Bayer & Borlase

I was a long time employee of a quasi-governmental agency. The supervisor who managed the department I worked in was only promoting people along racial lines. The pattern was unmistakable. I thought I was doing the right thing when I brought it to the attention of Human Resources. Surely my employer would uphold the laws of equal opportunity employment, and advancement based strictly on merit.

How wrong I was.

It soon became obvious that instead of HR disciplining or re-training my supervisor, they told him that I reported him. My supervisor changed my duties and moved me to a different office location where I could be monitored every minute of every day. I was constantly criticized for the work I did, even though I had done my job the same way previously without any incident or complaints. The list went on and the environment I was forced to work in became nearly unbearable.

To me, this felt like a clear case of retaliation, so I sought legal advice. I contacted practically every employment law firm in the San Francisco Bay Area, but no one wanted to touch my case. My employer had a confusing complaintprocedure that nobody wanted to navigate with me. When I told the law firms I contacted who my employer was, that was the end of the discussion – except for Bayer & Borlase. They not only heard me out, they took my case.

I later found out that Bayer & Borlase is one of the only law firms in the Bay Area willing to handle case against my employer. They knew that what was happening to me was wrong, and they weren’t afraid to work harder for me than perhaps they would on a more typical case. They threw themselves into my case despite the fact that the odds were against me.

Management, seemingly with the blessing of HR, was deliberately trying to pressure me into becoming insubordinate, making my life in the workplace so miserable that I’d either snap (become insubordinate), or quit on my own. Imagine going to work every day knowing that your employers want you gone. It’s incredibly stressful. Alan and Heather’s advice made all the difference in helping me get through each day. They were there every step of the way to give me the confidence I needed to push forward with my case, and to make sure I stayed on the job in spite of the environment I had to endure.

We ultimately ended up in mediation. I was surprised to see that many of the small, seemingly unimportant details about what happened to me in the workplace turned out to be very important in the mediation itself. That told me that Bayer & Borlase knew exactly what to look for to present the strongest case possible at my mediation against a very confident opponent. We are able to agree on a result that I was happy with and I could put the experience behind me.

Alan and Heather went into this knowing that I had a difficult case to prove. But they took it. They took this case when no one else would touch it. They devised a savvy strategy for my case that proved to be the difference against a feared employer who thought that they had the law on their side. And they did it all while caring for my well-being in ways that I never expected from a lawyer. They not only were my partners in this – they became my friends. I wouldn’t just recommend Bayer & Borlase, I’d encourage anyone with an employment issue to hire them. In my opinion Bayer & Borlase is the best employment law firm in the Bay Area.