Employer-employee relationship

Even where a duty not to disclose trade secrets arises by virtue of the employer-employee relationship, a trade secret agreement can have significant advantages. For instance, the contract can be used to help establish that the information disclosed is trade secret. The contract, within limits, can specify which state s law will govern construction of the agreement. The contract may expand the remedies that would otherwise be available. 

Your employees are one of greatest sources of creativity and innovative ideas in the area of safety, health, environmental, and related areas if their creativity can be tapped. A strategy to entice employees to express their creativity and ideas must be developed in conjunction with an overall plan that takes into consideration the nature of the employer-employee relationship. Employees are often skeptical about expressing their wild ideas or discussing blue-sky concepts with management because of potential repercussions regarding their jobs, or they may even fear that the boss will think I m dumb. An atmosphere should be created in which employees are encouraged to express their ideas, no matter how far-fetched. 

Acquire an understanding of the employer-employee relationship requirements for OSHA. 

Safety professionals often must identify the individual worker s employment status from the human resources department or other department, in order to identify the unique employer-employee relationship of individuals working in the woikplace. Safety professionals should consider the below listed basic questions, which can be utilized to assist in identifying the type of employment relationship that is present in most situations. Safety professionals should identify the following ... 

Safety professionals should also be aware that the employment status also has a direct bearing on the safety function as identified in the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 1970. In the OSH Act, the creation of an employer-employee relationship is essential in order for the employer to potentially be found liable for violations of the OSH Act by OSHA. The primary question that often arises is whether a company or organization can be found liable for alleged violations under the OSH Act when its own employees are exposed to a hazard created by another employer or when the employer responsible for creating the hazard does not affect any of its own employees. Safety professionals have often utilized the lack of an employer-employee relationship as one of the defenses against an issued violation. 

The Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission (OSHRC) initially addressed the employer-employee relationship shortly after the OSH Act was enacted in the case titled Gilles v. Cotting, Inc. In this case, two employees of the primary contractor were killed in an accident created by and resulting from the actions of a subcontractor. OSHA issued one citation to the primary contractor and one citation to the subcontractor. OSHA subsequently vacated the citation to the primary contractor, finding the citation was improper and would impose liability outside the employment relationship. Over the years, the OSHRC, as well as the various federal Circuit Courts of Appeal, has addressed this issue primarily in the construction area, with focus on creation of the hazard and control of the hazard. In recent decisions and with the inception of the multiemployer woiksite rule, the scope of the duty to safeguard employees at the worksite has been substantially expanded."... 

The problems addressed by agent theory are known in many areas, including employer-employee relationships, lawmakers-bureaucrat relationships, and corporate-subcontractor relationships. Different ways... 

This is the basis of the maxim volenti non fit injuria, which defined the employer-employee relationship. Not only did this approach assume that employers and employees shared the requisite knowledge to allow free contracting (Banks 2009 131), it also ignored the pressures to enter into work that resulted from the Poor Laws, which offered very little support to unwaged paupers. As a result, risk was a commodity to be priced and distributed between contracting parties rather than a social evil to be controlled. 

The intersection of the employer-employee relationship is the key point at which meaningful ehanges to our healthcare system can occur. Employers have an excellent opportunity to circumvent costly after-the-fact healthcare by instituting worksite health promotion and wellness programs that improve and sustain employees health. 

Misconduct in the place of work, or in certain circumstances outside it, is one of the major reasons for dismissal of an employee. It was defined by the Scottish EAT as Actings [sic] of such a nature, whether done in the course of employment or out of it, that reflect in some way on the employer-employee relationship. ... 

The law governing industrial relations is extremely complex and covers much more groxmd than it has been possible to cover in this chapter, but the most important of the statutory provisions have been covered briefly and some of the ways in which their application can affect the employer-employee relationship have been shown. 

It should be remembered, however, that since the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 (HSWA) came into effect all subordinate legislation, such as Regulations, made under it apply to all employer/employee relationships and though the title may not include construction this does not mean they do not apply to construction works. 

However, unlike the employment relationship, subcontractors are in a different, intermediate position. Paid work is very often a subordinate position, although being this position does not necessarily mean oppression and servitude. It can be a situation where work-related skills are made available to a third party or a contractor. The particular characteristic of subcontracting is that the company is no longer in a direct employer-employee relationship, but in an indirect relationship (Tinel et al. 2007). In practice, the commercial contract replaces the employment contract. The company continues to mobilise its productive effort remotely through subcontractors. 

---