Labor & Employment Law Section

Jennifer Abruzzo, Esq.

General Counsel National Labor Relations Board

Washington, D.C.

On July 22, 2021, Jennifer A. Abruzzo began serving as General Counsel for the National Labor Relations Board. Ms. Abruzzo had previously worked for the NLRB for over two decades, including as Field Attorney, Supervisory Field Attorney, Deputy Regional Attorney, Deputy Assistant General Counsel, Deputy General Counsel, and Acting General Counsel. Immediately prior to her appointment as General Counsel, Ms. Abruzzo served as Special Counsel for Strategic Initiatives for the Communications Workers of America.

James W. Bucking, Esq.

Foley Hoag, LLP.

Boston, MA

Jim Bucking is a partner at Foley Hoag, where he represents corporations and other
employers in union disputes, complex employment litigation and other labor and
employment matters.

Jim has extensive experience representing management at the bargaining table in union negotiations and litigating labor disputes in court, before arbitrators and at the National Labor Relations Board. Management clients have sought Jim’s representation in negotiations involving the Teamsters, UFCW, electrical workers, steelworkers, utility workers, broadcast employees, service employees, textile workers, building trades, security, police and firefighters. He also advises clients on day-to-day personnel matters, drafts employment agreements and policies, and assists with sexual harassment and discrimination investigations.

Jim has worked extensively on behalf of such major corporations as Anheuser-Busch, PG&E National Energy Group, CVS Health, Starbucks, Mariner Health Care, Owens & Minor, MasterCard, Dominion Energy, Clear Channel Outdoor, Cogentrix Energy, Guardian Life Insurance Company, H&M, Genzyme, Natixis, Steward Health, Covanta, Cubist Pharmaceuticals, Ameriprise, PolyOne Corporation, Verizon and Cornell Dubilier Electronics, Inc.

Susan Davis, Esq.

Partner, Cohen, Weiss and Simon LLP

New York, NY

Susan Davis has been a partner in the firm since 1992 and currently serves as Chair of the Management Committee. Ms. Davis serves as general or chief outside counsel to unions in the entertainment, health care and public sector arena, and represents unions in a wide variety of other industries including sports, manufacturing, transportation and communications.

Prior to joining Cohen, Weiss and Simon LLP, Ms. Davis was a clerk for the Honorable Constance Baker Motley in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

Ms. Davis is a fellow of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers, a member and former co-chair of the American Bar Association’s Section on Labor and Employment Law Committee on Practice and Procedure under the National Labor Relations Act, and a former member of the Council of the American Arbitration Association. She serves on the AFL-CIO Lawyers Advisory Panel, the Board of Directors of the AFL-CIO Union Lawyers Alliance, and is an Advisory Board Member of the Cornell University ILR School. Ms. Davis has been named repeatedly as a Super Lawyer for Employment and Labor Law, one of the Top Women Attorneys in the Metropolitan New York, and a New York Metro Super Lawyer. Ms. Davis was a 2013 Peggy Browning Fund Honoree.

Ms. Davis has written for and lectured extensively at bar association, attorney and union meetings on a wide variety of issues facing unions and their members.

Ms. Davis graduated with honors from the University of California at Berkeley in 1976. She received a law degree with high honors from Rutgers University in 1981, winning the West Publishing Company’s annual jurisprudence award and leading the Rutgers moot court team to the American Bar Association’s national moot court finals.

Ian Hayes, Esq.

Creighton, Johnsen & Giroux

Buffalo, NY

Ian Hayes is a partner at Creighton, Johnsen & Giroux in Buffalo. Ian works with unions, funds, apprenticeship programs, and individual employees to enforce their rights and protect their interests under the law. He has extensive experience representing unions in all aspects of worker representation, new organizing, and other issues. Ian represents workers in wage theft and other wage and hour-related suits. He also represents individual employees in employment discrimination and harassment-relate suits.

