"The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is expected to rescind guidance that addresses harassment based on gender identity. Should we remove mentions of gender identity from our anti-harassment policy? "
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WIRTW #781: the 'EEOC' edition

"The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is expected to rescind guidance that addresses harassment based on gender identity. Should we remove mentions of gender identity from our anti-harassment policy?"

An HR professional recently asked that question to HR Dive.

Let me answer it as succinctly as possible: NO!!!

Or, if you prefer, let me rephrase question for clarity: "The EEOC says, 'Don't follow the law.' I'm confused. Shouldn't they be telling us the opposite?"

No matter what the EEOC now wants employers to believe, the law has not changed. Title VII's prohibition on sex discrimination still includes discrimination based on transgender status. And because sex discrimination includes sexual harassment, it remains unlawful—legally, unquestionably, unequivocally—to harass an employee because they are transgender. The Supreme Court has already said this. Courts across the country have said this. The EEOC does not get to rewrite that reality by pretending otherwise.

But even if we play along with the EEOC's fiction for a moment, the law is a floor, not a ceiling. Nothing stops employers from choosing to protect their workers because it's the right thing to do. Your workplace policies should reflect your values, your culture, and your commitment to treating employees with respect—not the bare minimum that a politicized agency thinks it can get away with. Protecting transgender employees from harassment isn't only lawful. It's moral. It's responsible. It's who good employers are.

And frankly, the EEOC should be ashamed of itself. The agency charged with enforcing civil rights laws is now encouraging employers to ignore them. That isn't guidance; it's abandonment. Employers deserve clarity, not political gamesmanship.

So, no, do not remove gender identity from your anti-harassment policy. Keep it there. Keep following the actual law. And keep doing what the EEOC, apparently, won't: protecting all employees.


Here's what I read this week that you should read, too.

Discovery's New Frontier: Requesting the Plaintiff's GenAI Data and Updating Litigation Hold Policies for the Age of Generative AI Dan Schwartz's Connecticut Employment Law Blog

An AI Tool Withheld an Employee's Paycheck. That's Really a Human Error Improve Your HR by Suzanne Lucas, the Evil HR Lady

What are you doing to protect your company's trade secrets and keep them secret?

Sherbrooke, a captive insurer for nursing homes, built proprietary software to price risk and underwrite policies. Three insiders—including the CTO who created the software—allegedly decided to spin up a competing insurer and started using that same software to run it.

Sherbrooke sued, claiming trade secret misappropriation.

The district court dismissed the claim, saying Sherbrooke hadn't alleged that it took sufficient "reasonable measures" to protect its secrets. The 4th Circuit reversed. At the pleading stage, the court said, robust confidentiality and invention-assignment agreements were enough to plausibly allege trade-secret protection and misappropriation.

Businesses shouldn't read this case as a signal that NDAs alone will save the day when trying to protect your trade secrets. Courts expect to see evidence that you consistently treat your valuable information like it's actually valuable.

That means taking concrete steps such as:

➛ Identifying your true trade secrets—what they are, where they live, and who touches them.

➛ Locking them down on paper with strong confidentiality and IP-assignment agreements.

➛ Controlling access through permissions, passwords, and need-to-know limits.

➛ Training employees routinely on confidentiality expectations.

➛ Offboarding decisively, including cutting off access, recovering devices, confirming return/deletion, and suing when necessary.

➛ Conducting regular trade-secret audits.

➛ Using digital tools to detect risky downloads or data transfers.

➛ Tightening vendor controls with NDAs and security requirements.

➛ Clearly labeling confidential information as such.

➛ Adopting written policies for remote work, cloud storage, and AI use.

➛ Encrypting and segmenting key data.

➛ Monitoring access logs for suspicious behavior.

➛ Documenting leadership oversight of trade-secret protections.

➛ Reinforcing physical security where sensitive information lives.

Trade-secret cases are won and lost long before anyone files the lawsuit. If you can't point to a meaningful, well-documented protection program, this decision is your nudge to build one—now, and not when a competitor turns out to be your former insider. By then, it will be too late.

If you think women ruined the workplace, the problem isn’t women — it’s you

The New York Times recently asked, "Did Women Ruin the Workplace?" After an online firestorm erupted, it quietly changed the headline to "Did Radical Feminism Ruin the Workplace." That edit says everything. This isn't about law or fairness. It's about resentment dressed up in intellectual clothes.

Nothing about American workplace law is "feminized." It's statutory, constitutional, and precedent-driven—by courts, by the way, long dominated by men.

