Interactive tool · AI
The AI Use Intake
Answer ten questions about one AI use. Get a risk tier, laws that may apply, and a dated intake record to print. Your answers stay in your browser.
Legal checklists and resources
Checklists, decision trees, and guides for in-house counsel and HR teams. Find tools for employment decisions, commercial disputes, and AI use. Most are short and printable. Use and share them under the license below.
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AI & emerging risk
Review AI tools, hiring decisions, vendor contracts, governance, and litigation use. Set rules for data, verification, and oversight before deployment.
Quick reference · AI & risk
What AI Is Actually Good At — and What It Isn’t
Assess whether an AI tool fits the task. Compare uses, verification costs, and risks, then work through the questions to ask a vendor.
Framework · AI & risk
AI in Hiring: An Employment-Law Risk Review
Review AI hiring tools for discrimination risk. Covers adverse-impact testing, ADA accommodations, vendor diligence, and audit and notice requirements.
Checklist · AI & risk
Employee Monitoring and AI Surveillance
Review AI employee monitoring before deployment: productivity scores, communications, video, and badge data. Covers notice, biometrics, labor rights, disability, and discrimination.
Checklist · AI & risk
A Workplace Generative-AI Use Policy: A Build Checklist
Draft an employee AI policy with approved tools, data rules, ownership terms, human verification, prohibited uses, disclosure, security, and enforcement.
Framework · AI & risk
AI Governance: Inventory, Risk-Tiering, and Oversight
Build an AI governance program: inventory tools, assess each use, assign owners, set controls, monitor results, and track legal changes.
Framework · AI & risk
AI Governance and AI Security: Why You Need Both
Connect AI governance and security in one deployment review. Define the use, test controls, record legal requirements, and assign an owner to each decision.
Checklist · AI & risk
Buying an AI Tool: A Vendor Contract Risk Checklist
Review AI contract terms for data training, output ownership, IP indemnity, performance, model changes, audits, and exit rights.
Checklist · AI & risk
AI in Litigation: A Verification Protocol for Lawyers
Check every citation, quotation, and fact against the primary source before filing AI-assisted work. Includes supervision of outside counsel.
Labor & employment defense
Respond to charges and complaints. Review leave, accommodations, discipline, terminations, and workforce reductions.
Checklist · Employment
Responding to an EEOC Charge: The First 72 Hours
Respond to an EEOC charge: calendar deadlines, issue a litigation hold, notify insurers, identify decision-makers, and brief managers on retaliation.
Framework · Employment
Termination Risk Review: Nine Questions Before You Decide
Review a termination before deciding: check the reason, supporting records, consistency, timing, and how to carry out the decision.
Framework · Employment
Retaliation Risk Review: Before the PIP, Write-Up, or Transfer
Review retaliation risk before discipline, a performance plan, or a transfer. Check protected activity, timing, decision-makers, and the supporting record.
Decision tree · Employment
The FMLA–ADA Interplay: A Decision Tree
Review leave when FMLA does not apply or runs out. Work through the ADA accommodation analysis before deciding what comes next.
Framework · Employment
Running the Interactive Process: An ADA Accommodation Playbook
Run the ADA interactive process from the first request through follow-up. Includes Michigan PWDCRA coverage, cost-cap tiers, and the 182-day written-notice defense.
Framework · Employment
Pregnancy Accommodation Review: Nine Questions the Morning It Lands
Review pregnancy accommodation requests under the PWFA: common changes, documentation limits, leave, hardship, and the decision record.
Framework · Employment
Religious Accommodation Review: Nine Questions the Morning It Lands
Review religious accommodation requests: recognize the request, assess options and hardship, apply the current cost standard, and document the decision.
Template · Employment
Michigan Handbook Addendum
Adapt a national handbook for Michigan: earned sick time, the 182-day disability notice, personnel records, weapons, pay, and other state rules.
Template · Employment
Ohio Handbook Addendum
Adapt a national handbook for Ohio: payday and pay-stub rules, weapons in locked vehicles, whistleblower reports, and other state requirements.
Quick reference · Employment
Workplace Investigations: A Quick Reference
Plan a workplace investigation from intake to the closing memo: investigator choice, privilege, interim measures, interviews, credibility, and records.
Checklist · Employment
Reduction in Force: A Compliance Checklist
Plan a reduction in force: selection criteria, adverse-impact review, WARN thresholds, OWBPA releases, and employee communications.
Decision tree · Employment
Is This Role Really Exempt? An FLSA Classification Audit
Check FLSA overtime exemptions against salary and duties requirements. Includes a decision tree, common misclassifications, and stricter state rules.
