Readers of our blog will know that employers have a legal obligation to take workplace harassment seriously. These obligations are set out in Ontario’s Occupational Health and Safety Act (OHSA) and require that employers with more than five employees have a policy and procedure dealing with workplace violence and harassment. Employers are required to take the safety of their employees seriously and adequately respond to incidents of violence and harassment, but, not every employer does.…

For this week’s blog, we have gathered a list of the top 10 mistakes commonly made by freelancers and startups when hiring their first employee.  Avoiding these pitfalls will help start you off on the right foot and avoid the hiring headaches! We’ve also covered our Top 10 list in this month’s SpringForward Legal Updates if you prefer to watch the webinar instead. Email us for the replay link. #1 – Misclassifying your worker –…

Firstly, Happy May Day and Happy International Workers’ Day! This week we will be continuing our series on Sexual Harassment in the Fundraising Donor Space and exploring situations where needed donations or funding come with strings attached. If you haven’t read our Part One from last week, you may want to check it out before reading on. In our last post, we discussed the employer’s obligation to protect workers from violence, harassment and sexual…

We have talked a lot about workplace sexual harassment on this blog. Practising exclusively in workplace law we, unfortunately, see the issue of workplace sexual harassment come up a lot. Helping employers and employees of all shapes and sizes deal with issues related to sexual harassment makes up a lot of what we do. Employer Obligations Ontario organizations and businesses, be they big or small, for-profit or non-profit, as long as they have at least…

You may be scratching your head at our title. What’s ergonomics got to do with law? Maybe even asking, what the heck is ergonomics? Well in this post we will answer both of those questions and tell you why workplace ergonomics should be on the radar of employees and employers alike. Ergonomics is the science and study of working conditions with respect to the physical body and duties of the worker.  If you work in…