Episode 12 - Employee Rights - Michael Brown

No one likes to be faced with the idea that they are going to have to get a lawyer involved, but sometimes it becomes necessary. Michael and I get real about things still happening in the world of bad business and inappropriate actions.  

 

Leighann Lovely  00:15

Let's Talk HR is a place for HR professionals, business owners and employees to come together and share experiences, to talk about what's working and what's not. How we can improve best practices so that companies can better attract, train and retain all generations of workers. We all know that there has been a huge shift in what people want. generations are coming together, more than ever, on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about how the economy has been impacted, and what needs to happen to find a balance. I'm your host Leighann. Lovely. So let's get this conversation started. And remember, if you enjoyed this episode, follow us like us and share us.

 

Leighann Lovely  01:04

I am excited to have a great conversation with Michael Brown. He is an attorney who spends his time working with employees for employees' rights, contracts, and severance rights, as well as shareholders. This should prove to be an interesting conversation. So please join me. Michael Brown is the founding attorney of DVG Law Partners. Michael's legal practice focuses on employee rights, contract and severance rights and shareholder rights. He helps clients with negotiations, and when necessary litigation. Michael has been recognized as a rising star in this Super Lawyers publication, and has a superb rating from Avvo. With Michael's assistance, many clients have achieved highly successful legal and financial outcomes. Michael likes to spend his free time with his wife and three children. Together they enjoy travel, recreation, great Mexican food at certain favorite places and chasing their dog, whose name is Justice. Welcome, Michael. I am so excited to have you here today with me to you know, talk with me.

 

Michael Brown  02:24

Thank you. I'm excited to be here.

 

Leighann Lovely  02:26

So why don't we start off with you know, why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself and and the law that you practice? You know, what area that that you're in? Sure.

 

Michael Brown  02:37

Well, currently my law firm, which is a solo practice, I work with other attorneys often from other law firms and so on. But my my current legal practice mostly involves employee rights, or shareholder type rights. Most of my clients are individuals, you know, who are in the employment or the business context, then they had us stronger, wealthier opponent, however, you want to look at it do something, whether it was terminate their job, and from a seventh arrangement, or in the case of like a minority shareholder, there could be a group of majority shareholders who kind of gang up on the minority shareholder because they have more voting shares. And then sometimes that person's an employee as well, certainly employment law issues, as well as business or contract law issues and so on. But generally, I represent individuals for the most part who had any disputes, you know, whether it's in court, which I do a lot of court work and work in different legal forums, you know, like EEOC or Equal Rights Division, like agencies that enforce certain types of employment laws. But I do work in litigation, those different forums. And then I also do work in negotiations to try to help parties reach a settlement. And that that sometimes, I mean, a lot of times that occurs without litigation or before any litigation is necessary. But then cases in litigation are usually settled on average, if they don't lose, and then a lot of cases, the opponent tries to win the case, and they fail, and then they're open a settlement layer point, and so on. But yeah, that's most of the work I do is for individuals and disputes for those types. I also represent small businesses sometimes with like, a breach of contract issues, or, you know, the common denominators. Usually, my case is usually a larger opponent, you know, if I'm representing a company, it's usually against the larger company or organization. And my client is usually the plaintiff or the one you know, that had a financial loss or had something they allege was wrong, you know, like a job termination that was unlawful or whatever it is a breach contract by the other side. They had something that happened to him that they allege is legally wrong, and I agree with them, and that they lost money, usually a significant amount of money, case of job loss, obviously lose your income. And so a lot of the employment law, you know, recovery or potential awards or relief from the legal process involved paying someone for what they lost and lost income, you know, as a result of being improperly fired. But then on the business context, you know, it could be recovery of money related to profits or, you know, represent shareholders that were deprived of like dividends and employees who, like, had a big sale or sales person. And then the employer says, Oh, well, now that you made that sale, we don't want to pay you according to your commission formula, and you're fired, by the way, you know, like, that actually happens. Yeah.

 

Leighann Lovely  05:31

Wow, know that? I mean, is that happen frequently? Or is that kind of like a random every once in five year? I can't, I'm a sales person.

 

Michael Brown  05:47

I mean, it's hard for me to say if it's frequent, because I, you know, I only get the people calm either had something bad happen to the whole industry, but I'll definitely say it's not uncommon. And if there's a financial motivation for an employer save a lot of money, right. And then also, if they don't like the worker, or if there's an issue of discrimination there, they have a problem, workers age or race or whatever, like, there are a lot of different types of conflicts. And so some are more common than other others in my world. But yeah, it's it's it's not uncommon for the I mean, a lot of people shorted wages a lot of different ways. The kind of situation where if a sales not like a one salesman client that earn is a 1%, commission on revenue $100 million sale. So you're like over a million dollars he earned, you know, a guardians commission formula, Yorker, this employer for over like 15 years. But at the point he did that the employer is like, whoa, million dollars, a lot of money. And they tried to press him to take far less, which he refused. And then they fired him. And he wound up having to retain me after he tried with a business lawyer for a while to work things out and couldn't, and so on and so forth. But I mean, there's there are all these disputes, that kind of morphed out of human drama, and a lot of human drama. Someone does want to pay someone something else.

