Ms. Newkirk’s practice includes employment law litigation as well as employment law counseling and transactional work. She regularly represents clients in lawsuits and administrative proceedings involving federal and state employment law statutes (such as Title VII, the ADEA, the ADA, Texas Labor Code, etc.) as well as litigation involving allegations of theft of trade secrets and violation of non-competition and non-solicitation agreements. Ms. Newkirk also works with clients on complex employment law counseling issues such as managing discipline and terminations in high risk scenarios (which may involve employees who fall within multiple protected categories or are high-ranking executives), managing leaves of absences and navigating the issues raised by the FMLA, ADA and workers’ compensation statutes, and conducting sensitive or high level internal investigations. She has significant experience in planning and executing reductions in force, which includes evaluating the risks raised by the proposed reductions and drafting employee communications and severance agreements. Ms. Newkirk assists clients with drafting executive employment agreements as well as non-competition, non-solicitation and confidentiality agreements. She regularly advises clients on appropriate classification of employees as exempt or non-exempt under FLSA and of workers as employees or independent contractors under state and federal statutes; she handles administrative proceedings and litigation on these subjects as well. Ms. Newkirk also teams with transactional lawyers to perform due diligence and review and provide advice on the employment law aspects of merger and asset purchase agreements.