful reasons. Too often, workers are under the impression that they can be “let go” for any reason that their employer chooses. However, the law protects against involuntary termination for reasons that are unlawfully discriminatory, retaliatory, or otherwise prohibited by federal, state, or local laws. When an unlawful termination occurs, an affected worker may be able to hold their employer financially and practically responsible for the mistreatment they have suffered via a wrongful termination suit.

It isn’t always easy to know whether you have been terminated for unlawful reasons, especially because savvy employers often attempt to “cover their tracks” by citing alternative reasons for your dismissal. You may even be offered a severance package of compensation and an extension of certain benefits in exchange for a promise not to hold your employer accountable for your wrongful termination. Either way, it is important to connect with an experienced attorney to review the circumstances of your termination before you dismiss the idea that you may have grounds for legal action available to you at this time.

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