 

Leighann Lovely  07:08

And you would think that you know, the business, look at how much money the business is making. I mean, come on, pay your employee, what they're what they, but you're right. And, you know, it saddens me that you know, one, I'm sure you love what you do. Obviously, you wouldn't do what you do if you didn't love what you do. But you also are seeing, I guess, kind of the thieves of the world you're seeing the the negative side of society, you're seeing where people are coming to you because they're like, Yeah, I've been wronged in some way. Or allegedly, do I need to write? That's fine. I mean, yeah, they they're, they're coming to you, because you're so you're, you're really seeing the world from I guess, Hey, I've been wronged helped me write this situation, which is, I suppose the great side of your job is you get to help people. Right, what has been wrong, but you're also seeing really that side of the society, which is there are businesses or there are people or there are whatever it might be that do try to get away with this kind of stuff. Yeah. So yeah, yeah, that's, that's kind of I'm sure the downturn, the upside of your job is that I'm when you have your great successes, and you're like, Yep, I made this right for this person, and they walk away extremely grateful to you for being able to write that.

 

Michael Brown  08:40

Yeah, that's, that's all true. Yeah. You know, kind of a related thing that I enjoy with my legal practices, because I'm, you know, I have my own business. I'm my own boss, and I work for law firms, as well as some large companies like along the way of my legal career, but well, you know, the main reason I started my own firm had more to do with just practice expense and stuff, like I worked with really nice, good group of lawyers, I still work case with from time to time and really like them as people and lawyers, and so on. But the, like, it was just more much more cost effective for me because I didn't need a lot of things that certain other lawyers need need truly for their practice area and splitting those costs. And so as someone that can, like choose my own clients, I'm not forced to represent a corporation or forced by a law firm to work for this long term business client they have that I personally don't like or think is wrong, or like, I'm fortunate that I can choose my clients and only work for people who I believe are right, you know, legally and factually. Although that's 100%. You know, there are always times or evidence comes up surprise me on it wasn't right about that or so. But, you know, generally speaking if I think someone's credible after initially talking over their situation, reviewing their documents, and so on, usually at the end of the representation, there's no change in that, you know, like, you know, I try to represent people I think are credible, and all that. But what what? So while I'm mindful, like ways that I think workers, or you know, business people, so are legitimately hurt by the practices of large corporations or government employers on like large organizations, and I'm really attuned to, and I'll admit, I'm biased against large corporations and so on, because of all the experiences I have, whatever a big part of being a lawyer is, you're there for this whole process. And you're also dealing with opposing parties all the time. So you come to realize that there are people too, you know, just because people do bad things, Acts, you know, fire someone right in the middle of a surgery leave or something that is like, wow, that lacks compassion, like, you really want to cut this person off the income, and they work for yourself, like, these things that like, I really want to be judged, you know, and that's my job requires me to judge, predict what a real judge would say, and litigate  all that. But even with all that said, when I truly believe the evidence shows the other side was wrong, and so on. In dealing with them, you recognize plenty of good things, plenty of things they do, right, you know how other people with good and bad things they've done in the full scope. But yeah, when you're in my practice area, and if you, if you talk to attorneys that work in individual rights, they're probably going to focus more on like how people get disadvantaged, you know, by the large companies and corporations and a lot of factors involved with that. And also, as a lawyer on that side of the fence, so to speak for the little guy, you, you find yourself talking about that stuff, in part, because of there's a lot of misinformation out there. From the corporate side, there's all this, it what it does is propaganda, but they call it public relations. So there's these, there's a multi billion dollar industry of these think tanks and media conduits they have, and so on that intentionally perpetuate these motions, like people looking to bring lawsuits or looking to win the lottery. And they're overwhelming the courts with frivolous lawsuits, and so on and so forth. And lawyers and individual rights practice are just like, No, that's not how the world is operated. And even think in terms of common sense. Like, lawyers don't take frivolous cases, because they're going to a lot of us are paid most of our income on contingency basis where we only paid if a case settles, which means there's merit to it, you know, if anything significant is paid, or if it wins, so we don't want to take frivolous cases or bring them to court. So as a result, there aren't a lot of at least in the courts. But when I try to be objective, I look from the employer or company standpoint, there are certain types of legal processes, like discrimination complaints, for example, where it's very easy for a worker who's wronged to or who truly believes they're wrong, for good reason, you know, they got fired, and that that hurts that big consequence. And then they like, call me and point out two things, I think, yeah, those are legitimately wrong things, and you can prove them and so on. But it's only a certain subset of wrong things are actually discriminatory. So people that were wronged in some way, filed the wrong type of complaint, where maybe a different legal complaints more appropriate, or no legal complaint could, you know, fix the situation like there's no law violated just the wrong thing. And common common sense sort of wrong or, right. But anyway, like that, those types of complaints where people can find on their own, I can sympathize with employers, in some cases, because a lot of those people, if they talked to me, I would have said, this isn't a good case for a discrimination complaint for one reason or another. So I don't know, I don't wanna say there's like, no big like, if, or if there's a small business employer, and they happen to fire like, one worker ever, and it was a bad employee. And it turns out that one worker filed a discrimination case of Honda, lasting three years and costing the employer you know, $36,000, in corporate defense, legal fees, I couldn't sit, you know, who might say they're wrong or whatever, without looking at that, or that their belief sets, you know, don't make sense. But as far as like the public systemic information about the state of Legal Affairs and the law system, it's a complete whitewash, from my perspective, like corporations and large organizations dominate, they have more money, they have more access to lawyer, they have more help and they played the game, they fight. Fire 1000s of people so they, they know how to document things. If they have an unlawful motive, they know how to hide it. They play games with withholding documents and information and the legal process discovery as it's called, you know, so there's, there's all sorts of systemic things. I'm very confident saying a lot of large companies do wrong. But I tried to unload everyone, I talked to you about that stuff, right. Like, just solve their problem.

