An employment lawyer assists both employees and employers with respect to certain workplace issues or disputes in non-unionized workplaces. In contrast, labour lawyers offer advice to workers and employers in unionized workplaces. Some employment lawyers are also labour lawyers, but they do not have to be. Zeilikman Law, like some other law firms, offers legal services with respect to both non-unionized and unionized workplaces, and as such, are both employment and labour lawyers.

You may have heard of “employer side” or “management side” law firms versus “employee side” law firms in the employment law context. This means that some employment lawyers or law firms will only accept clients that are either employers or employees. For instance, if the lawyer is a “management side” lawyer, that lawyer only will offer legal services to employers. At Zeilikman Law, we represent both employer and employees alike and, as such, our firm, and firms like it are simply called employment lawyers or an “employment” law firm.

Let’s go into what exactly an employment lawyer does. We will first discuss what an employment lawyer will do for an employee. Generally speaking, an employment lawyer represents employees with certain issues surrounding their job. Most often, employment lawyers will assist employees when the employee has been terminated or dismissed from their job. They will assist employees with determining whether or not there was just cause for their dismissal, whether they are owed any termination or severance pay and how much, what notice they were owed or if there were any human rights issues that were in play. The employment lawyer may also assist the employee by reviewing any employment contracts that they have been asked to sign or were a part of. We have lots of information on our website which discusses other issues that employment lawyers will assist with including constructive dismissal, mitigation, discrimination and others. Take a look at our “for employees” page here.

Now for employers. Again, generally speaking, an employment lawyer represents employers with certain workplace issues. Most often, employment lawyers will assist employers when the employer wants to terminate or dismiss an employee from their job. Another very common set of circumstances, is when an employer is in receipt of a demand letter or other correspondence from another employment lawyer representing the employee and at this time would approach an employment lawyer to assist them in drafting a response which will go down the path of a probable negotiated settlement with or without litigation.

Employment lawyers can also assist employers with drafting and preparing their employment contracts or agreements with their employees. We also have lots of information on our website which discusses other issues that employment lawyers will assist with including human rights compliance, ministry of labour complaints, competing former employees and others. Take a look at our “for employers” page here.