Ian is a graduate of Fordham University, where he received Bachelor degrees in Philosophy and Sociology, and St. John’s University School of Law, where he concentrated on labor and employment law and published on those subjects. Before entering law school, he was a union organizer, working with groups of employees to establish new bargaining units and first labor contracts in New York City and around the country.

Ian is licensed to practice law in New York, New Jersey, and the U.S. District Court, Western District of New York. He is a member of the Union Lawyers Alliance of the AFL-CIO. He currently serves as Treasurer and Executive Board Member with the Coalition for Economic Justice and works with various other community groups to redistribute power and wealth to working people.

Professor Richard Wayne Hurd

New York State School of Industrial and Labor Relations, Cornell University

Ithaca, NY

Richard W. Hurd is Professor of Labor Studies (retired) and Associate Director of the Cornell Center for Innovative Hospitality Labor and Employment Relations. A leading specialist on trade union administration and strategy, on union representation in the hospitality sector, and on the unionization of professional workers, he has been quoted widely in the national and international print and broadcast media on various labor issues. He is co-editor of the International Handbook on Labour Unions: Responses to Neoliberalism (Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd. 2011), Rekindling the Movement (Cornell University ILR Press, 2001), Organizing to Win (Cornell University ILR Press, 1998) and Restoring the Promise of American Labor Law (ILR Press, 1994). He has published dozens of papers in books and professional journals, including “Public Sector Unions Under Siege” [with Tamara Lee, Labor Studies Journal 2014], “Moving Beyond the Critical Synthesis: Does the Law Preclude a Future for US Unions?” [Labor History, 2013], “First Contract Arbitration and the Employee Free Choice Act: Multi-jurisdictional Evidence from Canada” [with Sara Slinn, Advances in Industrial and Labor Relations 2011], and “Obama and the US Labor Movement” [Transfer: European Review of Labour and Research 2009]. His articles on union strategy have been published in Britain, Germany, Switzerland, India, South Africa, Korea, Australia, Belgium, Canada and the U.S. Professor Hurd works closely with labor organizations and professional associations, offering technical assistance on strategic issues including organizational change, internal and external organizing, and leadership development. His clients have included the Canadian Labour Congress, AFL-CIO Office of the President, United Food and Commercial Workers, American Federation of Teachers, Service Employees International Union, the National Association for the Education of Young Children, and the American Guild of Musical Artists Hurd earned his Ph.D. in Economics from Vanderbilt University, and is a former Brookings Institution Economic Policy Fellow.

Johnnie Kallas

Coordinator, Strike Tracker, Industrial Labor Relations School, Cornell University

Ithaca, NY

Johnnie Kallas is a PhD candidate in the Department of Labor Relations, Law, and History at Cornell University’s ILR School. His research focuses on strikes and labor militancy in the United States, with a special interest in healthcare. He also worked as a labor organizer for three years before enrolling in graduate school.

Professor Harry C. Katz

Director, Scheinman Institute on Conflict Resolution Industrial Labor Relations School, Cornell University

Ithaca, NY

Harry C. Katz is the Jack Sheinkman Professor of Collective Bargaining at the School of Industrial & Labor Relations, Cornell University. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California at Berkeley. After teaching at MIT he came to the New York State School of Industrial and Labor Relations at Cornell University in 1985.

Colin M. Leonard

Bond Schoeneck & King

Syracuse, NY

Colin is a management-side labor and employment lawyer who works with
clients throughout Central New York, the Mohawk Valley and the Southern
Tier of New York.

His practice includes traditional labor-related work, including collective bargaining, labor arbitrations and agency matters before the NLRB and PERB. Colin also represents employers in federal and state anti-discrimination litigation and counsels human resources professionals on wide-ranging legal issues, including wage and hour, employee discipline and the New York State Labor Law.

Colin has experience assisting employers manage downsizing situations, when
compliance with state and federal statutes relating to employment losses is critical.