 

Leighann Lovely  14:46

And there cases, and you know, you read about these there are there are a lot of cases where you have it's the human factor there. There are certain situations where you have somebody who is under threat in their position and they don't know any better, they make a mistake. They just don't know any better. You see this a lot in undertrained recruiters, when they are asking questions they shouldn't be asking when it during like a hiring process. You know, I hear about this all the time they ask simple questions like, will do have children, because they are trying to get to know somebody, well, you can't during an interview you, you can't ask them. You know, and I, again, somebody could turn around and go, Whoa, they didn't hire me. But you know, during the interview process, they did ask me, if I had children, they discriminated against me, because they didn't hire me, they found out that I have kids. And that's the reason that they didn't hire it. Sometimes it's about the person not being educated enough and making a mistake in a certain simple thing. Other times, it is a blatant, like, we're going to do this, we're going to cover it up, we're gonna, you know, some of the small companies out there, they're not educated enough, and they they make the mistake of, we're going to terminate this person. And sometimes the person firing them has no idea that somebody else in the company is aware that this person may have disclosed something about their background that would make them a protected class. And all of a sudden, that person goes well, I I just disclosed this information about myself. And now they're firing me. Wait a second that they just discriminated against? There's so many things and and again, yeah, you're you're on that side of weeding through Is this a frivolous case? Is there merit to this, and but you're right, the large the huge companies out there, who have been at it for ever, and know exactly what to do, how to do it properly, how to not put something in an employee file, because they know if they do that's going to, and again, I've been in the HR, you know, I've been in HR one way or another for over 17 years, I was taught early on, here's what you don't document, here's what you do not write down, here's what you do write down. And it's like, wow, these are, these are blatant things that the company is explaining, Hey, you can't put this in the file. Because if we ever get sued, that's gonna be a problem. And it's like, you're covering your butt from the very beginning, just in case this employer ever comes after you for anything?

 

Michael Brown  17:39

Yeah. Yeah, that's, that's all true. Although, I guess what I would say to on that point of not documenting things, like you're absolutely right. And I think the best way, like, if you're in, like, if you're working in HR, and you're in that specific context, you know, the work that we're talking about, you know, what they're telling you not to document, you can more readily tell, you know, if it's kind of a devious thing, versus what I'm about to talk about, but sometimes I'll just see, like, sometimes I give clients advice, not to document things, but not, but it's like, I'll say, Don't email anybody other than me about your legal case. But it's not because Oh, you're going to tell lies, and, but it's more that anything you email the other the opposing party can get. So it makes life a lot simpler, you know, if you just don't email anything that you don't need to write, or, and, and a lot of times just people want to vent to people that it doesn't really help them. And all it does is create risk, you know, through gossip them, get back to the lawyer or whatever. But yeah, you're right. Like, there, there are definitely tried and true methods, you know, that employers use, you know, like, administration wise in house and then also in the legal system, just common games, during depositions, common games, that opposing company, lawyers play, and so on. And those things are systemic, and they come up over and over and over again, from my standpoint. And, you know, it's, it's frustrating if I let it be, but, but you know, you just have to deal with it. Try to respond. The best he can

 

Leighann Lovely  19:12

Right, and it's also it is it truly comes down to two, you know, we are living in a technology world, anything. Absolutely anything that you put on your computer you put can be found. Once it hits the web, it exists, and it can't go away. I mean, it's just it's a simple fact. So if you want to say something, you want to just go vent and get something off your chest, don't email it. Right, have a have a face to face conversation with somebody. And trust me there are plenty of times where I'm like, I need to go invent I sit down. My dad is my go to person. My husband is my go to person, you know, and that's okay, I got it off my chest. I've said everything I need to say I'm over it, but I sure as hell I'm not gonna email along. Hey, I need to get this off my chest because God forbid I say something that in 10 years haunts me. And they're like, did you know that she?

