DEI Compliance Challenges for Multinational Employers: When U.S. and International Laws Diverge

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Course Details
- smart_display Format
Live Online with Live Q&A
- signal_cellular_alt Difficulty Level
Intermediate
- work Practice Area
Employment and Workers Comp
- event Date
Wednesday, December 10, 2025
- schedule Time
1:00 p.m. ET./10:00 a.m. PT
- timer Program Length
90 minutes
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This 90-minute webinar is eligible in most states for 1.5 CLE credits.
-
Live Online
On Demand
This CLE webinar will examine the challenges faced by multinational employers with employees in the U.S. and non-U.S. countries who must comply with the anti-DEI measures instituted under the current administration while remaining compliant with other countries' pro-DEI measures. The panel will provide an overview of these laws, address the issues facing multinational employers, and offer best practices for creating compliance strategies.
Faculty

Mr. Dowling has extensive experience advising U.S.-based companies on outbound international labor and employment laws. He provides counsel on a wide variety of global employment law matters, including codes of conduct and HR policies that guide operations in multiple jurisdictions, international compensation and benefits issues, whistleblower hotlines, and cross-border internal investigations and HR compliance audits. Mr. Dowling regularly advises clients on employment matters that arise with international restructuring, reductions in force, mergers, acquisitions, and outsourcing. Additionally, he helps clients properly engage independent contractors overseas, manage expatriate programs, and develop employment agreements and employee handbooks. Earlier in his career, Mr. Dowling served as in-house international employment counsel for a Fortune 500 company in Paris and as an employment law consultant for a global consulting firm. He has delivered hundreds of presentations on international employment law issues in English and Spanish in countries around the world and regularly publishes articles and teaches courses on a variety of global employment law topics.
Description
The anti-DEI stance taken by the current administration and propounded through executive orders and agency guidance (e.g., EEOC and DOJ) creates compliance challenges for multinational employers—whether U.S. based companies with employees in other countries or non-U.S. based companies with employees in the U.S—who may be required by laws in other countries to incorporate DEI initiatives in the workplace.
In the U.S., executive orders and agency guidance under the Trump administration have made it clear that protected characteristics like sex and race cannot be used as a basis for preferential treatment in employment actions and opportunities. This may conflict with laws in other countries that require employers to measure certain characteristics to reach targeted policy measures.
For example, the EU's Gender Balance on Corporate Boards Directive seeks a more balanced representation of women and men in corporate management bodies and requires at least 40% of non-executive directors and 33% of all directors in covered companies to be held by members of the underrepresented gender group by June 30, 2026. Additionally, the EU's Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) obliges covered employers to report on various sustainability measures including equality, non-discrimination, diversity, and inclusion.
Non-European countries have enacted pro-DEI initiatives as well. For instance, Japan has passed laws requiring employers to put certain measures into place to achieve the government's stated goal to achieve at least 30% female representation in managerial and executive positions by 2030. And the Canadian province of British Columbia has enacted gender-based pay transparency requirements triggered by employee headcount thresholds. Other provinces are developing similar laws.
Counsel should understand how to guide their multinational employer clients through this regulatory minefield so they may remain compliant in all jurisdictions in which they have an employee presence, which may mean strategizing to create policies with a more targeted, jurisdictional-based DEI approach rather than uniform policies with a global reach.
Listen as our expert panel examines the DEI conundrum facing multinational employers. The panel will compare current U.S. anti-DEI initiatives against pro-DEI trends in other countries and discuss best practices for helping these employers create compliance strategies.
Outline
I. Introduction
II. Current administration's anti-DEI initiatives
A. Executive orders
B. DOJ guidance
C. EEOC guidance
D. Judicial actions
III. Divergent international laws
A. EU
B. Non-European countries
IV. State and local pro-DEI requirements
V. Multinational employer challenges and options for DEI policy implementation
A. Unified or global policy approach
B. Jurisdictional or targeted policy approach
VI. Practitioner takeaways
Benefits
The panel will review these and other important issues:
- How does the anti-DEI stance taken under the Trump administration compare to pro-DEI initiatives being propounded in other countries?
- What challenges does this create for multinational employers with employees in the U.S. and in these other countries?
- What strategies may counsel offer their employer clients to mitigate risk of noncompliance in jurisdictions with divergent DEI laws?
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