Editors' Note: This article has been updated to reflect a correction. An earlier version included an incorrect photo of author Gary D. Friedman.

In a decision that will likely result in numerous workplace harassment cases being dismissed at the summary judgment stage and compel employers to more clearly delineate the job responsibilities of their employees to identify those who have "the authority to take tangible employment actions," the U.S. Supreme Court surgically narrowed the scope of who constitutes a "supervisor" under Title VII in its recent Vance v. Ball State Univ., No. 11-556, 2013 WL 3155228 (U.S. June 24, 2013) decision. In flatly rejecting the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's definition of "supervisor" as "nebulous," "murky" and a "study in ambiguity," the court adopted a standard that neither of the parties on appeal had proposed but that could be "readily applied" by litigants, courts and juries, and was consistent with the court's attempt to balance the interests of employers and employees in its seminal decisions in Faragher v. Boca Raton, 524 U.S. 775 (1998) and Burlington Industries v. Ellerth, 524 U.S. 742 (1998). Now, only those who have the "authority to inflict direct economic injury" will be viewed as supervisors, which will sharply limit the number of instances in which employers can be held strictly liable for workplace harassment.

Case Background

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