 

Michael Brown  20:12

Yeah. Yeah. Is there interesting issues for sure. It reminded me when I was in law school, which is 20 years ago that I had a criminal law professor, like, I went to Madison, and it's a so called progressive or liberal environment, they call like, an independent politically, I don't think what they call liberal back then is, and they call liberal right now, or remotely the same thing, like, but But um, but anyway, like, Madison's what people would call like, a democratic, you know, pro individual in their mind, you know, institution that teaches, you know, quote, unquote, liberal and progressive values to help people and which, I argue is probably not the case on the whole nowadays, but But anyway, that's the reputation so on. And at the time, I went to school as much more that way than now. And the law professor I had, however, despite this liberal background, he went to Madison also on his his job, like his main job in the in the private sector was he was the head of Wisconsin's prison system, which is kind of the most institutional job you can imagine, you know, so as to the progressive stuff. But he said something I thought was super interesting to the class as class huge lectures, college students, including meanings he said, How many of us have committed felonies, and we all kind of thought we're living on, you know, a minute or whatever. But he said, all of us. And I was like, whoa. But then I gave a thought. And I was like, well, there's so many felonies and so many laws, I haven't thought like, the felony. Like, if you're 16 years old, you knock over a mailbox, which I've done to migrate and bears, you know, but like, but if you really give it a thought, and so on, like we all have done wrong and violate some law and other but this point was made greater by like mentioning the word felony. But So while most of us haven't, you know, committed murder, kidnapped, or done some of the so called horrible things that popped to mind first, with felonies right, you give it further thoughts, like, we all have some degree of guilt. And so like having that humility, at least in the back of your mind throughout any type of conflict, definitely how

 

Leighann Lovely  22:17

It's so interesting that you say that because I was I was actually at a networking event. And there was the the presenter was an attorney. And on the criminal side, and she stands up, and she started presenting, and the first thing that she says is, how many of you in this room have an OWI or DUI, and you go, and of course, nobody in the room raised their hand, like you're sitting in a room of professionals in your life. And she goes, you're sitting at a table, and these are tables of force? She goes, you're sitting at a table with somebody who does? And we're all like, really, we are like, Well, nobody's going to admit it. Now, how many people in this room have driven drunk? And we're just like, well, holy shit, probably everybody. Now, if you consider what the legal limit for drunk is, I mean, it's like, it's very low. Now. Did I know at the time that I was intoxicated, when I drove? Do I did I know that my, my alcohol levels would have if I would have blown that they would have been right at that threshold? I don't know. Should I have been driving? No, I absolutely. Um, this is not about, you know, gee, you can have a couple beers. I'm not. That's absolutely. I'm not advocating. But the point being, is that the same, it's the same premice is that, you know, you, you have to really realize what, you know, you can't sit there and point a finger at somebody and go, Oh, how dare you break the law. I mean, it's a reality that each and every one of us at one point in our lives have broken the law, especially living in the state of Wisconsin, where in college, majority of the college students, not everybody partook in some type of excessive of drinking, or, you know, we've all walked into a store, stolen a pack of gum, or whatever it might be somebody at some you've broken the law. Right? You use the felony example. But you know, you're sitting in a network, nobody is going to admit it openly. But yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's just it's, and so we need to stop pointing our fingers at people and go, Yeah, we are only human. And we make human mistakes. Which note so this leads me into my next question. So, you know, this is obviously a very interesting it's a very for me, I'm a geek, I'm an HR geek, you know, employee, right, geek. I'm all here to talk. How did you determine and choose the area of law that you decided to go into and I can imagine or maybe not, maybe it's just new tricks, you know, old dog new tricks kind of thing. Well, that It doesn't make sense anyways, you know, how did you choose the area of law? And has it changed over the last 510 years with the way that companies have treated employees? The the different things that people come to you for and need?

 

Michael Brown  25:18

Yeah, remind me of that second question, what thing? Because the first ones probably might take, like, a little bit longer to answer but like, because I as far as choosing my area lot, I feel like I didn't entirely choose it because it was like, a response of things. Like I saw job opening. And it was for employment law firm. I didn't know anything about her ever think really practicing employment law or employee rights.

 

Leighann Lovely  25:45

So it found you. Well, yeah, kinda,

 

