Caroline P. Donelan 

Caroline P. Donelan is a Blank Rome LLP partner whose wide-ranging practice includes labor and employment counseling, litigation and mergers and acquisition work. Her position as a trusted advisor in multiple areas of her clients’ operations make her an “inside-outside” counsel to many.

She joined the firm in 2014. “We California employment lawyers have a really dynamic playing field where there’s something new every day,” Donelan said.

“To stay current, I spend at least an hour every day looking at the trade publications and reading new opinions to stay up with the news so I can best advise my clients. There’s never a dull moment, and I love it — there’s nothing rote about this job.”

Exceptional outside forces like the COVID-19 pandemic and economic downturns affect the labor and employment landscape with dramatic events like layoffs and reductions in force. In the current more stable environment, the mergers and acquisitions side of her job gets more emphasis, Donelan said.

“Today, the biggest issues involve all the talk about AI plus the huge legislative changes nationally and statewide with respect to non-competes and pay transparency. They’re all part of a patchwork you have to navigate for multijurisdictional clients.”

One such client is Freedom Mortgage Corp., a national mortgage lender that Donelan has represented for nearly a decade in both strategic counseling and in all California employment litigation matters. Most recently, she led a Blank Rome team defending the client in a potential class action and representative PAGA action alleging millions of dollars in unpaid wages, wage statement violations, unpaid business expenses, failure to provide meal periods and rest breaks and related civil and statutory penalties. Chowing et al. v. Freedom Mortgage Corp., 37-2022-00005613-CU-OE-CTL (San Diego Co. Super. Ct., filed Feb. 10, 2022).

Facing an exposure in the seven or eight figures, Donelan and her team implemented proactive remedial measures and negotiated an early favorable $650,000 settlement. “We were able to make some really good changes in operations,” she said. “It’s important that you don’t get myopic. There’s always room for improvement.”

Donelan alerts clients to important legal developments, as in a Daily Journal column last year spotlighting a 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal opinion that aided companies sued for large wait time penalties by photo model workers claiming employee status. She reported that targets of such suits now have available a good faith defense that precludes the penalties.

—John Roemer