Britt-Marie Cole-Johnson focuses her practice on counseling private sector employers, ranging from startups to the Fortune 500, multi-national corporations, nonprofit health care organizations, and educational institutions to manufacturers, in all areas of employment law. She handles sensitive, high-risk personnel issues and investigations as well as compliance and training. Britt-Marie is a member of our firm's Labor, Employment, Benefits, Immigration + Tax group as well as the Managing Committee.
Board Advisory Services
In today’s marketplace, boards are faced with constant change and a complex governance landscape. Between the rise in public scrutiny, an increased focus on risk management, and the significant role that directors have in the talent management strategy, organizations are expected to have insightful, forward-thinking, and effective boards. As a former board chair of a multi-million dollar organization and a counselor to the boards of significantly larger organizations, Britt-Marie is well-versed in the key collective and individual responsibilities of directors and the critical need for boards to seek governance, risk, and strategy guidance. When there is an employment-related or board member-related opportunity, challenge, or crisis (or some combination thereof), she is called upon to provide sound, strategic counsel. She regularly counsels board chairs, chief executive officers and other C-Suite executives, and nominating, governance, and audit committees, on a variety of matters, including C-Suite and director transitions, the executive search and selection process, workplace investigations, and board and committee training.
Employment Counseling, Compliance, + Training
Britt-Marie counsels companies and human resource professionals in all areas of employment law, including discharge and discrimination issues, workplace investigations, personnel policies and handbooks, affirmative action compliance, employee discipline, wage and hour issues, disability and reasonable accommodation, family and medical leave, unemployment, employment and independent contractor agreements, severance and separation agreements, individual terminations and reductions in force, and workplace health and safety issues.
Workplace Investigations
Britt-Marie is a trained workplace investigator and regularly conducts, manages, and provides advice regarding workplace investigations involving all types of employment-related issues, particularly those requiring Board of Director and senior management involvement and high-profile matters. She serves as a faculty member for the Association of Workplace Investigators and frequently gives presentations on workplace investigations for Society of Human Resource Management chapters, the Association of Workplace Investigators, and other professional groups, as well as firm clients.
Employment Litigation + Administrative Advocacy
Britt-Marie represents employers in claims of discrimination, wrongful termination, workers' compensation retaliation, and other employment disputes and litigation, including affirmative action compliance evaluations involving the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs. She also represents employers in related federal and state administrative proceedings, including discrimination claims before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and the Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities, workers' compensation retaliation claims before the State of Connecticut Workers' Compensation Commission, and retaliation claims before the U.S. Department of Labor's Occupational Safety & Health Administration.
Prior to law school, Britt-Marie taught in the Atlanta Public School System as a Teach for America corps member. She interned with Judge M. Yvette Miller at the Georgia Court of Appeals and participated in Emory University School of Law's Barton Child Law and Policy Clinic.