Michael Brown  25:49

I mean, I had interest in it to apply. And I thought, Oh, this could be interesting. But like it early, my legal career, I actually started out law school doing privacy law stuff is right at the time that this HIPAA law was going into effect. So there's all sorts of compliance work that needs to be done, and so on. So I law clerk for the UW Hospital. And I my first legal job was working for a affiliate of the UW Hospital, clinical affiliate entity, and they want a merging with another affiliate. So I lost my job. Some other people that too, as part of that, I want to the corporation that that time called cobalt, which Blue Cross Blue Shield and, and, but But anyway, like that corporation, I got laid off as well after several years, and then they had a merger. And then so you know, me and other people were looking for work at that time, too. And then looking at the jobs I, you know, I can say I guess I picked employment law because I had offer like I had an offer to work for another corporation when kind of comparable. And then there are other types of law firms, a couple other law firms right offers in different practice areas, including I'll tell really quick story like criminal law, tort law, because it goes back to what you're mentioning, but on criminal lawyer interviewed with us, interesting guy to talk to. And he's he said, he said, Yeah, people always approached me and say, like, at cocktail parties, and they say, how can you represent guilty people? Or at least some of your clients, you know, are guilty? How can you do that? And then he goes, those same people line of commie later because they need me to represent them or their family member? Yeah. So it's like, it kind of goes back to your point, like, everyone has something guilty for, you know, at some point, whether or not you're caught or whatever, but a big part of is just owning up to it, and that in the art and consequential, you know, the penalties and so on. But also, it's I think the bigger relevance of that as the humility standpoint of our culture is does not promote humility, whatsoever. It's all about political infighting. I'm right, you're wrong, you fail, you know, Let's roast this person laugh. So. So it's like, all this stuff is geared towards this one loss mentality and not towards introspection, in my opinion, you know, or like, looking at one's own faults, or humility or forgiveness are a bunch of like not to get into my religion stuff. On my view, I'm a Christian, in my view of that is like, internal stuff yet, even in the Christian institutions, like, it seems like there's too much external force, if you judge, you judge, you're the center. And it's like, well, that's not what I get out of out of this. But still, I fall victim to kind of say, in outside of the religious kind of any context, like culturally, these lodges, I feel like promoting busting others and not introspecting not forgiving that being humble. And, and I think that really matters. Because if that attitude is kind of set in those bad ways, it's sabotage everything for everybody. But all that stuff aside, when I applied for the jobs, you know, I went, I want to take a job, this employment law firm, because I thought it might be interesting. And that law, they're good and bad things like about that law firm environment in a small business environment. And, and then I just want to work in a couple law firms and Waukee employee rights and like, I really liked the practice area, it's in terms of like, interest level, it's never boring, you know, it's always human karma, you know, so it's like it, you know, I'm not someone that watches soap operas, but it's still it's like, if something is, you know, sensationalistic or human drama, it's just like, human nature. It's more interesting than like reading some dried, you know, legalese thing, or, you know, and then just doing it purely on emotional exercise or puzzle solving sort of thing, you know, so it's engaging, and I believe, you know, on the client side representative, for the most part, even when I worked for firms where they might have certain clients I wouldn't have chosen or whatever. So generally, I identified like I felt the clients from the right and so that mattered, you know, like doing something I believe the person is actually right and enjoying the work and finding interesting and not getting bored so on something that was all good. I pretty much stuck with that and and and move on and in like years of that arc, because I don't look to change areas of law so much at certain times, I look to, you know, to change a law firm environment to like, I move back to the Fox Valley, because my has worked in Waukee for a number of years, Madison before that, but moved back home to Fox Valley area where my parents are, still are and my wife has a family that wound up congregating here as well. So just with our kids, very young, first child at very young age, you know, we moved back here mainly for those reasons. But also the employment law allows you flexibility, so I could practice representing clients still from Milwaukee or anywhere in the state, in fact, in other states under federal law, so I, I want to get involved in like, cases, you know, the federal court in California or Washington, DC, you know, labor thing, you know, where there's a Washington DC based administrative judge who's presiding over the matter, lineup traveling here and there for representing clients. But most legal work actually is remote, you know, just on your computer and phone and occasionally go to a lot of times record, you can hear by phone or video, you know, rather than having to travel as well. So,

 

Leighann Lovely  31:09

So employment law, you can actually practice is that nationally, I mean, each state is that what I'm understanding?

 

Michael Brown  31:21

Yeah, so there's the federal law that applies nationaly, you know, and so there's federal discrimination law, for example, is a big area. And so like, if, if an employee is fired because of a disability issue related to disability, because it doesn't matter? Yeah, Americans with Disability Act like that. So then that person, even if they're another state, I can represent them. And in fact, that more often than not, I can usually represent someone if they want me to, you know, that's inquiry from a different state. It's usually, but yeah, it can get if an issue is primarily state law, that contract law is a good example. Like if, if a doctor you know, has a kind of employment contract with the hospital, and that one of the parties alleges that contract was breached, because the doctor gets fire or whatever Doctor pay or something and they say, the doctor says a contracts breach, usually a straight contract. Issue, like that is usually a state law issue. And in fact, the contracts often say on the state laws of Wisconsin apply, and a lawsuit must be brought in Wisconsin state court or so. But even by default, like that's the case for certain issues that their state law specific. Okay, so now kind of matters to subject matter whether attorney can step out of state to represent or not

 

Leighann Lovely  32:41

Interesting. So it has Have things changed, you know, with, because, obviously, you know, we talked a little bit about employers have gotten smarter in the way that they do things, but have things changed with, especially now with a lot more employers or additions, employers employees being more open over the last year with their mental health, with more employees coming out and talking about, you know, their addiction, or so, has that had an impact people coming to you with the discrimination? Or? I mean, has that changed over the last 510 years?

 