Framework · Employment
Employee or Independent Contractor? A Classification Framework
Review worker classification under IRS, FLSA, state ABC tests, and other applicable standards. Includes a checklist for your current roster.
Framework · Employment
Will This Non-Compete Hold? A Restrictive Covenant Review
Assess non-competes, non-solicits, and confidentiality covenants. Review enforceability factors, state-law differences, and narrower protections.
Checklist · Employment
The Departing Employee: Protecting the Business on the Way Out
Handle a sensitive employee departure: review covenants, preserve devices, investigate access, and protect customer relationships.
Checklist · Employment
Hiring From a Competitor: Onboarding Without Inheriting a Lawsuit
Review a competitor hire’s covenants, set a written no-documents rule, and document onboarding to reduce trade-secret and breach-of-covenant risk.
Checklist · Employment
Severance and Releases: What a Defensible Agreement Needs
Review severance releases for consideration, scope, OWBPA age-waiver requirements, NLRB limits, and payment terms.
Commercial litigation
Review business contracts, respond to demand letters, assess claims, and decide how to resolve a dispute.
Visual guide · Commercial
The Anatomy of a Lawsuit
Follow a business lawsuit through pleadings, discovery, experts, summary judgment, and trial. Compare timing, costs, team workload, and chances to settle.
Framework · Commercial
Demand Letter Triage: The First Week
Respond to a demand letter in eight steps: check deadlines, preserve records, notify insurers, review the contract, and choose a response.
Framework · Commercial
Early Case Assessment: Twelve Questions Before You Litigate
Assess whether to bring, defend, or settle a case. Review exposure, documents, witnesses, forum, fees, counterclaims, and settlement options.
Checklist · Commercial
Contract Disputes: The Pre-Suit Checklist
Check contract requirements before filing suit: notice, cure periods, dispute-resolution steps, forum, deadlines, and whether to keep performing.
Quick reference · Commercial
Contract Risk Review: The Key Terms, Triaged
Review 12 commercial contract clauses in order of risk, with a reference table, points to check, and typical negotiation requests.
Decision tree · Commercial
NDA Triage: Green, Yellow, Red
Route inbound NDAs with a green, yellow, and red review system. Define signature authority and identify terms that need counsel’s review.
Quick reference · Commercial
Indemnification and Limitation of Liability: Reading the Risk-Shifting Clauses
Read indemnification and liability limits together: scope, defense control, damages exclusions, cap exceptions, and negotiation options.
Framework · Commercial
Insurance Tender: Getting Your Carrier to Defend
Notify insurers of a claim: inventory policies, tender promptly, check additional-insured coverage, and review reservation-of-rights letters.
Litigation holds, records, and response
Preserve records, respond to subpoenas and data incidents, protect privilege, and prepare corporate witnesses.
Checklist · Cross-practice
Litigation Hold: Trigger to Release
Manage a litigation hold from trigger to release. Cover texts, workplace messages, video, departing employees, and other records teams can overlook.
Checklist · Cross-practice
Served With a Subpoena You’re Not a Party To
Respond to a third-party subpoena: calendar deadlines, preserve records, object in time, protect privilege, assess costs, and check notice duties.
Quick reference · Cross-practice
Attorney-Client Privilege for In-House Counsel
Protect attorney-client privilege in-house: separate legal and business advice, give Upjohn warnings, control distribution, and assess work product.
Framework · Cross-practice
The 30(b)(6) Deposition: Preparing the Company Witness
Prepare a Rule 30(b)(6) corporate witness: review the notice, narrow topics, choose designees, meet the duty to prepare, and protect privilege.
Framework · Cross-practice
Records Retention: A Schedule That Survives Litigation
Build a records-retention schedule: inventory systems, map legal requirements, document disposal, and suspend destruction for litigation holds.
Checklist · Cross-practice
Data Incident: The First 48 Hours
Respond to a suspected data incident: activate the team, contain the threat, preserve forensic evidence, contact counsel and insurers, and assess the scope.
Framework · Cross-practice
CMMC Diligence: Verify Status, Scope, and Contract Requirements
Review CMMC contract eligibility, assessment scope, current status, subcontractor requirements, and the evidence behind a readiness claim.
How to use these
Print these tools, add them to your playbooks, or adapt them to your policies. When you republish or redistribute them, follow the CC BY-SA 4.0 license: give credit and share under the same terms.
These resources provide general information. State laws vary and change, especially rules on non-competes, leave, and final pay. Review the facts and current law with counsel before acting.