

How Companies Kill Their Employees' Job Searches - zwieback
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/10/how-companies-kill-their-employees-job-searches/381437/

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michaelochurch
It's amazing to me that non-competes (or one-way non-disparagement, or binding
mandatory arbitration) are even legal.

At a bare minimum, non-competes should entail full salary and benefits during
the period of non-competition ("gardening leave") plus an allowance (15% or
$30k per year, whichever is less) for education and training during the
period, plus a well-defined scope of competition.

If you won't pay someone not to work for a competitor for two years, then it's
not fucking important that he not work for the competitor. So let him go.

Plenty of just-worlders say things like, "Well, no one should sign a contract
like that." The problem is that some people are desperate and ruin the
negotiation for all of us, and that it's embarrassing to negotiate those terms
as an individual. When you're really just looking out for your rights, you end
up having to identify yourself as potentially litigious before you even start.
This kind of nonsense is exactly why we, in software, need either a
professional guild or a union.

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nmjohn
They aren't always legal - or rather they rarely hold up in the court of law.
(USA at least)

What I've been told by my lawyer is basically the only time it will hold up is
if you can prove that it was violated and your company was significantly
harmed as a result (ex: You took 50 clients with you to the new firm). And the
time period was reasonable (ex: 5+ year non-competes are likely never held up
as the time period is absolutely unreasonable in almost all cases)

Additionally, it has to be worth it to the company to actually go after the
person who violated the agreement - it is civil not criminal.

Which in the end results in a system where they are hardly ever enforced if
violated and serve more to scare people from violating them then actually
being legally enforceable.

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gumby
Actually they vary by state in the US. Texas has wide ranging and draconian
non-complete restrictions. California forbids them. I have worked in both
places and I can tell you that California is much better from the POV of
employee AND employer.

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qwerta
In Europe (at least in czech rep) non-compete is limited to one year, and
original company has to pay worker, if he is unable to find new job due to
non-compete agreement.

