Managing Within the Law Training: Reduce Legal Risk and Build Better Managers

Managing Within the Law Training

Employment law training for managers and executives

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“Managing Within the Law Training is still making its impact on management 18 months later.

I was stopped by a manager a few days ago, who wanted to let me know that he had been dealing with a situation and was able to correct the behavior and performance issue successfully due to specific skills and examples he acquired in your program.”
H.R. Manager | Hitachi Data Systems

“On target, engaging, and educational. Absolutely wonderful. Thank you!
Manager | Oracle

Description
Employment law is constantly evolving, making it increasingly challenging for managers to make sound people decisions while minimizing organizational risk. This research-based Managing Within the Law Training equips leaders with the practical knowledge, legal awareness, and management skills they need to confidently navigate today’s workplace.

Rather than focusing solely on legal compliance, this highly interactive program emphasizes the spirit of the law by helping managers develop an ethical decision-making framework that promotes fairness, consistency, accountability, and respect.

Participants gain practical guidance on the employment laws most likely to affect everyday management decisions, including:

  • Wrongful termination
  • Discrimination
  • Harassment
  • Retaliation
  • Defamation
  • Whistleblower protections
  • Documentation best practices
  • The Sarbanes-Oxley Act and other critical legal requirements

The curriculum is updated annually to reflect changes in federal and state employment laws, including state-specific harassment prevention requirements. Each workshop can also be customized to incorporate your organization’s policies, procedures, values, and real-world management challenges.

All programs are led by experienced employment attorneys who combine extensive courtroom expertise with exceptional facilitation skills. Through engaging stories, practical examples, and appropriate humor, they make complex legal concepts accessible, memorable, and immediately applicable.

Learning is reinforced through:

  • Small-group discussions
  • Real-world case studies
  • Video scenarios
  • Skill-building exercises
  • Guided practice and feedback
  • Interactive Q&A sessions
  • Comprehensive participant workbooks and reference materials

Managers leave with practical tools they can use immediately to make better decisions, improve employee performance, reduce legal exposure, and foster a respectful workplace.

Target Audience
This program is designed for:

  • Executives
  • Directors
  • Managers
  • Supervisors
  • Team leaders
  • New people leaders.

Delivery Options
Available in Full-day workshops, Half-day workshops, Live virtual instructor-led training.

Executive overview and consulting sessions are also available.

Managing Within the Law Training Workshop Outline

I. How Company Values Guide Management Decisions

  • Aligning leadership behaviors with organizational values
  • Applying ethical decision-making in difficult situations

II. The Four Foundations of Employment Law

  • Making consistent management decisions
  • Establishing legitimate business reasons for employment actions
  • Documenting performance, conduct, and disciplinary issues effectively
  • Knowing when to involve HR, leadership, or legal counsel

III. Managing Employee Performance Legally and Effectively

  • Setting clear expectations and accountability
  • Coaching for improved performance
  • Conducting fair performance evaluations
  • Using progressive discipline appropriately
  • Understanding the legal implications of policies, employee handbooks, and verbal commitments
  • Protecting employee whistleblower rights

IV. Preventing Discrimination

  • Understanding protected characteristics
  • Avoiding stereotypes and unconscious bias
  • Conducting legally compliant behavioral interviews
  • Recognizing illegal interview questions
  • Managing reasonable accommodations
  • Following best practices for employment references

V. Creating a Respectful Workplace

  • Preventing harassment, discrimination, retaliation, bullying, and abusive conduct
  • Understanding why disrespect is often unintentional
  • Recognizing unconscious bias and workplace microaggressions
  • Responding appropriately as a bystander
  • Meeting a manager’s legal responsibility to prevent and address misconduct
  • Applying the Platinum Rule to build an inclusive, respectful culture

VI. Managing Leave, Disability, and Workplace Accommodations

  • Responding appropriately to workplace injuries
  • Understanding workers’ compensation requirements
  • Navigating Family and Medical Leave and Pregnancy Disability Leave
  • Following organizational leave-of-absence policies
  • Meeting obligations under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)

Ready to Customize Managing Within the Law Training?
Whether your goal is to reduce legal risk, strengthen management capability, improve documentation, or create a more respectful workplace, this program can be customized to your organization’s industry, policies, legal requirements, and leadership challenges.

Contact an LSA expert today to discuss how Managing Within the Law Training can be customized and delivered onsite or virtually for your managers and leaders.

Related Information

We turned to LSA to customize and deliver a leadership solution to meet our unique needs.

LSA delivered the exact top quality solution that we wanted. I’d recommend LSA Global to any company looking for a best-in-class management training and consulting partner that always focuses on what matters most to your people AND your business.

Kortney Riddle
HR Manager

Here’s a token of my appreciation for ALL your efforts. I’m offering my most sincere thanks, and it extends to all the folks who made our customized management development programs such a great success.

