Meet Our Staff

Kandis Sells

Employment Attorney

In 50 words or less

Employment law & all things HR guru
Pacific Lutheran University, B.S. of Business Administration
University of Washington School of Law, J.D.
Attorney licensed in Washington
Football fanatic

Experience

With a focus on providing practical, sustainable solutions to employment issues, Kandis provides Vigilant members with legal counsel on all aspects of state, federal, and local employment laws and regulations. Her 15 years of practicing employment law and litigation, and 8 years in Human Resources, allow Kandis to assess employment issues and best practices from application form to the courtroom, and every stage in between.

Kandis was born and raised in Washington, and has lived in several cities across the state. When she’s not guiding members on ways to manage a successful workforce, you can probably find her cheering on her UW Huskies or Seahawks, binge-watching the latest Disney, Star Wars, or Harry Potter movie with her family, or making to-do lists for everything else.

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Kandis Sells

Employment Attorney

Recent Blog Posts by Kandis Sells

Apr 18 2019

Leave Laws

Q&A: Are remote employees who are out of state eligible for FMLA?

Question: We have a handful of remote employees who work out of their homes in other states where we don’t have offices or other employees. Can these employees ever be eligible for FMLA since we don’t have 50 or more employees within 75 miles of them? Answer: Yes, they may still be eligible…

Mar 08 2019

Q&AHarassment & Discrimination

Q&A: Do we have harassment liability if a workplace relationship is consensual?

Question: An employee in a consensual, romantic relationship with a manager in another department has started complaining about “harassment,” which is really just her coworkers teasing her about the relationship. She’s also complaining that they’re having “problems” in the relationship which is spilling over into hostile treatment at work by the manager. The owner is ready to terminate her for continuing to bring her drama into the workplace. Are there any legal concerns we should consider?

Aug 06 2018

Q&ADisabilityHarassment & DiscriminationSafety and Health

Q&A: “100-percent healed” return-to-work policy violates ADA

Question: To avoid workplace injuries, we require all employees to be 100-percent healed without any medical restrictions before they return to work after an illness or injury. We think this is an important policy to protect employee safety, but recently heard it might be unlawful discrimination. Is it?

Jul 02 2018

Harassment & DiscriminationHiring

Q&A: Limit on prior work experience in hiring may be age discrimination

Question: In job postings for our entry-level manager positions, we list the requirements as “3 to 7 years (no more than 7 years) of relevant work experience” to make sure we don’t waste our time interviewing a bunch of overqualified candidates. We recently had an applicant complain that our cap on prior work experience constitutes unlawful age discrimination, but job postings like ours seem really common. It’s okay for us to set a limit on prior experience when we’re hiring, right?

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by Kandis Sells