In particular, he has worked closely with employers in managing WARN-related
risks resulting from plant closings and mass layoffs. Colin has represented
employers in claims brought by unions and employees asserting violations of the
New York State WARN Act. He helps employers conduct risk assessments and
adverse impact analyses relating to layoffs, so that an employer can proceed with
planned downsizing consistent with applicable law.

Ritu Pancholy, Esq.

Founder, Culturupt

South Orange, NJ

Ritu Pancholy, Esq. is the founder of Culturupt, a HR consulting firm. She is an experienced workplace investigator and an attorney barred in New York and New Jersey. Ritu has over 10 years of deep experience in handling employment related matters for organizations including public companies and the government. Most recently, Ritu was in-house global employment counsel at Dun & Bradstreet, Inc. (a public company with 5,000 employees) where she was responsible for all employment, compliance and litigation matters. Ritu supervised all global employment and compliance investigations, handled on boarding and performance management questions, advised on employment policies, as well as reductions in force, and championed diversity and inclusion programs. Ritu has served as an Adjunct Professor of Law at Seton Hall University and has taught Conducting Internal Investigations.

Ritu is a graduate of Duke Law School and received her undergraduate degree at Rutgers University. Prior to working in-house, Ritu was as an attorney at the NYC Department of Education where she advised the agency on employment and education matters, handled investigations and defended the agency against suits with the EEOC or federal/state agencies. Ritu started her career as an associate at Weil, Gotshal and Manges LLP in New York City.

Ritu is passionate about providing organizations with the tools necessary to build a respectful culture and empower its employees. Ritu believes that people are the heart of all organizations and that organizations must manage these relationships with care.

Stephen P. Sonnenberg, Esq.

Mediator & Arbitrator, JAMS

New York, NY

Stephen P. Sonnenberg, Esq. has deep experience in understanding and resolving complex labor and employment disputes. Mr. Sonnenberg’s unique background, which allows him to understand both plaintiff and defendant concerns, comes from the practice of law, experience as a mediator, and prior experience as a psychotherapist. He is also a member of the JAMS Title IX panel. Mr. Sonnenberg is known for his attention to detail, thoughtful approach to emotion-laden disputes, and demeanor conducive to settlement. He has resolved numerous labor and employment disputes, including ones on both the east coast and in California.

Mr. Sonnenberg has mediated numerous Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and state law wage and hour collective and class actions involving employees and companies in the retail, hospitality, technology, health care and transportation industries, among others. These actions have involved state-specific, multi-state and nationwide claims. When mediating a putative or certified collective or class action Mr. Sonnenberg draws upon not only his prior experience mediating complex class claims but his earlier practice litigating wage and hour matters in both California and New York.

Pearl Zuchlewski, Esq.

Kraus & Zuchlewski LLP

New York, NY

Pearl Zuchlewski is a partner in Kraus & Zuchlewski LLP where she primarily represents individual employees.

She is a former Chair of the New York State Bar Association (“NYSBA”) Labor and Employment Law Section and presently serves on the Section’s Executive Committee. She also is a Section representative to the NYSBA House of Delegates. In addition, Ms. Zuchlewski is a member of the American Bar Association (“ABA”) Labor and Employment Law Section’s Employee Rights and Responsibilities Committee, the National Employment Lawyers Association and the Association of the Bar in the City of New York (“ABCNY”).

She has served on the FINRA task force which drafted the FINRA Code of Arbitration provisions for statutory discrimination claims and is former Chair of the FINR’s National Arbitration and Mediation Committee. Ms. Zuchlewski most recently served as Chair of a FINRA employment task force which reviewed and consolidated the former NASD and NYSE Codes of Arbitration Procedure.

Ms. Zuchlewski has been recognized for several years as among the Best Lawyers in New York and in Superlawyers. She is a Fellow in the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers and a member of the College’s Board of Governors. She also is a member of the advisory boards of the New York University Law School Center for Labor and Employment, the Hofstra Law School, CPR Employment Disputes Committee and the New York City Chapter of the Labor and Employment Relations Association; her other professional activities include membership in the Public Investors Arbitration Bar Association.