remote work

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We are clearly (and thankfully) well past the pandemic, and yet demands for flexible and remote work press on. While the overall global trend of transforming the traditional 9-to-5 work model is consistent, laws governing flexible work arrangements can vary significantly by jurisdiction.

We monitor this space closely (see our previous update here) and advise multinational companies on a multitude of issues bearing on remote, hybrid and flexible arrangements, including health & safety rules, working time regulations, tax and employment benefit issues, cybersecurity and data privacy protections, workforce productivity monitoring and more.

Key recent updates around the globe (organized by region) include:

Asia Pacific

  • Australia: Right to disconnect – Working 9 to [to be determined…]?
    In August 2024, a Full Bench of the Fair Work Commission finalized the new “right to disconnect” model term, which will soon be inserted into all modern awards. Whilst we wait for the Fair Work Commission to issue its guidance on the new workplace right, here’s what you should know, and what we think you should do to prepare for the introduction of the right to disconnect

Continue Reading HR Trend Watch: Maintaining compliance while unlocking the talent rewards of flexible work arrangements

Special thanks to co-presenters Maria Cecilia Reyes, Victor Estanislao Marina and Katherine Ninanya.

Many employers have made getting their arms around their remote work populations a new year’s resolution for 2024. Simultaneously, a growing number of jurisdictions are offering Digital Nomad Visas to attract foreign nationals — and some countries are actually shifting…

What Canadian Employers Need to Know to Ring in 2024

In 2023, we helped Canadian employers overcome a host of new challenges across the employment law landscape. Many companies started the year with difficult cost-cutting decisions and hybrid work challenges. We’ve worked hard to keep our clients ahead of the curve on these issues, as well…

With special thanks to co-presenters Daniel Urdiain, Pamela Mafuz and Ludmilla Maurer.

In our latest Global Immigration and Mobility Video chat, our on-the-ground immigration and mobility attorneys in the US, Mexico, Spain and Germany explore digital nomad visas by providing a brief overview of the requirements, process, tax and social security consequences, what…

In our latest Global Immigration and Mobility video chat, Melissa Allchin provides a year-end review of essential immigration and mobility updates for employers. Melissa highlights equal pay transparency laws and the impact on an employer’s obligations under existing immigration law, COVID-related travel considerations, immigration compliance considerations employers should keep top-of-mind with respect to remote or…

Special thanks to Tony Haque and Hanna Jung.

In our latest Global Immigration and Mobility Video chat, our attorneys discuss the challenges of employee travel during the upcoming holiday season, with a focus on the United Kingdom, Australia, and the wider Asia Pacific region. The 15-minute video covers immigration complications from the state of…

Across the world, trade secrets are becoming increasingly important. As companies align workforce transformation, manage supply chain operations and balance the needs of their digital transformation journey, new strategies are required for the identification, protection and enforcement of their most valuable, complex and market-differentiating trade secrets.

In this series of bite-sized videos, hear from Baker…

Join us for a four-part webinar series as our US moderators welcome colleagues from around the globe to share the latest labor and employment law updates and trends. US-based multinational employers with business operations in Europe, the Americas, the Middle East and Africa, and Asia Pacific regions will hear directly from local…

The writing is on the wall: remote work is here to stay. According to data collected by Ladders, three million professional jobs in the US went permanently remote in the fourth quarter 2021 alone. By the end of 2021, 18 percent of all professional jobs in the US were remote. Ladders projects that number will be close to 25 percent by the end of 2022. Of course, this leaves employment lawyers and HR professionals wondering — what employment laws apply to our distributed workforce?

One particularly thorny issue facing employers in this context is the permissibility of post-termination non-competition agreements. Non-compete laws and their requirements differ greatly from state to state. For example, in Illinois, one of the requirements is that the employee must earn at least $75,000 annually in order to enter into an enforceable post-termination non-compete, but in Oregon, that minimum annual income threshold increases to $100,533 — and that same employee would be subject to no income threshold if Missouri law applied. On the other hand, in Colorado, where post-termination non-competes are generally unlawful, the employer could soon face misdemeanor criminal liability for seeking to enforce an unlawful post-termination non-compete against any employee, and in California, the employer could be exposed to compensatory and punitive damages if a claim is accompanied by other deemed tortious conduct (e.g., interference with the employee’s future employment prospects by seeking to enforce the unlawful agreement).

In this post, we analyze how remote work further muddles the already complicated landscape of post-termination non-competes and how employers can best navigate this complex backdrop.

What law applies? Guidance from recent case law

One issue arising out of remote work is knowing what state’s law will apply when it comes to the enforceability of non-compete restrictions. With remote work, long gone are the days where an employer can be relatively certain that the state where an employee is located at the beginning of the employment relationship will be the same state that employee is living and working in at the end of the employment relationship. As a result, when the need to enforce non-compete restrictions arises, the parties may dispute what state’s law should apply to the non-compete (e.g., the state where the employee was located when they entered into the contract, the state where the employee began work for the employer, or the state whether the employee was living or working at the end of the employment relationship).Continue Reading Navigating The Intersection Of Remote Work And State-Specific Post-Termination Non-Compete Laws