Is a former employee stealing your data so that he can start competing with you? Can he get around his obligations by borrowing a password, or by having his partners in crime do it? You may have a friend in the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. Billy Hammel of our Dallas Office and Susan Bassford Wilson of our St. Louis Office have a good breakdown of the recent decision in United States ...

Well, maybe not light reading, but good reading about good news that you won't want to miss! Here are our bulletins and other publications from the last week, in case you missed them:

*Heather Owen is already shooting off Fourth of July fireworks at the FOCUS women's leadership blog because our firm was named this week by the National Law Journal as the fourth best law firm in the ...

I was on vacation last week, and so we have a lot of catching up to do. Here's what's been going on, from most to least recent:

*David Phippen has been keeping us up to date on the U.S. Department of Labor's Persuader Rule and what that will mean for employers. On Wednesday, a federal judge in Minnesota refused to preliminarily block enforcement of the rule. There are two other challenges ...

Administrative partner Teresa Ryder Bult has a guest post this week: "Inverting Views on Networking: How Can You Influence Someone's Life Today?"

Hint: Don't make it all about you.

(Teresa is the original founding chair of Constangy's Women's Network.)

One more thing: The FOCUS blog was having technical difficulties with email notifications to subscribers. The problem ...

Heather Owen of our Jacksonville Office and FOCUS blog editor, has a nice meditation on Mother's Day and what it means for professional women.

You won't want to miss "The 'Mores' of Professional Moms."

Taren Greenidge of our New York City Office has a new post, "Some Advice From Behind the Desk of Successful Constangy Women."

Subscription is free, so if you haven't signed up, please do so!

Federal protection for trade secrets, "suitable seating," inadvertent labor trafficking, Uber's status as an employer -- whew!

Be sure to check these out if you haven't already:

*Billy Hammel of our Austin Office and Bill McMahon of our Winston-Salem Office (and my next-door neighbor), with Anna Rothschild of our Washington D.C. Metro Office, are digging into the federal Defend ...

Today marks the launch of FOCUS, our firm's new blog for women leaders in the workplace (and their friends and supporters). The inaugural edition features posts by Sarah Phaff of our Macon Office on Women's History Month, and Heidi Wilbur of our Denver Office on Overcoming Stereotype Threats (and Butterflies).

In addition to Sarah and Heidi, other editors and regular contributors ...

NOTE: On January 15, this post was updated and one correction made (see "Nipped in the bud" and "Jury clobbers Catholic diocese," below). 

Happy New Year, everyone! While I've been out for the holidays, the courts and government agencies have stayed busy with employment law matters. Here are the developments that I thought were especially noteworthy:

WAGE AND HOUR

Twenty states raised ...