Michael Brown  33:25

You know, it's a really good question. It's kind of hard for me to answer because there's, there have been so many things that I, I think have been going on, since I felt like I first started employee rights practice in 2004, sort of over that, you know, over 15 years. And in that time, there have been a number of things that I see as constants that are problematic from like the corporate standpoint and government standpoint. And also, like legal systems standpoint, like deficiencies and, like, personnel of the federal government, for example, it's just some of these agencies, it's just a joke. I mean, it's just like, you'd be amazed as a non lawyer, like, if you first think, honor, like, certain department of labor, personnel, you're like, Oh, my God, this person refuses to give me their name on the phone, and their government is in charge of investigating this case. And they tell me, they won't tell me their name. And they're supposed to issue a decision on this legal decision in writing. And they left it out, they claim they made the decision but left a voice message on my clients phone two years ago, like it's just like really mind blowing stuff for like, what you think is the law and what's supposed to happen is very different from the situation you actually deal with, with the government, employees and so on. But there's also just a huge problem like overload of cases on investigators desk and just insufficient resources and personnel allocated, and that's still going on. Since I started employment, you know, like, I'm sure before but but it's gotten worse, you know, far worse and I and that's part of it. One of the factors, many factors that drove me to political independence. But like at the time, back in the day, I was a Democrat. And I thought like democratic appointees like Obama's appointees and stuff would fix that situation or better. But over time, like their appointees were less and less individual rights are progressive oriented to amateur athletes is progressive or democratic, just like, but you know, do they care? Do they have a beating heart about individual rights? Like, will they ever decide to quit? Would they ever decide a case to employees favoring or like feeling employees wrong? And you actually have some judges and stuff, not the majority. But you have some, like Alito, for the Supreme Court, like he has made a thing during his confirmation process that he had never decided discrimination, summary judgment motion, in favor of the employees like, and those are pretty common motions in federal court. So like, my guess is he might have had hundreds of those types of options and always decided in favor of the employer. And he gave on that he gave some explanation like, Well, the good case is usually settled before they get to that point. And while that's true, like in part, it definitely is true at some of those cases. But there are all sorts of very strong employee rights cases that go to summary judgment stage, where the employer is not offered a dime of settlement. And in fact, some of them are aggressively like, bad mouthing us. So it's like, the strength of a case is not the employer never sees the case against them as strong. So it's like, Alito, his explanation does not explain that circumstance, you know, so Right. So as a like, as an app, politically act interested person, I've had worse and worse disappointment, seeing what the Democratic Party in particular has devolved or backtrack to like, in just everything's getting more and more corporate, you know, on the Republican appointees, in my mind report, pro corporate too. So it's heavy against the work, you know, you have judges that they're there, in the case of state judges, fifth campaign funds paid by large industries, or like companies or industry groups. And that's, that's a legitimate potential conflict of interest, at least, I'd like to take Pfizer in that situation, as a judge, I would be, say, look, I gotta be honest with myself, like, I'll feel indebted as a good human being to this company that gave me a lot of money, just as a matter of parent, like, I still remember someone like, let me 20 bucks five years ago, and I forgot to pay him back, you know. So it's like, it's a good thing, in some ways, like want to repay. But I think it's just a bad dynamic for that whole system. Right? Dominant.

 

Leighann Lovely  37:40

So it's, it's interesting, because it seems that it doesn't matter. It's political driven either way, is what I'm hearing is that, even though we as a society are continuing to accept people more, and we now have more protected classes, employers are now becoming aware and offering all of these different resources for, you know, employees and everything, it doesn't seem to matter, because it seems that these issues are still politically driven on decisions, regardless of acceptance within the workplace, and it really comes down to the employer.

 

Michael Brown  38:21

Um, yeah, I agree with most of what you said, I think, like individual court decisions, I guess, I don't usually observe to be like political per se. But But I do think that the whole, like, there are these orientations or mindsets or ideologies, we have. And I mean, I can speak to like, my own side, you know, like, starting out on plaintiff's employment practice, I was very involved with Democratic stuff, go to fundraisers contribute, you know, donations and stuff as an individual, you know, but like I would, I would, I would do that and try to get Democrats elected and, and so on to judge position, you know, and so I'm thinking, like, yeah, this judge is going to be more likely to give individually, I didn't think they'd be biased in favor of individuals more like this judge could is not is not necessarily going to side with a big company, just because they're, you know, that the logo and the name recognition or like, they'll actually consider the individual side and stuff without any sort of bias. Like that's how I like looked at it. People on the business side might look at it not how you play, the players just want judges that are gonna decide cases and favorite individual. No, I can't, that's irrational or whatever. But, but anyway, we all try to look at it our own way, what political person we support. But I think really reality is that over time, the legal system has done more and more like all systems, right? Governments and so on have been more and more corporations do better and better, the largest corporations do better and better whereas the small businesses do worse and worse. And so I don't want to lump the small businesses in like this bad behavior, I'm talking about this. Now, my view, it's usually the smaller an organization is you have more accountability, you have less leverage and wealth, you know, the hold over people, workers, even if they're even still unfair, and they don't have enough leverage is held more than in the large corporate setting so as to see like less problems like, or impactful, like society problems coming from small business isn't stuff. But what gets kind of weird like that when I'm in these networking contexts or whatever, sometimes, small business owners will look at me like, well, you're just looking to sue us or whatever, that's right. No, no, I, I know, I look like the skunk in the room, because I'm the employee rights guy. But like, a lot of what I think is most problematic in the world really starts with the ultra rich, and the politicians my view that they control and the systems of governance that they more than us everyday people influence, you know, and, and so that's in my mind, that's kind of like the problems really start up there. If you look back and been, you know, and then filter down to those that kind of, can't afford those same like, kind of readings of the system or gerrymandering, gerrymandering of the political district or whatever right? tricks they can afford to do.

