Promoting and enhancing the quality of impartial workplace investigations.™
Representatives from four workplace investigation firms discuss lessons learned from operating in the current COVID-19 environment. Attendees will learn about how investigation firms have weathered the current environment including how their investigators have adapted to stay at home orders. The impact of the pandemic on work and revenue will be explored. Suggestions will be provided for useful activities to be conducted during the downturn – such as using the time for training and marketing. Predictions as to how investigations will be changed will help prepare attendees for the post-COVID-19 environment.
Disclaimer: The contents of this webinar and the positions taken are those of the presenter only, may be time-sensitive, and are not warranted, endorsed, or otherwise recommended by AWI and are not intended to provide legal advice.
| AWI June 23, 2020 Webinar Handout (239.4 KB) | Available after Purchase | ||
Deborah Maddux is a Senior Partner with Van Dermyden Makus Law Corporation, a California law firm specializing in workplace investigations. Deborah has personally conducted hundreds of investigations into claims of misconduct, including claims of harassment, discrimination, retaliation, and improper governmental activities, as well as investigations involving the Public Safety Officers Procedural Bill of Rights Act, the Firefighters Procedural Bill of Rights, and Internal Affairs reviews. Many of these investigations have involved elected officials and other high-profile individuals.
Deborah has provided both in-house and private training regarding how to conduct effective investigations, with a focus on ensuring that internal reviews are fair and thorough, as required by law.
Prior to forming her law firm, Deborah served as Counsel to the University of California, Davis. In this role, she conducted, oversaw and managed many investigations, and collaborated with management regarding the appropriate follow-up to investigative findings and conclusions. Deborah began her legal career in 1993 as a litigator with a Sacramento-based law firm where she managed cases in both state and federal court. She also served as counsel to the California Fair Political Practices Commission where she litigated political reform and oversight issues at both the trial and appellate level.
Michael A. Robbins is President of EXTTI Incorporated—a company he founded 23 years ago. The professionals at EXTTI provide Expert Testimony, Training and Investigation services in employment matters. Michael has conducted and/or supervised well over 600 workplace investigations. He has served as an expert witness in over 650 employment cases—primarily on workplace investigation issues. Also, he has served as a Consent Decree Monitor in Federal District Courts. Prior to forming EXTTI, he was a labor & employment attorney for 20 years, including four years as in-house counsel and 16 years in two nationally recognized law firms. Mr. Robbins graduated Phi Beta Kappa from San Diego State University where he was Valedictorian—first in a graduating class of over 5,000 students. He received his JD degree from UCLA School of Law where he was selected for the Moot Court Honor Program. He is a Past President of the Association of Workplace Investigators (AWI), a Past Chair of the Los Angeles County Bar Association’s Labor & Employment Section and a current member of the California Lawyers Association Labor & Employment Executive Committee. In 2013, he was elected a Fellow of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers.
Keith Rohman, AWI-CH, is a recognized expert in civil and criminal workplace and Title IX investigations. Since founding Public Interest Investigations in 1984, Rohman has investigated hundreds of high-profile cases involving board members, staff, contractors, and other stakeholders facing allegations such as embezzlement, conflicts of interest, wage and hour issues, discrimination, wrongful termination, and other serious misconduct at public agencies and private sector employers. Rohman has also conducted investigations relating to the torture of prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, and served as the federal monitor of a consent decree at the Orange County Prisons.
Rohman provides training on the various aspects of conducting workplace and Title IX investigations, including recent training to the California POST investigators. Rohman is a past president and active member of the Association of Workplace Investigators (AWI), an international association that promotes and enhances the quality of impartial workplace investigations for its 2,100+ members, and has been an Adjunct Professor of Law at Loyola Law School for over 20 years teaching fact investigation.