Amy Beth Royal

Amy is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Royal.  She has over sixteen years of experience in private and public sector employer-side representation.  Amy began her legal career as an Assistant Attorney General for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts where she defended the Commonwealth in complex civil litigation matters.  Amy has also served as a judicial extern for the Honorable Lawrence E. Kahn in the United States District Court, Northern District of New York and was employed by the City of Springfield in its Law Department.

Upon entering private practice, Amy concentrated in company-side labor and employment law.  Over the course of her career, Amy has successfully defended employers in federal and state courts as well as before administrative agencies in a variety of areas of employment law, including employment discrimination and sexual harassment, unfair competition, breach of contract and wrongful discharge claims, workers' compensation, and Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) and Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) violations, with a special emphasis in wage and hour class actions.  Amy has assisted employers with unionized workforces during contract negotiations, at arbitrations, and with respect to employee grievances and unfair labor practice charges.  She provides regular counsel to clients on general workplace matters, performs preventive work such as wage and hour law compliance, recordkeeping audits, and management training, and drafts contracts, employee manuals and affirmative action plans.  Amy also advises non-union clients on maintaining a union-free workplace.

Amy is a frequent speaker at a wide variety of business associations and organizations and has authored innumerable articles on employment-related legal topics.  She is also the author of “The Parameters of the Substantial Justification Test as Established by the Supreme Court in Lunding v. New York Tax Appeals Tribunal,” 63 Alb. L. Rev. 657 (1999).