 

Leighann Lovely  41:15

Yeah. So do you think that and, you know, my next question is, I think that it's kind of become a little bit less relevant because of, you know, where this conversation has, you know, kind of gone, but do you think, a society, we have definitely become more inclusive, and we've become more open to, you know, a wide variety of things. And so speaking from the employee rights side, do you think that employers will will try to be better? Do you think that there will be an emphasis on training and on understanding of employees rights more now, because of what has happened and transpired over the last, it's been more than a year, I was gonna say, in the last year, it's now been, you know, a year and a half, almost two years? Do you think that that employers are going to try to be better and do better, especially some of these larger employers? Or do you think that they're going to just continue down the same path of let's just continue to do the cover ups pay the expense too, because we've definitely shined a light on the fact that there are a lot of issues within our society that people need more from their employers, and they expect more from their employers, and they have the ability to leave, if they want to. And employers are now under the gun. So do you think that that employers will invest more in being better for their employees? And that you'll see, I guess, less employee claims against employers because they need to be better?

 

Michael Brown  42:50

That's a good question. And it's, I guess, it'd be hard for me to answer like, the one thing that's pretty new to me, and probably all of us is just the change in a number of employers having a shortage of workers COVID phenomenon. And that the fact you know, that that has been like a significant effect. I don't know, though, how that falls on. Like, in my mind, it falls more on the smaller employers having shown this in the larger ones, but I don't know that you know, like,

 

Leighann Lovely  43:23

1. It does. I mean, a lot of the smaller, the smaller employers, the employers are struggling more because they can't afford to pay as much as the larger employers, but the larger employers are struggling, just, you know, they're struggling the same. It's across the board. It is, Vince, you gave an example, one of the star salespeople sells a, I can't remember what that number was, but it was a huge sale, and they were gonna make a million dollar in commission, and they, you know, let's just let the employee go versus paying that. Well, in today's society, you may not be able to replace that, that employee, you may not be able to replace a star sales person because they just don't exist right now. And other you know, companies out there are willing to offer small employers not going to be able to pay a million dollar commission, but there the trade off is they're willing to do whatever they can to make that employer happy, that employee happy. So yeah, even the large corporations are under the gun to do better be better. And I just wonder if that if, and I guess I'm not asking you to foretell the future. But it's an interesting thought to think that employers need to clean up their act. And that doesn't just mean Hey, pay me better. That extends to hey, if you if you're doing some sneaky stuff behind the scenes of treating your employees, shitty in firing people because you find out that you know, he drinks too much at home and he might be an alcoholic. Let's get rid of before he becomes a problem, you know, that's, that's shady stuff.

 

Michael Brown  45:05

Yeah, I agree. Like, it's a really good issue in question to bring up, it's because like, part of me is thinking, well, there are certain individuals that, you know, just are looking to cheat people, for lack of a better ethics a minority people, and, you know, but just certain individuals, like whether it's an issue over 10 bucks, or it's an issue over a million dollar sale Commission, which, you know, if a small business salesman get some $100 million contract, it's, it is the same as you know, but it's like, but then, but then that same issue of greed confronts that small business owner that maybe as a small business they hadn't had experience with before or whatever. And so maybe they're greedier than they otherwise would have been, or whatever. But, but um, I think part of me is thinking, well, people that are inclined to kind of cheat or whatever, probably going to do that, or, you know, press or take from someone unfairly are probably going to do that, or at risk to do that no matter what environment they're in, whether it's large company, or small, or what year it is, or whatever. But then on the other hand, it's if with a worker shortage that leverages leverage, so to speak. And so if, if a worker it like a worker is going to be more valued, on average for doing their job, if they're doing it satisfactory, in that circumstance, than a work or in a situation where they're doing their job well, but there's a, you know, hundreds of job applicants waiting to take his or her job at any point, you know, so I think the leverage itself makes a difference. I will say, though, that as far as the mindset and emotions and I ideology, like all that, like wanting to do better for workers, I don't I think companies only gotten worse. But I think all all of society has gotten worse. I think a lot of that boils down to what I view as propaganda from the mute like mainstream what people think is normal mainstream media, I think is hate talk, like not not legally actionable hate speech. It's hate. It's like, I only pay attention. So I know who's gonna hate who including me, for what reason, I don't watch it, because I think there's anything constructive or useful as a citizen I can do or think about it, or any good can come from it. For the most part. Yeah. And along that lines, I think a lot of these things with, like, if you're talking about like the Civil Rights Act, or like Americans Disability Act, sitting on additional protections that like, there's been all sorts of very, you know, meaningful changes in the law in a more opening and inclusive direction of giving more people rights, and there's no doubt about it. And like, more means to contest situations if someone's been fired on basis, the race and so on. But with all that said, and like all that groundwork and stuff, which is still there, to an extent, I think like the the spirit a lot of that, behind it is gone, it's become more like the political landscape. It's more about this litmus test of like, how do I compare my race or my religion to someone else's, or, or even if it's not any of those factors of like, race, or identity, or sexuality, or if it's, if it's just like a factor of this person, the other political party here, or people in a different country, or whatever it is, I just think a lot of the function of politics is to kind of like, take some concepts that used to be good things like he caught, or there are good things, but the meaning behind them all was like equal opportunity, and like treating others with compassion and stuff. And then kind of taking those concepts of like race discrimination wherever but then kind of using them for the wrong context. Like when some Facebook debate with someone you know, so yeah, it's up to you. Like, I'll say, I have a problem with this politician selling arms to this to Saudi Arabia or whatever. Yeah, like, and they use the arms for bad reasons, in my opinion, and I have a problem with that, and then get a response that was just like a white male to say that, you know, okay, so you know, it but but that the other is I mentioned that, as I say, Oh, poor me on Unnai as a white male, like, I definitely have had it easy. You know, because of that, and a lot of ways throughout my whole life. But the reason why I noticed that reaction, because it happens more and more over time. In fact, I serve it more towards like others and stuff. But it's like, if we sit back and say like, what are we really doing here? If we're talking about something that has nothing to do with anybody's race or religion, and then it's just culturally acceptable to interject those things to like, win that argument, say they lose and they like that's the kind of finding the problem with and repeated observational, and this

