Practice Areas / Litigation & Arbitration / Employment and Labour Disputes
Employment & Labour Disputes
Strategic legal representation for complex workplace and employment disputes. We help employers and senior professionals navigate sensitive matters while protecting legal, commercial, and reputational interests.
Resolving Workplace Disputes with Clarity.
We represent employees and employers in industrial disputes, labour court proceedings and employment-related litigation, including disputes involving employees falling within the workman and non-workman categories. Our practice covers disputes arising across the employment lifecycle, including disciplinary action, termination, retrenchment, workforce restructuring and negotiated exits. This work is closely integrated with our employment advisory and HR practice, enabling us to advise on the litigation consequences of employment policies, restructuring decisions and employee exits, as well as defend those decisions when challenged.
What We Handle
Industrial disputes and labour proceedings: Represent employers in industrial disputes, labour court proceedings and proceedings before labour and other employment-related authorities, including disputes concerning termination, retrenchment, disciplinary action, wages and service conditions.
Workman and non-workman disputes: Advise and represent employers in disputes involving workman and non-workman employees, including issues concerning employee classification and the legal and procedural consequences of such classification.
Termination, retrenchment and restructuring disputes: Advise on and defend claims arising from termination, retrenchment, workforce restructuring and redundancy, including challenges to the legality and procedural validity of employer action and claims for reinstatement, compensation and other relief.
Disciplinary and misconduct proceedings: Advise employers on disciplinary processes and domestic inquiries, including allegations of misconduct, evidentiary considerations, procedural fairness and subsequent litigation.
Senior management and executive exits: Advise on sensitive exits involving senior management and C-suite personnel, including negotiations concerning severance, bonus and incentive entitlements, ESOPs and stock options, threatened claims and negotiated releases.
Post-employment obligations and protections: Advise on confidentiality, intellectual property, non-solicitation and other post-employment obligations, including protection of business information and management of disputes concerning their enforceability and alleged breach.
Representative Experience
Senior management and C-suite exit and settlement. Advised an employer on the collective exit of senior management and C-suite personnel, involving complex negotiations around separation terms and potential litigation. The engagement involved assessment and resolution of claims relating to ESOPs and stock options, bonus and incentive entitlements, contractual dues and other separation benefits, together with issues concerning confidentiality, intellectual property, non-solicitation and other post-employment obligations. Advised on threatened claims and the employer’s potential exposure and negotiated a comprehensive settlement and release of claims, while protecting the client’s business, confidential information and intellectual property and managing the legal and commercial sensitivities associated with multiple senior-level exits.
Large-scale ITES retrenchment dispute. Represented an ITES employer in proceedings arising from the retrenchment of approximately 400 employees across both workman and non-workman categories. The principal issue concerned the legality of the retrenchment and the applicability of different statutory and contractual protections to the affected employee categories. Advised on the legal basis and procedural framework for the restructuring, assessment of employee classification, compliance with applicable retrenchment requirements and the employer’s strategy for defending challenges to the workforce reduction. Represented the employer in the resulting proceedings and successfully defended the legality of the retrenchment, protecting the client’s restructuring decision from challenge.