Robert S. Giolito
I began my career in 1974 in Atlanta as an associate with the labor law firm of Adair, Goldthwaite, Stanford & Daniel. In 1977, I became a founding partner of the firm Stanford, Fagan & Giolito, which grew to become the preeminent labor and employment firm in Georgia. In 2002, the Directors Guild of America in Los Angeles recruited me to be their General Counsel. I returned to private practice In 2007, remaining in Los Angeles.
I have litigated all kinds of labor and employment disputes, including wage and hour, wrongful termination, and discrimination claims. I have handled contract negotiations large and small, from individual employment contracts and deal memos to collective bargaining agreements involving an entire industry. I’ve helped creative talent, designers, agents, and content producers in rights negotiations, distribution agreements, privacy issues, and copyright, trademark, and other intellectual property claims. My labor union work is quite extensive, including organizing campaigns, hiring hall administration, contract mediation and arbitration, strikes and boycotts, as well as internal union governance and merger issues. For example, I represented the Screen Actors Guild in its successful merger with the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists to form SAG-AFTRA, the world’s largest entertainment union.
I have also been active in professional activities that help to develop the law. I am the former Co-chair of the American Bar Association’s Committee on Practice and Procedure under the National Labor Relations Act, and former Chair of the Labor and Employment Sections of the State Bar of Georgia and the Atlanta Bar Association. I’ve also served on the Chairman’s Advisory Commission of the National Labor Relations Board. I am a Chapter Editor of How to Take a Case Before the NLRB published by Bloomberg BNA Books. I frequently speak at national and regional conferences on labor and employment issues, including at the American Bar Association’s annual Conference on Labor and Employment Law and the annual meetings of the Practice and Procedure Committee.
I graduated from the University of Wisconsin Law School in Madison in 1974, and from Stony Brook University in Stony Brook, NY, in 1971. I was born and raised in New York City, lived for many years in Atlanta, and currently reside in Santa Monica, California.