Michael J. Ossip

Partner

Michael J. Ossip is a partner in Morgan Lewis's Labor and Employment Practice. Mr. Ossip's practice is devoted exclusively to the representation of management in all facets of employee relations, including the litigation of claims of employment discrimination in federal and state courts. Mr. Ossip has tried to verdict numerous jury and nonjury cases.

Mr. Ossip also represents employers in matters raising common law claims, including wrongful discharge, before federal, state and local administrative agencies, including the Department of Labor and EEOC, and in arbitration proceedings.  He has also negotiated collective bargaining agreements and regularly provides advice to employers regarding union organizing campaigns, reductions in force, disciplinary matters, the development and administration of human resources policies and procedures, sexual harassment prevention and investigations, and strike-related proceedings, including injunction actions. Mr. Ossip also regularly advises employers with regard to the development and enforcement of restrictive covenants and other agreements designed to protect the employer's confidential information and trade secrets.

From 2004 through 2008, Mr. Ossip was named one of the leading U.S. lawyers for employment law by Chambers USA, based on the views of clients, peers, and other industry professionals. Chambers has called Mr. Ossip a "talented employment litigator" and a "leading authority on the FMLA." One client remarked to Chambers, "I have absolute confidence in him in a courtroom."

An active lecturer, Mr. Ossip regularly conducts programs for clients on employment law issues, including sexual harassment, implementing reductions in force, the Americans with Disabilities Act, and the Family and Medical Leave Act.  He is a regular speaker at conferences sponsored by the American Bar Association and the Pennsylvania Bar Institute (the continuing legal education arm of the Pennsylvania Bar Association).  Mr. Ossip has been a course planner of the PBI's annual Employment Law Institute since its inception in 1995.

In addition, he has served as a faculty member of Cornell University's School of EEO Studies, where he has taught a course on defending charges of discrimination before the EEOC and other administrative agencies.  He has written extensively on the interaction among the ADA, FMLA, and workers' compensation statutes, sexual harassment, and other employment law topics.  From 1979-80, he served as a law clerk for Judge Murray M. Schwartz of the U.S. District Court for the District of Delaware.

Mr. Ossip is the co-editor-in chief of Ossip and Hale, The Family and Medical Leave Act, published in 2006 by BNA Books, the most comprehensive treatise on the FMLA ever published. He was also the chapter editor (Chapter 18: Litigation Issues) for the ABA's treatise on the Fair Labor Standards Act, published in 1999 by BNA Books.

Mr. Ossip is admitted to practice in Pennsylvania and before the U.S. Supreme Court.