Practice Areas & Industries: Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney PC

Practice/Industry Group Overview

The Labor and Employment Law Group of Buchanan Ingersoll & Rooney has a team of lawyers in offices in Pittsburgh, Harrisburg and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Newark and Princeton, New Jersey; New York City and Buffalo, New York; Washington, D.C.; and Miami and Aventura, Florida. The group provides legal services for employers on all issues that arise out of the employer-employee relationship, and with access to all of the firm's lawyers, it addresses workplace issues practically and effectively.

The group's broad geographic presence helps clients minimize the amount of time, effort and money they spend resolving employment-related problems, permitting them to concentrate on their primary business goals. Through counseling, careful planning and execution, confrontation often can be avoided completely. When unavoidable, however, the group's aggressive pursuit of focused litigation is an equally effective tool in helping clients achieve their human resource goals in accordance with the law.

Services Available

Our lawyers have a broad-based background in the resolution of employment-related problems. They represent management nationally for many of our clients. Our lawyers not only provide sound, aggressive legal advice, but also apply the practical insights they have gained through years of hands-on experience. Various members have served as in-house human resource managers and legal counsel, and have worked with state and federal government labor and employment law agencies. Six have served as federal judicial law clerks.

In daily practice, our lawyers represent a wide range of private and public sector employers, including banking, health care, high technology, hotel, manufacturing, retail, transportation, municipal, franchises, educational, nonprofit organizations, real estate developers and other service-related companies.

Employment Counseling and Litigation

Our lawyers counsel clients concerning compliance with federal, state and local statutes. We also work with clients in developing and revising employment policies, drafting and defending affirmative action plans, counseling on employee terminations or reductions-in-force, and, as appropriate, structuring alternative dispute resolution procedures. The group provides advice in connection with the sale, merger or acquisition of organizations.

While our philosophy is to practice preventative employment law, our lawyers aggressively defend clients' interests when claims are filed. We routinely represent clients in investigations and hearings before a variety of state and federal agencies. Our lawyers frequently litigate employment issues in state and federal courts, including jury trials, in a wide range of cases.

Employee Benefits

In conjunction with Buchanan's Tax Section, we provide counsel on and develop the spectrum of employee benefit plans, programs and arrangements. Examples include qualified pension, profit-sharing, 401(k), employee stock ownership, severance benefit, health and welfare, and cafeteria benefits. Our lawyers advise employers with organized work forces, including those that participate in multi-employer welfare and pension plans.

Labor-Management Relations

Our lawyers advise employers concerning unions that represent or seek to represent clients' employees. This work includes representing clients in collective bargaining, labor arbitrations, and union organizing campaigns. When clients and their unions are unable to resolve their disputes through negotiations, we constructively represent clients' interests in a number of forums, including state and federal courts, arbitration, and the National Labor Relations Board. Our lawyers also provide advice during labor disputes, including developing strike contingency plans and instituting countermeasures to union "corporate campaigns."

Noncompetition Agreements and Trade Secrets Litigation

We assist clients in protecting their confidential information and trade secrets, and in enforcing their non-competition, non-solicitation and other employment agreements. This representation includes internal audits, compliance programs and injunction litigation.

Workers' Compensation

Buchanan lawyers are experienced in handling workers' compensation, occupational disease, and state and federal black lung matters. A significant portion of our compensation practice is focused on rendering services to clients who participate in self-insurance programs. Since the relationship between compensation and labor and personnel matters are often quite complex, particularly where employees are covered by a collective bargaining agreement, cumulative experience with a single client enables our lawyers to render services in workers' compensation matters that are consistent with the clients' individual needs, without upsetting the delicate labor/management relationship.

Approach to Handling Labor and Employment Law Matters

Buchanan's approach to handling labor and employment law matters for any client is to designate the minimum number of shareholders and associates necessary to service that client's needs effectively. By doing so, the "team" becomes familiar with the client's business operation, key in-house personnel, and employee relations strategy. When new matters arise, there is usually no need for attorneys to face any learning curve and the client to bear the fees and costs associated with that process. At the same time, the lawyers who serve the client have the resources of other attorneys in the group when necessary for specific issues.

Achieving the Business Goal

When approaching any labor and employment law problem, we recognize that the solution must be framed primarily in the context of the client's business goals. We talk to our clients like business people and present solutions to their problems without overlawyering. We do not, for example, respond to a question requiring a "yes" or "no" answer with an opinion letter, unless the client specifically requests one.

Our objective is to give our clients answers to reach their business goals with the minimum amount of risk.

Preventing the 'Problem' from Turning into a Lawsuit

We believe that we serve employers and their managers best by increasing awareness about potential problems in the workplace. To do this, our lawyers regularly conduct seminars on legal and employee relations issues. The group also authors the monthly Pennsylvania Employment Law Letter to help keep human resources and legal professionals across Pennsylvania informed of significant developments in state and federal law. On a national level, the group has published its white paper series: "How To Hire Right, Fire Right: Managing Within The Law," and provides on-going training for clients through its seminars and briefings. We believe these activities permit managers to achieve their business goals within the law, thus avoiding costly litigation whenever possible.

Managing Litigation from a Business Perspective

With regard to litigation matters, we review each case with the client to assess realistically the strengths and weaknesses of the parties' respective positions and to determine the most cost-effective way to resolve the suit. When it is concluded that an early settlement is appropriate, we use whatever leverage is available to force a favorable settlement, including use of alternative dispute resolution procedures. When the decision is made to litigate, our goal is to resolve the litigation successfully and as efficiently as possible. We pride ourselves on being "trial lawyers" rather than "litigators." We proceed through the discovery process with a minimum of paperwork and wasted motion. The discovery that we do undertake is focused on factual and legal issues designed to nail down the plaintiff's case and, where possible, win before trial. This approach has enabled us to achieve victories through summary judgment as well as at trial.