Monitor HR compliance updates from DOL with GPT-4o-mini and Google Sheets

Quick overview This workflow checks the US Department of Labour RSS feed every hour, filters for HR-relevant updates, uses OpenAI GPT-4o-mini to assess whether each item requires action, and logs actionable compliance tasks with summaries and checklists to a Google Sheets tracker.

How it works Runs every hour and reads the latest items from the US Department of Labor RSS feed. Filters the feed items for HR-related keywords (for example wage, overtime, FMLA, discrimination, and compliance) while excluding settlement and back-pay style announcements. Processes the remaining articles one at a time to avoid rate limits. Sends each article’s title, date, excerpt, and link to OpenAI (GPT-4o-mini) to return strict JSON with actionability, summary, priority, checklist, owner team, and due timeline. Cleans and parses the AI JSON output, formats the checklist as bullet points, and defaults to non-actionable if parsing fails. Appends actionable items to a Google Sheets “Compliance Tracker” tab and waits 30 seconds before continuing to the next article.

Setup Add an OpenAI credential for the GPT-4o-mini model. This workflow polls the US Department of Labor RSS feed every hour, filters articles for HR-relevant keywords, uses GPT-4o-mini to analyze each update for actionability, and saves only items requiring real HR action to a Google Sheets compliance tracker. 1 The workflow polls the US Department of Labor RSS feed automatically every hour to check for new employment law releases and regulatory updates. 2 A filter step checks each article's title and description against an HR keyword list — keeping items about labor, wage, safety, overtime, FMLA, discrimination, and compliance — while dropping settlement verdicts and back-pay award announcements. 3 Each filtered article is processed one at a time through a batch loop to avoid sending too many requests to the OpenAI API at once. 4 GPT-4o-mini analyzes each article and returns a structured JSON object containing: whether the update is actionable for HR, a 2-sentence summary, priority level (High, Medium, or Low), a specific action checklist, the owner team responsible, and a due timeline. 5 A parse step cleans the GPT output, strips any formatting, and converts the checklist array into bullet points ready for the sheet. 6 An actionability check routes each article: if GPT marked it actionable (Yes), it is saved to Google Sheets. If not actionable (No), it skips the sheet and goes directly to the wait step. 7 A 30-second wait runs after every article — whether saved or skipped — before the loop moves to the next article. This prevents rate limit errors and keeps the workflow stable.

Requirements Active n8n instance (self-hosted or cloud) OpenAI account with GPT-4o-mini API access Google Sheets with a tab named Compliance Tracker Google Sheets OAuth2 credential connected in n8n No RSS account needed — the DOL feed is publicly accessible

Customization Monitor a different agency — in node 1. RSS — US Dept of Labor Feed, replace the feedUrl value with any public compliance RSS feed: OSHA uses https://www.osha.gov/news/newsreleases/national/rss.xml, EEOC uses https://www.eeoc.gov/rss.xml, and NLRB uses https://www.nlrb.gov/news-outreach/rss Add more HR keywords — in node 2. Code — Filter HR Relevant Articles, add terms to the includeKeywords array such as ada, cobra, erisa, or pay transparency to catch additional regulation types Add email alerts for High Priority items — after node 7. Sheets — Save to Compliance Tracker, add a Gmail step with an IF check that sends an immediate email notification when the Priority field equals High Change the polling frequency — in node 1. RSS — US Dept of Labor Feed, change the poll interval from every hour to every 6 hours or daily to reduce API usage for lower-priority monitoring Add a Slack notification — after node 7. Sheets — Save to Compliance Tracker, add a Slack step to post the article title, priority, and due timeline to a compliance channel so the team is notified without checking the sheet

Additional info The 30-second wait in node 8. Wait — 30s Before Next Article is intentional rate-limit protection. Both the actionable (YES) and non-actionable (NO) paths from the IF check merge at this wait step before looping back to process the next article. Do not remove or bypass this step — doing so may cause OpenAI API rate limit errors when many articles are processed in one run.

The batch loop in node 3. Split — Process One by One processes all filtered articles from the current hourly poll in sequence. If 10 articles pass the keyword filter in one hour, the loop runs 10 times — each taking approximately 30 seconds minimum. Large batches may take several minutes to complete.

GPT-4o-mini is instructed to only mark an article as actionable if it requires a real HR policy or process change. Informational updates, research reports, and court verdicts are typically marked as non-actionable and skipped without saving to the sheet.