Title VII is neutral. Since 1964, it's banned discrimination because of sex. The Supreme Court has made sure those protections apply equally to everyone. Feminism didn't twist the law; the law simply requries equality.

When commentators complain that we favor "punishing male vices and allowing feminized vices totally free rein," they're not making legal arguments—they're confessing ignorance. Meritor, Oncale, Faragher, and Ellerth created a balanced framework protecting both sides.

If your culture of "masculine virtue" involves push-up contests or pinups, that's not authenticity—it's Exhibit A. The courts didn't invent that risk. You did.

A local jury recently underscored this point. Former FirstEnergy senior counsel David Farkas claimed he was fired for criticizing the company’s DEI program. The company said he was fired for non-consensually touching a colleague. The jury weighed the evidence and found no retaliation. Not bias. Not "wokeness." Just facts and law. That's how the system is supposed to work.

That's not "feminist bias." That's due process. Evidence mattered. Facts won.
MeToo didn't abolish fairness; it amplified accountability. "Believe women" was never a legal standard; it was a moral correction to decades of disbelief. The law still demands proof, process, and balance.

HR doesn't exist to "appease women." It exists to protect the company. If your managers fear lawsuits, that's not feminism's fault—it's bad management.
Feminism didn’t break the workplace. It civilized it.

After nearly 30 years defending employers, I'm here to tell you this: the workplaces with the fewest problems — legal or cultural — are the ones that take equality seriously, and hold to account those who fail to do so. Not as politics. Not just as policy. But as a daily expression of what's ethical and moral

If you think feminism "ruined" the workplace, you're not defending tradition. You're defending impunity. And you're asking for a lawsuit.

Leadership always starts at the top

"Quiet, Piggy."
 
That's what Donald Trump said to a female reporter over the weekend aboard Air Force One in response to a question she asked him about the Epstein Files.

We should all agree that Trump's response was inappropriate, disgusting, and deplorable.

Now, let's take this story off of Air Force One and into your workplace. When an employee is confirmed to have said something like "Quiet, Piggy" to a coworker, management's path is straightforward and non-negotiable.

First: act immediately.
Check in with the targeted employee, ensure they feel safe, and make clear that retaliation will not be tolerated. Interim steps—like separating the parties—may be appropriate depending on the environment.

Next: investigate the context and impact.
Even with the facts confirmed, the employer still needs to understand the circumstances: where it happened, who witnessed it, whether there's a pattern, and how it affected the workplace. Document thoroughly.

Then: take corrective action.
A confirmed comment this demeaning violates any credible workplace conduct policy. The response must be proportionate but meaningful: coaching, discipline, suspension, termination—whatever aligns with the seriousness of the offense, the employee's track record, and the company's past practice.

Finally: The speaker's title is irrelevant.
Whether it's a line employee, a manager, or the CEO, the expectations are the same: dignity, respect, and professionalism.

In fact, the risk is greater when the offender is a CEO or leader. Culture flows downward. When the person at the top models bullying, everyone sees it. It erodes trust, encourages similar behavior, and sends the message that the rules apply only to the rank and file. Boards, owners, and leadership teams have an obligation to respond even more decisively when the misconduct comes from the top.

Here's my bottom line, and it should be yours, too. Confirmed disrespectful conduct requires action—swift, consistent, and aligned with policy. Position doesn't excuse it. If anything, the higher the role, the higher the responsibility to set the tone.

WIRTW #780: the 'breakup' edition

"You deserve someone who loves you for who you are, not who they want you to be."

That's the heart of this week's episode of The Norah & Dad Show.

Norah got dumped, and we talk all about it:
  • "Fake boundaries" (like rules about what she can wear, who she can hang out with, and how many drinks she's allowed)
  • One-sided codependency (not her)
  • Why being single in college is freeing
  • And how two parents ended up on an emergency highway run to triage her mental health.

It's part heartbreak, part humor, and part masterclass in learning to walk away from unhealthy dynamics.

If you're raising (or working with) young adults, I think you'll get a lot out of this conversation. Here's a short preview.

 

Listen to the full episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, Amazon Music, Overcast, in your browser, or wherever you get your podcasts. And if you enjoy it, please like, review, and subscribe—it truly helps!


Here's what I read this week that you should read, too.





A Fertile Ground for Lawsuits: Employer Risk in Embryo Personhood Jurisdictions — via The L•E•Jer

I got an abusive message from an email subscriber — should I let his employer know? — via Ask a Manager

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