Margaret A. Harris

Margaret A. Harris has been practicing employment law since 1983.

She is a 1981 graduate magna cum laude from the University of Houston where she and Kathy Butler met and became friends. She has an accounting degree, and, before law school, worked for three years as a management auditor with the U.S. Government Accountability Office (formerly known as the U.S. General Accounting Office).

Margie founded and served as the first president of the Texas Employment Lawyers Association – a professional association composed of lawyers whose employment practice is largely based on representing employees. Since its inception, TELA has grown from a handful of lawyers to a membership of over 100 lawyers.

Margie served on the Executive Board of the National Employment Lawyers Association (NELA) for ten years (1994-2005), and was an officer during her last years on that Board.

Margie currently serves on the Rules Committee of the National Employment Lawyers Association, which interacts with federal judges regarding the rules that apply to employment-related litigation. Margie served on the Employment Protocols Committee, a 16-lawyer group from around the country appointed to develop standardized discovery requests that can be used to minimize unnecessary costs and delays. Subsequently, Margie was one of approximately forty lawyers, academics, and judges from around the country invited to participate in a forum hosted by the Institute for the Advancement of the American Legal System to comment on and suggest changes to proposed amendments to the federal rules of civil procedure.

Margie was invited to serve on the first Labor and Employment Law Pattern Jury Charge Advisory Committee for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. In 2005, this committee, which consisted of seven members representing both sides of the bar, developed a standard set of jury instructions recommended for federal trials of employment law cases in Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi federal trial courts. Subsequent recommendations from this committee were included in both the 2006 and 2009 revisions to the standard jury instructions.

Margie volunteers with volunteer for Friends for Life (FFL), a non-profit and no-kill animal shelter in Houston dedicated to offering No Kill solutions to the animals of Houston and the people who want to help them. FFL’s programs include rescue, rehabilitation, adoption, humane education and animal food/supply support.