Employment and Labor Law: What to Watch for in 2011 and Beyond

Patricia A. Shiu serves as the Director of the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs at the U.S. Department of Labor. She leads a staff of nearly 800 men and women around the country who are dedicated to protecting workers, promoting diversity and enforcing the law. Director Shiu also serves on the National Equal Pay Enforcement Task Force which has been charged by President Barack Obama with cracking down on violations of equal pay laws and fulfilling, once and for all, the promise of the 1963 Equal Pay Act. She also represents Secretary of Labor Hilda L. Solis on the federal Interagency Working Group of the White House Initiative on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.

Prior to joining the Obama Administration, Ms. Shiu served as Vice President for Programs at the Legal Aid Society-Employment Law Center in San Francisco. Ms. Shiu joined the Employment Law Center in 1983 as a staff attorney and spent 26 years litigating both individual and class action cases focused primarily on employment discrimination, including gender, LGBT, national origin, immigrant, disability and race-based discrimination and harassment.

Ms. Shiu was also the Director of the Legal Aid Society’s Work and Family Project and advocated for the passage of California’s Family Rights Act, the Family and Medical Leave Act, and Paid Sick Leave. She has litigated numerous cases under these laws. Ms. Shiu has also litigated educational access class action cases under Title IX and disability laws.

Terence P. Smith is a partner and litigator in DLA Piper’s Labor and Employment practice, based in Chicago.

Mr. Smith litigates in state and federal courts, before government agencies (such as EEOC, NLRB, California DFEH and Illinois Department of Labor), and before arbitration panels and mediators. His practice includes wage and hour class actions, statutory and common law employment suits (jury and bench trials) and a variety of labor and employment hearings across the country.

Mr. Smith conducts multi-state wage and hour audits to determine whether jobs are (or should be) properly classified as exempt from overtime. He likewise provides a full range of traditional labor services, including campaign management in response to union organizing activity, secondary boycott litigation, contract negotiation, grievance arbitration and strike management. He also counsels employers and writes and speaks regularly on a variety of labor and employment subjects.