Hunton Employment & Labor Perspectives

In Amnesty International of the USA, Inc., 368 NLRB No. 112 (2019), a number of paid staff of the nonprofit advocacy group joined a petition circulated by Amnesty’s unpaid interns, seeking compensation of their volunteer work.  In response to the petition, the director of the organization made statements that she was “disappointed” that the signers of the petitioners had not availed themselves of the organization’s open door policy to discuss the matter with her and the executive team before signing the petition, and that she did not think the petition was “appropriate” as it was “litigious” and “adversarial.”

Under the National Labor Relations Act (“Act”), employers usually may not discipline employees for engaging in certain collective or concerted activity, including comments regarding terms and conditions of employment, unless the employee’s behavior is so outrageous that it loses the protection of the Act.  But how far can employees push the boundary before their conduct will be found indefensible?