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Substance (Alcohol and Drug) Addiction is treated in specialized drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs and affiliated mental health centers. No single drug treatment is appropriate for all individuals as treatment approaches and individual programs continue to evolve. Today there are hundreds of these facility types in existence to battle the blight of these addictions which affect all age groups and walks of society. Individuals with a drug addiction or drinking problem have a wealth of different options available to them for treatment. Various treatment facility type options represent viable target classes for commercial insurance program business in the non-profit area.

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In an issue of Corporate Counsel an article entitled It's a Systemic World Out There discusses the EEOC's pursuing large "systemic" cases. For example, in fiscal year 2011 they conducted 580 systemic investigations, filed 84 systemic lawsuits, and settled 35 systemic cases for total $9.6 million. Although your company might not be large enough to be on the EEOC's radar screen, I can tell you that attorneys are also suing small to midsized companies on a class basis. An employee walks into a lawyer's office because they didn't receive their final paycheck, and before you know it they're filing a class-action lawsuit against your company for missed overtime and meal periods. The article provided a few golden nuggets of advice: When responding to an EEOC inquiry, don't use the phrase "pursuant to our consistently applied policy." This only invites a broader request for information. Do not submit more information than is necessary. Conduct your own statistical analysis before submitting data. Do preventative analysis looking for adverse impacts in the hiring, promotion, or termination practices. Validate pre-employment tests. Conduct preventative compensation analysis periodically. Cover all internal analysis with attorney-client privilege. This might be impossible in smaller organizations, but you can certainly retain outside counsel to instruct you on how to conduct such analysis and report back to them. Listen to your employees. As I have always recommended, you should survey your employees, including use of the Employee Compliance Survey that can be found in HR That Works. Invigorate that underutilized internal complaint system. Again, go one step further and ask if there's a problem –don't wait for them to tell you there is one. Stay current with legal trends. This is one reason why HR That Works membership is so valuable. Walk the talk. Are you sensitive to the potential for your practices to cause adverse impacts? Frankly in my experience I can tell you that some business owners could care less about whether a practice causes an adverse impact. All they care about is getting the best employees they can, damn the EEOC. Of course, few companies appreciate a risk until they're hit with it. Finally, the article points out how large corporations can gather the data requested by the EEOC easily because they have such large HRIS systems. However, most companies with less than 500 employees don't have this data readily available, and t collecting it can be an over-burdensome process. This is one reason to make sure that you hire an attorney any time you receive a communication from the EEOC or another regulatory agency.

No matter how prepared you are – or believe you are – you can still suffer a cyber-security breach. What you do next can have a profound impact on the reputation of the business, customer loyalty, employee morale, and, ultimately, your bottom line. An effective communication strategy should follow these guidelines: Notify key regulatory and legal authorities as soon as possible, unless this might impede a criminal investigation. Even if notification isn’t required by law, it’s an important courtesy. Make sure that staff roles and responsibilities for communicating the breach are outlined and understood clearly. Tailor the notification process to the audience – high-value customers, senior employees, or individuals who might particularly vulnerable (such as the elderly, the disabled, and minors) and to the nature of the breach; handle the theft of confidential client information differently than stealing employees' Social Security numbers. Have legal counsel review the method and content of all communications. Prepare for media inquiries to deliver a clear message for parties affected directly or indirectly. Be sure that your spokesperson is qualified and trained to deal with the media. Provide ways for victims of the breach to ask additional questions and/or learn how to minimize potential harm. Test the plan: If you had to execute it, how well did it work, and how did you update it? Many businesses have discovered holes in their response plans after failing to consider the impact of a cyber security breach on daily operations, or underestimating the attention the event drew. To learn more about spreading the word after a data breach, please get in touch with us.

...y face, whether it is hurricane, liability allegations arising out of the fail...

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...derwriting Nonprofits and Social Services, NIF has designed the most comprehen...rking with nonprofits and/or Social Services programs have many risk and from ...

...derwriting Nonprofits and Social Services, NIF has designed the most comprehen...rking with nonprofits and/or Social Services programs have many risk and from ...