McCain Tops Obama In Poll Of HR Executives

Main Category: Public Health
Article Date: 30 Sep 2008 - 1:00 PDT

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In a poll conducted this morning at the Advanced Employment Issues Symposium, John McCain topped Barack Obama when attendees were asked who they would prefer to win the White House, voting 54.4% to 45.6% for the Arizona senator. More than 350 Human Resources professionals are attending this 13th annual event.

"I'll be interested to see if those numbers hold when we present this event again in Nashville on October 16," said attorney and program moderator John Phillips. "We should have a clearer picture on the economy by then and a better idea of the impact each candidate would have on employment law."

Phillips is a Member of the law firm of Miller & Martin and has more than 30 years of experience representing employers in a variety of legal issues. He has served as Assistant General Counsel for Coca-Cola Enterprises and is host of the award-winning Danger Zones for Supervisors DVD-based training system.

Each year, the Advanced Employment Issues Symposium brings together HR executives and management, employment law attorneys, and in-house counsel for 2 days of discussion of employment law and regulatory compliance. The event addresses employer policy questions and human capital management best practices.

"The hot topics this year are knowing when and how to say no to a Family and Medical Leave Act leave request and how to avoid wage and hour disasters," Phillips said. "Obama plans to expand FMLA to both cover more employers and to allow more employee activities to be protected by it, like elder care and participating in their children's activities at school."

Wage and hour law, the umbrella term for laws and regulations covering overtime and payroll, is the source for more litigation than any other area of the employer-employee relationship, topping even discrimination and harassment claims. "With class-action wage and hour claims, things can get very expensive very quickly for employers," he said.

The Advanced Employment Issues Symposium is sponsored by M. Lee Smith Publishers LLC, since 1975 a leading source of state and federal employment law compliance information. The Nashville-based company produces newsletters, guidebooks and manuals, Internet databases, DVDs, audio conferences and live seminars. Customers, representing employers ranging from FORTUNE 100 corporations to small businesses, use these tools to avoid policies and situations that spark claims of discrimination, harassment, payroll misclassification and worse.

Advanced Employment Issues Symposium