Anna Wermuth, Employment Attorney in Chicago, Illinois

Anna serves as the vice-chair of Cozen O’Connor’s national Labor & Employment Department, where she has been integral to the growth and success of the firm’s L&E practice. Working out of the Chicago office, employers engage her to represent them in high-stakes, high-profile labor and employment litigation before state and federal courts and administrative agencies.

She is also widely recognized as a “go to” legal resource for institutions of higher education, representing prestigious colleges and universities in leading collective bargaining negotiations and labor arbitrations, developing employee-engagement strategies for union-organizing campaigns, and litigating a myriad of faculty, staff, and student matters.

For over 20 years, Anna has brought both innovative and practical approaches to complex employment law matters to achieve favorable and precedent-setting results, whether in large-scale class actions or single-plaintiff cases involving the full range of employment-related disputes, including discrimination, wage and hour and non-compete agreements. Anna also has a robust traditional labor practice, representing employers in managing unionized workforces, negotiating collective bargaining agreements, developing employee engagement strategies, and litigating labor arbitrations and matters at the NLRB. She also regularly counsels employers on the full range of novel legal issues facing employers, from addressing the impact of national current events in the workplace, to navigating the patchwork of state and local obligations in the workplace, executing human resources strategies, and conducting internal investigations. Anna is praised by clients for being an “extraordinary litigator and trial lawyer;” and “extremely skilled, very good with clients and strategic.”

Anna is also an active member of the American Bar Association’s Labor & Employment Law Section, where she has held several leadership positions. In 2021, Anna was appointed Employer Vice-Chair of the ABA L&E Section’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the Legal Profession Committee. She also currently serves as the management co-vice chair for the Section’s National Trial Advocacy Competition. She is the past management co-chair of the Section’s Development of the Law Under the NLRA Committee and has served as an associate editor of Developing Labor Law - the leading traditional labor law treatise jointly published by Bloomberg/BNA and the ABA. Anna is also the past-chair of the Chicago Bar Association’s Labor & Employment Law Committee.

In addition, in 2021 Anna was appointed to the Advisory Committee for the Study of the Rules of Practice and Internal Operating Procedures of the District and Bankruptcy Courts of the Northern District of Illinois.

Inducted in 2020 as a Fellow of the College of Labor and Employment Lawyers (CLEL), Anna has been recognized by several law and business publications for sustained outstanding performance in the legal profession, including Crain’s Chicago Business, the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin, and Lawdragon/HRE magazine. She is also consistently recognized by her peers as one of the top labor and employment attorneys in Chambers USA, Best Lawyers and SuperLawyers.

Anna writes and speaks on a variety of contemporary labor and employment topics for the American Bar Association, the National Association of College and University Attorneys, the Corporate Counsel Institute, the Practicing Law Institute, the Society of Human Resource Management, and other business, bar, legal education, and academic associations.

Prior to entering private practice, Anna served as law clerk to the Honorable Rebecca R. Pallmeyer of the District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. In addition to her legal practice, Anna serves on the board of directors of the Chicago Youth Centers, a 64-year-old nonprofit organization that services more than 4,000 children and families in Chicago each year with early childhood education, out-of-school, and teen leadership programs.

Work History:

Cozen O’Connor (2015 – Present)

Meckler Bulger Tilson (2000– 2015)

Honorable Rebecca R. Pallmeyer, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois (1999-2000)