As everyone knows, Tiger Woods’ automobile accident has blossomed into a mixture of tabloid frenzy and honest journalistic reporting. That’s what happens when sports, celebrity and sex are jumbled up in the same story. Are there any employment lessons to be learned from this incident?

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A couple of days ago, I did a post about a non-traditional way of promoting workplace safety. The New York Times reports on the more traditional way: blowing the whistle on unsafe working conditions. Stories like this one always raise the question of whether whistle-blowing is for the noble or the foolish.

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Execupundit provides this week’s tip with a conversation about substance vs. perception.

As noted in last year’s post on Thanksgiving, it was not recognized as an official day of thanksgiving and remembrance until Abraham Lincoln proclaimed it so in 1863. The need for our country to set aside a time for thanksgiving had, however, been recognized in two proclamations issued by George Washington, one in 1789 and the other in 1795.

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Employees are increasingly concerned about losing their privacy because of the Internet. All the while, they’re losing more of it every day. A Canadian employee has allegedly lost her insurance benefits because of pictures she posted on Facebook. (Click here and here.)

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Thanksgiving being upon us, many blogs have posts on the subject, the day, the meaning, etc. Some of the blogs I regularly check out have Thanksgiving posts that you should check out.

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Many employers have their own security departments. The Wall Street Journal reports that whether an employer has a security department or not, it’s time for all employees to take responsibility for providing security for the employer and each other. Stickups and burglaries are increasing at all kinds of businesses.

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Not long ago, labor and employment lawyers representing employers felt comfortable advising clients that the law was weighted in an employer’s favor when it comes to the subject of monitoring an employee’s email at work. An employer should have a written policy advising employees that monitoring will occur, thus eliminating employees’ expectation of privacy. The Wall Street Journal says it’s not quite that simple any more.

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A post on Cultural Offering about six honest serving men and another on Execupundit on talking about values seemed to go together. Click on each one and get ready to think.

Hardly anything is more controversial than health care reform. President Obama’s desire for a bill before year’s end is unlikely. Lobbyists are spinning reform so fast and hard that nausea is difficult to avoid. Some arguments are preposterous. Some reasonable.

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An executive recently told me that his company had almost gone belly-up this year. It laid off 70% of its employees and barely survived. Things are looking up now, he said.

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A lot of employers have international operations and are located in several countries. American employees being the creative folks they are, particularly when it comes to the Internet, let’s say they set up a website in the U.S. to identify the best-looking and worst-looking employees based on country of residence.

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The U.S. Department Labor has issued at least seven separate pieces of guidance on dealing with H1N1 or Swine Flu in the workplace. To get them, click here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.

The day after Fort Hood, a former employee, armed with a gun, went back to his workplace in Orlando and killed one employee, wounding five others. The shooter was Jason Rodriguez, an engineer. The former employer was Reynolds, Smith & Hill, an architectural design firm. (Click here, here, here and here for more.)

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The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan make our remembrance of Veterans Day important. We have young men and women risking, sometimes giving, their lives in service to our country.

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Harassment on the basis of religion is against the law. So is religious discrimination. Major Nidal Malik Hasan, the shooter at Fort Hood, had complained about religious harassment, and the Army seems to have been intent on avoiding religious discrimination. (Read other posts on the shooting at Ft. Hood.)

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Major Nikal Hasan, the shooter at Fort Hood, was harassed because of his Muslim faith. Everything from taunts to giving him a diaper to wear around his head to drawing a camel on his car with “Camel jockey, get out” written underneath to keying his car. (Read other posts on the shooting at Ft. Hood.)

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What happened at Fort Hood is every employer’s worst nightmare. (Read other posts on the shooting at Ft. Hood.) Employers conduct training on workplace violence, including training on how to spot an employee capable of workplace violence. The situation involving Major Nidal Malik Hasan demonstrates the difficulty of putting the training into action.

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The gunman at Fort Hood was Major Nidal Malik Hasan. The Army had put him through college and then medical school, where he trained to be a psychiatrist. Before being moved to Fort Hood, he had worked at Walter Reed Army Medical Center for several years. (Read other posts on the shooting at Ft. Hood.)

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The Fort Hood military base is the largest employer in Texas. Until recently, it was thought to be one of the safest. It’s now another workplace of terrible violence. (Read other posts on the shooting at Ft. Hood.)

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