Re:How non-competes are damaging the Massachusetts economy: ...
by yummyfajitas on Thursday September 15, 2011 @10:45AM
(#3000549)
Presumably she wouldn't be allowed to /start/ a company, either.
No, she couldn't start a competing company.
I signed a noncompete, and am now starting a company. The only thing the noncompete prevents me from doing is a certain kind of high frequency trading.
Re:How non-competes are damaging the Massachusetts economy: ...
by _delirium on Thursday September 15, 2011 @11:27AM
(#3000722)
Outside CA, large tech companies tend to interpret a "competing company" to mean "another tech company", or at least they try to advance that interpretation (courts don't always accept it). For example, IBM's position is that a non-compete prohibits you from working in any field of endeavor that IBM works in, not only the specific one you previously worked in at IBM--- and IBM works in quite a lot of technology areas.
Re:How non-competes are damaging the Massachusetts economy: ...
by sethg on Thursday September 15, 2011 @01:03PM
(#3001120)
Related: A decade or so ago, I worked for a small company that was acquired by Lucent, and part of their legal paperwork involved assigning any IP we created that was relevant to Lucent’s current or future businesses. A co-worker of mine observed that according to this document, if Lucent got into the Web content business, it would own his personal Web site.
Re:How non-competes are damaging the Massachusetts economy: ...
by xsmasher on Thursday September 15, 2011 @03:57PM
(#3001869)
That's a good reason to write an addendum that defines "competing company" and "related business" in very narrow ways.
Employers have reacted more favorably to addendums rather than crossing out clauses, even if the addendum practically neuters the entire document.
Re:How non-competes are damaging the Massachusetts economy: ...
by _delirium on Thursday September 15, 2011 @04:52PM
(#3002077)
Hmm, that's an obvious-in-retrospect approach I hadn't thought of. Just try to submit an addendum that defines the relevant field as something that isn't absurd-sounding, but is quite specific to what you're being hired for, and therefore clearly excludes wide swathes of things that aren't that.
That's an incredibly long time.
That she chose to stay in the same industry was her fault
I consider my mind and my skill set as a tool of my trade. If I can't use it freely, I'm a serf. Presumably she wouldn't be allowed to /start/ a company, either.
A cow-orker of mine came to (large software company) from (another large software company), and had expertise in a certain sensitive area. We only found out about this when we asked him the reason he would go silent in meetings on certain subjects. He was under a funky trade-secret non-compete that had been worked out by lawyers, and was gagged for (I believe) five years from having technical input on stuff he was an expert in at the other company.
I don't agree with any of it.