If you’ve found yourself in a situation in which you believe that you need to retain the services of a San Jose labor law lawyer, you undoubtedly want “the best.” There are some considerations to bear in mind when you seek the best labor law attorney San Jose. In searching for the best labor law lawyer San Jose, there are six primary steps in a comprehensive process:
- Narrow the focus of your search for legal counsel
- Take advantage of State Bar of California resources
- Take advantage of Santa Clara Bar Association resources
- Obtain recommendations from family, friends, associates
- Review attorney websites
- Schedule an initial consultation
Before diving deeper into what strategies to employ to find the best labor law attorney San Joes, you need to have a general understanding of labor law itself and what types of cases tend to involve employee law claims.
Definition of Labor Law
Labor law or employment law is in fact a broad area that encompasses statutes, regulations, and court cases addressing issues arising out of an employer and employee relationship, according to the Legal Information Institute at Cornell Law School. Employment law or labor law involves thousands of statutes, regulations, and court decisions on the federal and California state level. These include laws and regulations designed to protect against discrimination, disparate treatment, harassment, injury, and other types of malfeasance.
Types of Cases Involving Labor Law Claims
There are in fact a spectrum of different types of employee-related cases that involve labor law claims of different types. When seeking the best labor law attorney San Jose, you want to consider the specific types of cases a lawyer previously handled. In the grand scheme of things, one of the qualifications to be considered among the best labor law lawyers is experience in successfully handling employee claims that include:
- Disability discrimination
- Gender discrimination
- Wrongful termination
- Workplace harassment
- Workplace sexual harassment
- Unemployment discrimination
- Workplace injury
Narrow the Focus
A crucial initial step in finding the best labor law attorney San Jose for your case is to narrow the scope of your focus. For example, you may have started the legal counsel exploration process by looking for a San Jose labor lawyer or a San Jose labor law attorney. While that certainly is a good place to begin, you definitely will want to narrow the scope or focus more on the specific issue you are facing. This is the reason some of the more commonplace employee claims was set forth a moment ago for your consideration and use. In seeking legal representation, you want to focus on attorneys that have demonstrable experience in one or another of the particular categories into which your specific situation falls:
- Workplace harassment lawyer
- Workplace injury attorney
- Disability discrimination lawyer
- Wrongful termination attorney
- And so forth
State Bar of California Resources
Once you’ve done least some work identifying what you truly are seeking in the way of a best labor law attorney San Jose, consider the attorney director resource that is offered by the State Bar of California. The State Bar maintains a consumer-friendly, searchable database of attorneys practice in the Golden State. The director classifies legal counsel into various practice areas, which makes the search process easier and more efficient.
In addition to classifying legal counsel by practice areas, the State Bar also provides a useful geographic breakdown as well. For example, you can find legal counsel in the “labor law attorney San Jose” search point. There is no charge associated with use of the State Bar of California attorney directory.
Santa Clara Bar Association Resources
The Santa Clara Bar Association maintains its own attorney directory. Like the one on the state level, the Santa Clara directory derivation permits a person seeking legal representation the ability to find lawyers by practice areas. In addition, there is something of a geographic element to the directory as well as you are able to find legal counsel in San Jose or in other communities in Santa Clara County.
The Santa Clara Bar Association attorney directory is available to the public at no charge. The directory is a public service of the local bar association and its membership.
Recommendations
Unfortunately, labor law or employment law disputes are surprisingly commonplace in San Jose, across California, and throughout the United States. Consequently, odds are strong that you have a family member, friend, or some other type of associate who has retained the services of an employment attorney at some time in the not-too-distant past.
Through the experiences with legal counsel among people in your life, you are apt to be able to obtain information about possible employment law lawyers in two broad categories: attorneys recommended for use and lawyers to be avoided. Both categories of information is highly useful when you find to identify the best labor lawyer San Jose.
You are likely to hear some people recommend that you use online review of attorneys. While online reviews might possibly provide some level of assistance in your search, you need to bear to points in mind:
- First, there tends to be disproportionate number of aggrieved individuals who post negative commentary about professionals online. Moreover, there are situations in which a view lacks fairness and has been posted more as an emotional response to something or another that occurred in a case. Of course, there are bona fide complaints at online review platforms pertaining to lawyers. However, online review must be taken with at least a grain of salt.
- Second, there are also situations in which professionals hire services that boost up positive commentary at review sites. It’s virtually impossible to identify when this occurs. However, this type of “paid-for” review scheme can also warp what otherwise might be a more accurate online review. Again, even positive commentary at a review site should be taken with a grain of salt.
Attorney Websites
Attorney websites can be helpful in the search for legal representation. Having said that, an attorney’s own website is naturally designed to attract new clients and affirm the decisions of existing clients to have retained a particular law office. Nonetheless, when you are in the process of seeking employment law representation, an attorney’s own website can provide you some insight into a legal practice.
You can ascertain such things as how many attorneys are associated with a practice, how long a firm has been in business, and how close is an attorney’s office to you. A website can provide you a preliminary idea of a specific law practice seems to be one that you would be comfortable having at your side in your case.
Initial Consultation
Finally, an initial consultation is invaluable to the process of finding the best San Jose labor law lawyer for your specific case. During an initial consultation, you not only obtain a preliminary evaluation of your case from legal counsel, but you get the opportunity to question a lawyer and find our more about his or her practice or firm.
In closing, as a matter of practice, a San Jose labor law attorney charges no fee for an initial consultation. There is no obligation for a person seeking legal representation to hire a particular lawyer because an initial consultation occurred in a labor law case.
