Senior HR judgment, an employment law background, and twenty years of having made these calls under pressure — without a full-time executive on payroll.
Thirty minutes. No pitch. I will tell you if I am not the right fit.
J.D. Employment law
20 years Executive HR, including Chief People & Legal Officer
SHRM-SCP and PHR certified
5.0 from 17 Google reviews
Most organizations do not get into trouble because they lack a policy. They get into trouble because a competent manager made a fast decision without knowing which rule applied, and nobody senior enough was in the room to catch it.
I have sat on both sides of that. I spent two decades in executive HR — most recently as Chief People & Legal Officer at a national nonprofit — and I hold a law degree in employment law. That means I can tell you what the law requires and what will actually work with the people you have, which are not always the same answer.
Three ways that shows up below. All of them start with a conversation, and none of them start with a retainer.
A standing seat at your leadership table. I carry the people-and-risk agenda so your executive team stops making these calls in the gaps between meetings.
Who it is for. Organizations between 40 and 400 people with an HR generalist or a small team, and no senior HR voice above them.
Book a conversationMost compliance problems are not discovered during an audit. They are discovered during a claim, when someone asks for a document you assumed existed. This work finds those gaps while they are still cheap to fix.
Who it is for. Organizations that have grown faster than their HR paperwork, or that have just had a complaint expose something.
Book a conversationWhen a complaint involves a senior person, a protected characteristic, or anyone your HR team reports to, an internal investigation is the wrong instrument — you need someone outside the reporting line. Interviews conducted and documented to a consistent standard, findings on the balance of the evidence with the reasoning shown, and a written report your leadership can stand behind.
Liability usually lives in the gap between what your handbook says and what your managers actually do. I draft and review policies so the two match, in language a supervisor can follow at speed — not paragraphs written to be defensible and never read.
A structured review of the records and practices that get requested when something goes wrong: I-9 and work authorization files, personnel file practices, exempt and non-exempt classification, hiring and separation documentation, and whether your handbook still reflects current practice. You get a prioritized findings list — what to fix now, what can wait.
What this is not. This is employment-law-driven HR compliance. It does not cover workplace safety or OSHA — for that you want a safety specialist, and I will happily say so.
Your managers make decisions with legal consequences most weeks, usually in a corridor, usually fast. This is the training that improves the quality of those decisions rather than the volume of your policy manual.
Who it is for. Managers and directors who supervise people and have never been taught the legal edges of that job.
Book a conversationThirty minutes. You tell me what is actually happening. I tell you whether I am the right person, including when the answer is no.
Scope, deliverables, timeline and cost in writing. No retainer before we both know what the work is.
For fractional engagements, a standing rhythm. For investigations, a defined start and finish. Either way, you always know where it stands.
Documentation you keep, and a clear view of what to do next — whether or not that involves me.
A consultant delivers a project and leaves. A fractional CHRO holds the seat — attends leadership meetings, carries the people agenda between them, and is accountable for the same things a full-time CHRO would be. The difference is days per month, not depth of responsibility.
No. I am a licensed attorney, and that background is why my advice is different, but I am engaged as an HR consultant. No attorney-client relationship is created, and nothing I provide is legal advice or covered by privilege. Where a matter needs counsel, I will say so plainly and work alongside yours.
That is the situation independent investigation exists for. When the subject sits above your HR team in the reporting line, an internal process is difficult to defend regardless of how carefully it is run.
No. My compliance work is employment-law driven — records, classification, policy, documentation and investigations. Safety is a genuinely different discipline and you are better served by a specialist. I would rather tell you that now than take the engagement.
It depends entirely on scope, and I would rather quote you accurately than post a number that turns out to be wrong. Every engagement is priced in a written proposal after the first conversation. That conversation is free and carries no obligation.
Yes. Fractional and advisory work is largely remote, and I travel for investigations and in-person training. Employment law here is federal-first, with state variation flagged where it matters.
Thirty minutes, no obligation, and a straight answer about whether this is something I should be involved in. If it is not, I will usually know who should be.
Book a conversationOr email latisha@cultivatehrconsulting.com.