Writing Arbitration Clauses that Will Stick in the New Normal of 2023

This webinar will provide an in-depth look at arbitration as a litigation-prevention tool, delve into the challenges being marshalled against its effective use by employers, and suggest strategies and tactics for dealing with these challenges with an eye to keeping this valuable defensive weapon effective and efficient.

• What is arbitration?
• Varieties of arbitration proceedings
• Latest Supreme Court employment-arbitration decisions
• Impact of the 2022 Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act
• State-law assaults on employment arbitration
• Mass-arbitration filings
• Arbitration clauses with teeth
• Winning arbitration tactics

Arbitration clauses in employment contracts and collective bargaining agreements offer the best shield against class actions and collective actions by employees, former employees, plaintiff-side employment attorneys, and anti-discrimination agencies.  But new laws, such as 2022’s Ending Forced Arbitration of Sexual Assault and Sexual Harassment Act, have raised questions about the enforceability of arbitration provisos.  And aggressive plaintiff-side lawyers have found tactics to make arbitration more onerous for employers.  To keep arbitration as a valuable risk-management option, management-side attorneys and HR Compliance Professionals need to know both law and procedure.

• Legal counsel
• General counsel Associate general counsel
• Human resources director
• VP
• Compliance officer
• Chief compliance officer

Dr. Jim Castagnera holds an M.A. in Journalism from Kent State University and a J.D. and Ph.D. (American Studies) from Case Western Reserve University. He worked 10 years as a labor, employment, and intellectual-property attorney with Saul Ewing Arnstein & Lehr and 23 years as associate provost & legal counsel for academic affairs at Rider University, where in 2018 he received the university’s highest annual award for distinguished service. He also did stints as a full-time law professor at UT-Austin and Widener University Law School.

Having retired from Rider in 2019, he is engaged in a portfolio of activities: President of Dr. Jim’s One-Stop HR Shop, a full-service HR law and compliance company; Partner with Portum Group International LLC, a data-privacy & compliance-consulting firm; Of Counsel to the Wilftek law firm; an Adjunct Professor of Law in the Kline School of Law at Drexel University, and an arbitrator for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania.