Our practice group Co-determination Management specializes in dealing with all legal, strategic as well as tactical issues in the area of operational and corporate co-determination.

In addition to our usual excellent analysis of the legal framework, we especially incorporate our many years of experience in corporate practice into our consulting services. In particular, we offer you consulting services based on a 4-pillar approach. This comprises practical knowledge acquired 1.) in management and politics, 2.) in the works council, 3.) in mediation, 4.) in HR management and it is based on the many years of experience of our consultants in various positions and areas such as

• former member of the Board of Management of various companies in the energy and recycling industries, most recently as Chief Human Resources Officer of E.ON SE, and active member of the Supervisory Boards of RWE Generation SE and RWE Power AG,
• independent member of a corporate, general and local works council at AOL Germany and former advisor to numerous works councils from companies in various industries,
• long-time human resources manager with operational experience in the implementation of transformation projects,
• trained mediator in labor law and collective bargaining conflicts.

In addition to this special professional range, we often look back on other professional experiences besides the practice of law, which make our understanding of trade unions, works councils and employees authentic and lively. Our knowledge and perceptions are therefore not only based on theoretically acquired knowledge, but have been gained in the context of tangible personal life and professional experience.

Experience has taught us that successful and constructive dealings with employee participation bodies are not based on being right or being the strongest in a specific situation, but on creating a viable solution that does justice to the interests of the individual participants in the long term and thus creates acceptance.

After identifying the relevant stakeholders, we analyze their interests and possible objectives and develop a conflict and agreement matrix to achieve the best possible congruence with corporate goals.

We have mastered the entire range of co-determination management, from forceful confrontation to balancing cooperation. We see ourselves not only as your legal advisors, but as assertive companions of your individual project.

We pay special attention to the connection between company co-determination and corporate co-determination in terms of labor law and corporate law, but also in the factual sense. In doing so, we also include the European stock corporation.

Our Team: Dr. Tobias Pusch, Thomas Wahlig, Dr. Holger Thomas, Dr. Tobias Brors, Dr. Alexander Lorenz, Christoph Dänzer-Vanotti, Franz Donner, Paul Brummer, Johannes Wickler, Stefanie Götz-Dertinger, Julia Glock, Pauline Kuhn, Dr. Hannes Thormann, Jacqueline Volmari

Your contact persons

Establishment, interpretation, amendment and termination of pension commitments

If companies decide to provide their employees with company pension schemes, they have a wide range of options at their disposal. In particular, the selection of the implementation method, the type of commitment and any external pension providers, as well as questions regarding employer subsidies, deferred compensation and pension adjustments present numerous challenges for employers, for which we will work with you to find a legally and economically appropriate (individual) solution. In addition, special features of company pension law must be taken into account when interpreting, amending or terminating pension schemes, on which we can provide you with comprehensive advice based on our many years of experience.

Representation in and out of court

Disputes under company pension law, both in and out of court, are often characterized by facts dating back years. In this respect, in addition to a comprehensive and excellent legal assessment and the consideration of strategic issues, it is also of great importance to clarify the relevant facts as comprehensively as possible. Moreover, it is not uncommon for issues raised by pension beneficiaries to affect a large number of other pension beneficiaries or even to lead to mass proceedings. With our extensive experience in procedural tactics, we can set the strategic course at an early stage and always keep an eye on the overall picture, even when evaluating individual cases.

Company Pension Schemes (bAV) consultation in the area of M&A transactions/restructuring

Dealing with pension obligations raises special issues in corporate transactions and restructurings. Especially in the context of corporate acquisitions, pension obligations often play a special role due to their volume. Furthermore, corporate transactions and restructurings often raise difficult questions regarding the continuation of externally operated pension schemes and the harmonization of various types of schemes. Based on our many years of experience in accompanying a large number of national and international M&A transactions, we can provide you with the best possible advice on the legal and strategic solutions to these issues.

“De-risking”

Many companies are struggling with the burdens and volatility of their pension obligations, which often act as an obstacle to transactions or transformation. These risks can be minimized through suitable measures such as capital market-oriented investment of plan assets or outsourcing of pension obligations. This applies to individual commitments to shareholder-managers in small and medium-sized companies as well as to large-volume pension obligations in group structures. With our expertise, we support you in minimizing risks and continuously optimizing your pension schemes.

Pension obligations of managing directors, members of the Board of Management, shareholders and other executives

Particularly in the case of non-employees such as shareholders or members of corporate bodies, questions often arise regarding the settlement of pension obligations, their transfer, waiver or their insolvency protection by the Pension Security Association. In most cases, this involves the distinction between entrepreneurial activity and employee status and the resulting intervention of mandatory provisions of company pension law. Often, the information required for this distinction must be determined and legally classified over long periods of the respective employee histories, so that, for example, in the case of corporate transactions, certainty is created for the acquiring party that a company has actually become free of pension obligations. We advise you on these issues in transactions, insolvency cases or restructuring. We also advise executives on questions of company pension law, in particular in connection with the conclusion or termination of their employment contracts.

Our Team: Dr. Thomas Thees, Johannes Wickler, Karsten Keller

Your contact persons

Digitalization is affecting almost all areas in the world of work. This creates large amounts of data. Their use represents an ever-increasing value for companies. This applies not only to customer data, but also to employee data.

The processing of this data offers great opportunities but at the same time involves legal risks.

The Practice Group Data & Privacy supports you in establishing and maintaining data protection compliance. Instead of viewing data protection as an obstacle, our approach is to work with our clients to find solutions that enable comprehensive data processing within the current legal framework while avoiding risks.

Our Team: Dr Michael Witteler, Dr. Tobias Brors, Dr. Anne Hoßfeld, Dr. Anna Franziska Hauer, Sebastian Krumnack

Your contact person

Our competencies and experience from many years of advising numerous clients on the implementation of an effective compliance structure and on measures to prevent and deal with compliance cases are bundled in our HR Compliance and Occupational Health and Safety Practice Group. The Practice Group combines our competencies in the areas of

• Core Compliance: From compliance audits to the implementation of effective compliance structures – we are your partner when it comes to the prevention, detection and monitoring of compliance issues under labor law.
• Third-party staffing: Employee leasing, freelancers, employer of record, crowdworking – our experts advise you on the legally compliant use of third-party staff, support you in the implementation and accompany you in official or legal proceedings.
• Occupational health and safety: Together with you, we maintain an overview of the wide range of occupational health and safety requirements, from working time protection to risk assessment and instruction, and we support you in setting up a legally compliant occupational health and safety organization.

We offer you comprehensive, practice-oriented consultation in the fields of HR compliance and occupational health and safety in order to classify and efficiently minimize any legal risks. We support you in the identification of risks in existing structures, the appropriate response and future prevention. At the crossroads between labor law and criminal law, our network of experienced attorneys in other fields enables us to provide our clients with optimal support in form of a 360° approach. We also use innovative consulting services – such as our LegalTech tool SV-Status Check for checking the social security status of employees and our tool for whistleblowing.

Core Compliance

In recent years, many companies have increasingly focused on the issue of compliance. In this context, internal investigations for the internal clarification of possible legal violations or internal misconduct are becoming more and more important and are being carried out with increasing frequency.

We support and advise our clients conceptually on all issues that may arise in this context. This includes in particular preventive measures such as the introduction of efficient compliance structures, compliance and ethics policies as well as whistleblower guidelines, taking into account the co-determination rights of the works council, in order to avoid later problems as far as possible or to establish an effective compliance structure following a completed compliance investigation.

In addition, we conduct compliance audits and screenings in advance, in which existing structures and systems are analyzed comprehensively. This ensures an optimal risk assessment and the minimization of existing risks. Since proper advice in these areas often raises more than just labor and data protection issues, we have established a Compliance Task Force for this purpose in cooperation with other specialists in antitrust, corporate and criminal law.

In addition, we regularly advise on the clarification and sanctioning of compliance violations under labor law. In order to prepare possible contentious proceedings in the best possible way, we conduct internal investigations with the necessary discretion and confidentiality or support the internal organizational units entrusted with them. In the course of internal investigations, a large number of labor law issues arise, which we examine, supervise and manage: Does the works council have to be involved? Does the employee concerned have a right to legal counsel during an interview, which may have to be financed by the company? May employees’ e-mail accounts be viewed without their consent? What deadlines must be met? As part of the investigation, we evaluate documents and data in compliance with data protection regulations, conduct interviews with the persons involved and secure evidence that can be used in court. Here, too, we work closely with our colleagues from the Compliance Task Force.

In the course of or after the conclusion of an internal investigation, further questions arise regarding the possible legal consequences and the sanctioning of identified violations, in particular for the persons involved and affected: Are the facts of the case suitable to justify a termination, possibly an extraordinary termination? What deadlines must be met, especially with regard to extraordinary termination? How must the works council or the affected employee be involved? We advise our clients comprehensively on the implementation of these sanctions and the further consequences and also accompany any subsequent court proceedings (e.g. proceedings for protection against dismissal).

The coordination of our communication concept, both internally towards supervisory bodies, employee representatives and employees as well as externally, is also part of our consulting spectrum.

An essential subject of compliance is the correct works council remuneration, especially with regard to threatening consequences of the acting persons in case of a violation of the prohibition of favoritism and discrimination. We review the works council compensation of companies, evaluate the comparison groups and hypothetical promotion positions. We also support companies with guidelines, checklists and workshops. If unavoidable, we also handle the corresponding litigation.

More specifically, our key priorities are:

• Screening and compliance audit
• Implementation of compliance structures
• Introduction of compliance policies
• Cooperation with specialists in antitrust, corporate and criminal law
• Conducting and supporting internal investigations
• Evaluation of investigation results
• Securing evidence that can be used in court
• Coordination of internal and external communication concepts
• Sanctioning of compliance violations

Your experts for core compliance are: Dr. Tobias Pusch, Dr. Jochen Keilich, Kristina Schilder and Maren Burkhardt

Third-Party Staffing

The manifestations of third-party personnel are as diverse as the legal and practical challenges of their legally compliant deployment. We advise and represent you on the client and contractor side in all areas and stages of the deployment of third-party personnel: from strategic planning, implementation and execution to dealing with any legal violations and liability issues.

Our main focus is:

• Legal and strategic advice on all forms of external staff deployment (service and work contracts, employee leasing, freelancers, employer of record, crowdworking, contracting, interim management etc.)
• Drafting, reviewing and negotiating contracts
• Representation in and out of court before labor, social and ordinary courts (e.g. in the context of status proceedings, equal pay, liability disputes or official permits)
• Design and implementation of compliance management systems
• Cooperation with specialists in criminal and tax law

Your experts for third-party staffing are: Dr. Jochen Keilich and Marijke van der Most

Occupational health and safety

In the areas of occupational safety and health, we are one of the few law firms that offer targeted and specialized advice. A functioning occupational safety and health system is essential in companies from a compliance point of view, if only because of the considerable liability risks and the threat of consequences under administrative offences and criminal law. This requires the correct knowledge and application of a multitude of legal and sublegal standards, regulations and technical rules. Through our Practice Group, we can efficiently bundle and specifically apply the experience gained from day-to-day consulting on occupational health and safety issues.

More specifically, our key areas of focus are:

• Support in official proceedings including fine proceedings – We provide support in communicating with the relevant supervisory authorities so that on-site appointments and official proceedings run as smoothly as possible and without interfering with business operations.
• Contestation of penalty notices and representation in opposition proceedings and court proceedings
• Legal review and evaluation of occupational health and safety issues – We provide comprehensive advice on all occupational health and safety issues in day-to-day operations and work with external service providers for technical occupational health and safety if required.
• Advice on dealing with occupational accidents and on preventive occupational safety measures

Your expert for occupational safety and health is: Meike Christine Rehner

Our team: Dr. Tobias Pusch, Dr. Jochen Keilich, Meike Christine Rehner, Marijke van der Most, Dr. Anne Hoßfeld, Maren Burkhardt, Kristina Schilder, Anika Müller, Linda Wetzl

Your contact persons

Legal Tech is part of our Practice Groups range since innovation is an integral part of our firm‘s culture – for us, this includes linking our legal advice with future orientated technology. With the help of Legal Tech, we standardize complex and time-consuming processes, facilitate difficult decisions and find creative solutions for our clients. Our overall goal is to improve the efficiency and quality of daily and routine processes, in particular when dealing with large restructuring mandates.

From and within the mandate, our Legal Tech Practice Group – consisting of a team of lawyers, business professionals and legal tech experts – constantly identifies our clients’ requirements, which are met and even exceeded with the help of our tools in a timely, comprehensive and legally secure manner. Our legal tech solutions include a range of different restructuring tools, HR business tools and the tool Kündigung+. You can find more information on our website: https://pwwl-workplace-tech.de/.

We can offer our clients time- and cost-efficient added value in various situations by using standardized processes. Even in concrete negotiation situations, we provide our clients with legal tech-based assessments in restructurings that are powerful and irrefutable. This is confirmed by one of our clients:

„PWWL’s social plan tool helped us to significantly reduce the volume of the social plan and to focus the discussion in the conciliation committee on the actually relevant question of what economic disadvantages the affected employees really have to expect as a result of losing their jobs. We were very impressed.“– Hartwig Dilling and Julius von Jagow, Managing Directors of PSB-IT-Service GmbH

Our Team: Dr. Tobias Pusch, Thomas Wahlig, Dr. Jochen Keilich, Dr. Michael Witteler, Dr. Falko Daub, Dr. Tobias Brors, Dr. Alexander Lorenz, Dr. Juliane Schwarz, Julian Hartfill, Sebastian Krumnack, Sebastian Spuhl, Dr. Hannes Thormann, Martin Brune

Your contact persons

Our Mergers & Acquisitions (M&A) Practice Group advises on all employment and pension law aspects of national and international M&A projects – whether on the side of the buyer or seller, whether strategic investment, private equity or venture capital. The members of PG M&A have many years of experience in major international law firms and have handled a large number of M&A projects, some of them highly complex.

On the buyer side, our experts prepare the labor law input for the legal due diligence, whereby commercial and project-specific aspects are incorporated into the concrete recommendations for action in addition to the legal considerations – because a bidding process follows a different dynamic than an exclusive process. In the context of company sales on the seller side, we prepare legal fact books or vendor due diligence reports upon request. In this context, our experts always point out practical pitfalls and help to find pragmatic solutions, for example in questions of the transaction-related transfer of employees to new pension or insurance systems, etc.

Depending on the transaction structure, our experts draft, revise and coordinate all important employment law transaction documents, such as letters of instruction and/or transition agreements in asset deal scenarios.

Our experts draft and negotiate all employment and pension law clauses in company purchase agreements – both in the asset purchase agreement (APA) and in the share purchase agreement (SPA) – and accompany the implementation of the provisions made until closing and beyond, if necessary.

If the transaction structure requires this, as is often the case in carve-out transactions, or if the transaction involves changes to collective labor agreements, our experts negotiate with trade unions and works councils, including the preparation of the relevant documentation.

The range of services also includes post-merger integration, which requires good and prospective planning and should be taken into account as early as the preparation and execution of the transaction.

For cross-border projects, our experts are happy to coordinate the entire employment law/pensions workstream upon request, either involving associated law firms from our network or with law firms selected by the client. The members of PG M&A are used to working internationally at the highest level and all speak fluent English.

Our Team: Dr. Albrecht Nehls, Eckbert Müller, Ingo Sappa, Teresa Gabele

Your contact persons

We have extensive, in-depth experience of reorganization and restructuring, including cross-border projects, and in implementing operational changes. As your long-term partner in labor law matters, we start work well in advance. We analyze the legal framework, the interests of the negotiating partners and other stakeholders, and develop specific strategies for action, taking into account the external impact for your company. We also support you with our knowledge and experience in preparing a business plan that can stand up to scrutiny by the works council and a labor court.

Together with you, we implement the necessary measures (particularly staff cuts, relocations or transfers of business). You receive support in negotiations on reconciliation of interests and social plans, structural agreement negotiations as well as labor court disputes, all from one source. We have co-developed legal-tech tools that can be used to limit the costs of a social plan and/or to enable you to make a legally sound selection, based on social criteria, that complies with the Federal Labor Court’s case law and corresponds most closely to your wish list.

Specifically, we focus on:

• Negotiations on reconciliation of interests and social plans
• Collective bargaining social plan negotiations
• Arbitration committee proceedings
• Structural collective bargaining agreements
• Restructuring-based collective agreements
• Mass redundancy notifications
• Works council hearings
• Representation in litigation

The Restructuring Practice Group advises companies on the employment law planning and implementation of restructuring projects.

The advice begins with an initial preparation and planning phase. It is crucial that a restructuring decision conceived from a business perspective is translated into an entrepreneurial decision that is viable from an employment law perspective, so that it can withstand possible negotiations with the works council in the context of a reconciliation of interests procedure and later dismissal protection proceedings. For this purpose, PWWL has developed a sample template and supports the management in the preparation and conceptualization of the entrepreneurial decision.

In the implementation phase, PWWL provides support in negotiations with the works council within the framework of a reconciliation of interests procedure and in drawing up a social plan. PWWL has developed a tool to sustainably reduce social plan costs. With the help of this tool, the expected economic disadvantage can be quantified on the basis of labor market statistics. This usually leads to a substantial reduction of the volume of the social plan.

At the same time, we also provide support in optimizing social selection or the application of legal instruments for a reduction in personnel that deviates from social selection in order to realize the reduction in personnel desired by the company. In the further implementation phase, we provide support in the preparation of mass dismissal notices as well as in the conduct of any dismissal protection proceedings with employees who are taking action against the termination of their employment relationship.

PWWL has extensive experience in providing employment law support for restructuring projects and advises you at the highest level every step of the way. In addition, with currently more than 60 professionals working in 6 locations in Germany, PWWL also has sufficient personnel capacities to be able to implement projects on any scale in a timely manner. We regularly work with transfer companies, interim personnel managers, insolvency administrators and lawyers as well as restructuring consultants and can establish all necessary contacts within the scope of a restructuring project and therefore set up a powerful team.

Our Team: Thomas Wahlig, Dr. Jochen Keilich, Dr. Falko Daub, Verena Braeckeler-Kogel, Dr. Alexander Lorenz, Marijke van der Most, Dr. Eva Trost, Dr. Juliane Schwarz, Dr. Constanze Mercedes Merkelbach-Scholtka, Kristina Schilder, Stefanie Götz-Dertinger, Iva Martchev, Karsten Keller

Your contact persons

It takes one to know one.

We understand start-ups because we used to be one ourselves. We know about bold and hopeful beginnings, we know about success as well as the odd setback and, above all, about the challenges that come with growth. We are driven by innovation, something we have in common with our clients. We enjoy accompanying them on this path – from the early stage to profitability.

Do business, but know the risks.

Nothing ventured, nothing gained. Without a certain willingness to take a risk, founders are unlikely to get beyond the pre-seed stage. However, it is important to keep damage away from the company and oneself. To be able to do this, the management needs to know where the limits are between (residual) risks and dangers. Advice on prevention is not in line with the way we see ourselves; we are open to unconventional ideas and almost always find a way to implement them effectively and in a legally secure manner.

It’s a people’s business, always.

In the beginning, start-ups can often hardly afford to recruit excellent and therefore expensive employees, and certainly even less so mediocre to poor employees. Therefore, they have to be creative in the competition for talents: intrapreneurship, non-cash benefits and a workplace that can be adapted to private needs must be attractive and legally secure. Thanks to our international network, we are also able to do this across borders.

Preserve what makes you distinct.

In a market economy, one cannot help but deal with the competition. In order to establish an optimal defence, we work with an interdisciplinary network of experts with which we have built a trustworthy relationship over many years.

Steady wins the race.

With „ product-market-fit“, growth begins – at least ideally. The business model is scaled, investments in marketing, sales and staff are made. We have the quantitative and qualitative capacity to stand by our clients at all stages, in operational as well as strategic questions.

Our Team: Dr. Tobias Pusch, Dr. Falko Daub, Maren Burkhardt, Kristina Schilder, Dr. Anna Franziska Hauer, Teresa Gabele

Your contact persons