Susan Anderson
Workforce Planning Bureau

I continue to be impressed by the depth and breadth of LSA’s expertise in leadership development, and management development.

What a smart and client-centric group of great people who really know how to help leaders attract, engage, develop and retain top talent in a practical and results-driven manner.

Thank you LSA!

Tracy Esposito
Director, HR Business Partner

We have been able to utilize LSA’s extensive expertise to leverage our investment in employee development.

The result has been the cost effective and highly effective delivery of high quality management training programs.

Thank you!

Steve Feller
Vice President, Human Resources

What a refreshing change from the half-baked psycho-babble you normally get from training and consulting organizations. LSA gives you the practical and results-oriented assistance you need to define and reach your goals.

Their leadership, management, and sales expertise has been invaluable.  They think strategically and provide a results driven plan – not just a temporary fix.

They are great to work with, and even more importantly, they “get it!”

David Fiano
Director of Merchandising

LSA helped to meet the needs of my teams within a very narrow timeframe.

My team walked away with highly useful management development tools and practices.

Thank you for designing and delivering the right solution for our specific needs.

Sandeep Kumar
Director, Software Engineering, EPG

The customized Managing Virtual Teams program was extremely valuable for our managers and leaders.

LSA’s fundamental knowledge of our company provided an incredible base to build upon while tackling the complications of managing and working with globally distributed teams.

Our teams walked away walked away with highly useful insights, practices, and tools. It was excellent.

Debra Martucci
Vice President, Information Technology

I am very impressed with the quality of work and talent. LSA did a great job of listening to my needs and providing the exact management training program expertise we needed to get the job done.

Don Pryor
Director, Business Planning & Analysis

LSA has become the gold standard for team building and management training programs at Genomic Health!

I have not found companies that come close to their level of customization, impact, expertise, and experience.

Emily Couey
Director of Human Resources

For our go to training outsourcing partner, LSA provides exactly what we want and need – which is not an easy task.

As always, they design and deliver outstanding leadership development results and high quality management training programs that totally align with our unique business and talent strategies!

Elizabeth Siebert
Director, Organizational Excellence & Development

Intuit

We contacted LSA to help us design and deliver customized management development programs. LSA worked with us to meet our exact needs. We started at the top with our executive team.  It was such a great success that we rolled it out company-wide. We look forward to a long-term partnership with LSA Global and their team of experts.

Barry L. Byrd, SPHR
Human Resources Manager

I continue to be impressed by the level of leadership development training and management expertise and quality of advice and facilitation that LSA has to offer.

What a smart and client-centric group of great people who really know how to help assess and develop high performing leaders.

Tracy Esposito
Director

zynga LSA Global gaming client

LSA helped change our entire culture around meetings, making them more effective and efficient, thus enabling our leaders, managers, and teams to concentrate on driving more business.

Thank you!

Terry Wassman
VP of Human Resources

LSA’s customized Effective Presentation Skills program has helped us elevate our presentation skills to the next level. I personally now have a much greater self-awareness of my presentation skills and can leverage my strengths while working to improve upon other areas.

I definitely recommend LSA Global to anyone for whom presentations are an integral part of their job.

Jim Elliott
Senior Marketing Manager

Samsung

LSA helped us with leadership development by designing a solution to match our unique needs and culture.

It was a huge success. I would highly recommend LSA to help take leaders and managers to the next level.

Karen King, SPHR
Manager, Human Resources

Alliance Data

FAQs

Managing within the law training helps managers make legally sound employment decisions while creating a fair, respectful, and high-performing workplace. Participants learn how to reduce legal risk related to hiring, performance management, discrimination, harassment, retaliation, wrongful termination, accommodations, and documentation. The training also equips leaders to confidently handle difficult employee situations before they become costly legal issues.

The program covers the employment laws and management practices that leaders use most often, including wrongful termination, workplace harassment, discrimination, retaliation, documentation, performance management, whistleblower protections, interviewing, reasonable accommodations, leave management, workplace investigations, and respectful leadership. The curriculum is regularly updated to reflect changing legal requirements and organizational best practices.

Managing within the law training is designed for new and experienced managers, supervisors, executives, team leaders, and anyone responsible for hiring, coaching, evaluating, disciplining, or terminating employees. HR professionals also benefit from attending alongside leaders to reinforce consistent decision making and organizational policies.

Yes. The training is customized to your organization's policies, culture, business challenges, and applicable federal, state, and local employment laws. Experienced attorney-facilitators incorporate your real-world scenarios, policies, and procedures to ensure the learning is practical, relevant, and immediately applicable. Programs are available in full-day, half-day, and virtual formats.

Managers often create legal exposure through inconsistent decisions, poor documentation, ineffective performance management, or a lack of understanding of employment law. Managing within the law training provides practical tools, ethical decision-making frameworks, and legally defensible management practices that help organizations reduce lawsuits, strengthen workplace culture, improve consistency, and build greater employee trust.

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