In last week’s final scorecard on the Governor’s signing decisions, I listed SB 947, the “No Robo Bosses Act of 2026,” among the technology bills that became law. It needs a fuller treatment. Governor Newsom signed it on September
The Governor’s last signing period is over. When I previewed the key employment bills on his desk on September 4,
I said what he signed this month would be the law employers live with in 2027, and what he vetoed
Earlier this month I presented a program for the Beverly Hills Bar Association titled “Defending Businesses to Minimize Litigation Exposure.” The material was built around the questions I get from business owners and HR teams every week: where is the
Every wage and hour case that comes into our office starts the same way. Before we talk strategy and long before mediation, we ask the client for one thing: the raw time and payroll data. Not a summary. The punch-level
Scaled Comp’s August Settlement Pulse recorded about 225 California PAGA and wage-and-hour settlements totaling $157.4 million. The medians tell you where the market sat. They don’t tell you why one employer paid six times what another did for nearly the
The Legislature adjourned on Monday night, August 31, 2026, and everything it passed is now on Governor Newsom’s desk. He has until September 30 to sign or veto each bill. This is his last signing period before his term ends
Most executives operate on a comfortable assumption: the company is the employer, so the company bears the wage and hour liability. Form the entity correctly, keep your corporate housekeeping in order, and your personal assets stay out of the line
As we move through 2026, it remains the perfect time for California employers to return to the fundamentals. With evolving employment laws, local ordinances, aggressive enforcement, and high volumes of wage-and-hour and PAGA claims, getting the basics right continues to
Getting served with a wage and hour class action or PAGA lawsuit is one of the worst days a California business owner or executive can have. The complaint typically alleges nearly every wage and hour violation in the Labor Code,
At our recent masterclass, “Exiting with Confidence: Best Practices for Lawful Terminations and Litigation Prevention,” Anne McWilliams, Caylee Scott, and I went back to basics on one of the highest-risk moments in the employment relationship: the termination. We debated whether