 

Leighann Lovely  49:41

is why I try to stay away from just reading random social media because it drives me crazy when you look on a perfectly normal social media post and all of a sudden it digresses into some buddy bringing in something that has nothing to do with The original post but becomes this argument about politics, race or religion. We are coming to time. So this the question of the season. Okay, I've been asking everybody this question. So if you could pinpoint a time period in your career that made a huge difference in your life or career path. When would that be? And why?

 

Michael Brown  50:23

Yeah, that's a great question. For me, yeah, ties a little bit into being an employment lawyer and seeing things from that perspective, but also just I think it could have been something that happened me no matter what my profession or whatever, but, like there's a point in time in my career where I knew I want to do a play rights law but I also wasn't in a city I knew I didn't want to be in for long term because of my kid and so on work environment wasn't exactly what I wanted and so on. But that was like the first time where I was proactive, like my own destiny instead of just looking at job postings, you know, like an Appleton or Fox Valley where I want to move and seeing okay, what's available there. I actually thought to myself, Where do I want to work? So I knew the city what type of law firm environment do I want to have? How many hours you know, I roughly wanna work do I want to work in the type of legal practices a lot of hourly billing clients which has its own pressures and and and risks for clients and stuff but also just pressures an attorney you got to build a certain number of hours a year and incentives that can sometimes go bad with that and so on. But you know, I just give thought to like all these factors like once I had some experience and like I knew is generally what I wanted area law but I knew like more administratively and practice wise and lifestyle wise through experience kind of what I wanted. So at that point, so looking at the job postings and so on, I I call up someone I knew that was a connector but I can't remember how they like some person that was recommended by someone else I trust that worked in the Fox Valley where I'm from but I just didn't really know as high school and grew up and stuff but I didn't know any attorneys really at the time in the area so I found someone's an attorney was recommended by someone I trust that has told this person like here's here's I was looking for a job thanks for spending your time talking to me and you know, the local scene and so on but like, here's the type of legal work I do here's the type of law firm environment I'm looking for and the type of hours and thought so forth. And then telling him that he recommended someone he's like, Hey, there's there's a guy law firm I know and the guy the first name it was Peterson Bergen Crosse in Appleton But as John Peterson you only refer me to like the first name under the law firm. He's like, You should call John I just called up John randomly never having talked to him before like, hey, you know, I'm unfamiliar. It's for him Locky like alert, you might be interested, like having someone like you work for he's like, sure. They're just like, come on talk interview. Like, like, even talk to his other fighters and stuff. Yeah, I want like interviewing, I think a couple times, you know, all the lawyers there and stuff before I was hired. But it's just funny, like how that worked out. And it was a it was a great work environment, I still interact and talk with those folks and stuff. And, you know, good people, good attorneys. And, but so it but that was really the first job I had that I like truly felt I chose myself and chose wisely and chose, like educating myself in the right ways. But it was mainly because it was proactive on my part, you know, like you can get a job listing. So I'm do a good job research, like talk to people that know that people have done that, too, you know, and gotten saved from taking a couple bad job offers, you know, in the past, you know, from doing that, but I think being proactive is a big part of it. Well, that's

 

Leighann Lovely  53:45

awesome. And it is it's it's often about who you know, and and when you decide that you're going to take you know the direction or really take control of your of your destiny, asking the right people getting to know the right people asking for advice. That's usually when the bus things happen. And that's awesome. And thank you for sharing that. And I really appreciate you coming on and talking to me today. Um, this has been a very educational conversation for me, especially, you know, talking with somebody who, who really truly is in the in the thick of, you know, a side of society and business and has a background that is way beyond my understanding, and you know, the legal side of things. So I truly thank you Michael for talking with me today.

 

Michael Brown  54:35

Oh, no problem. And thank you for having me on as I really enjoyed it. And it was interesting for me as well. Well, you

 

Leighann Lovely  54:40

have a wonderful day.

 

Michael Brown  54:42

You too. Thank you.

 

Leighann Lovely  54:44

Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support. Without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode to follow us like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.

 

Michael Brown Linkedin - linkedin.com/in/michaelfbrownemployeerights

Michael Brown E-mail Address - mbrown@dvglawpartner.com

Website, DVG Law Partners - dvglawpartner.com

 

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