On February 21, 2023, the National Labor Relations Board (“NLRB” or the “Board”) decided in McLaren Macomb that an employer commits an unfair labor practice when it presents a non-supervisory employee with a proposed severance agreement containing broad confidentiality or non-disparagement provisions. Reversing two earlier decisions by the previous Republican-majority NLRB in 2020, a majority of the presently constituted Board opined that broad confidentiality and non-disparagement terms “have a reasonable tendency to interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise” of rights guaranteed under Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act (the “Act”), which include the right to engage in “concerted activity” for “mutual aid and protection.”
Confidentiality and non-disparagement provisions are commonplace in severance agreements. Employers have relied on these tools for years to condition payment of severance benefits on departing employees’ commitment not to malign their employers or disclose the terms of their severance packages. But it’s this chilling effect on speech with which the Board took issue in McLaren Macomb, finding that clauses like these interfere with employees’ ability to discuss terms and conditions of their employment, assist employees of their former employer, or communicate with their union representatives (if applicable). Indeed, the Board found broad nondisclosure and non-disparagement terms to so significantly impair employees’ ability...
COLLEGE STATION, Texas (KBTX) - An attorney representing a man arrested following a weekend altercation at a Northgate bar is disputing the allegations outlined in a police report, stating his cli...