Anyone ever sign a non-compete form for their job?

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cheese9988

Senior Member
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Anyone here ever sign one of these things? Anyone ever try to get another job and not tell their old employer? Seems kinda scary that I can't get a job again with what I am doing without moving a couple of states away.
 
Well, when I wanted to be a driver at one pizza place while doing cutbox at another they wouldn't hire me unless I quit the place I cutboxed at.

Never signed that kind of contract, but yeah it'd be a conflict of interest.
 
yeah, i've signed two :)

no biggie in the IT world. it just applies that you cant work for competitors really. my non-compete states i cant work at another exhibit house within 100 miles.

how many competitors in the exhibit world in my area? none for a few hundred miles :)
 
what do you do? it's mostly where you could steal clients from your current company or sell information to your new company. I have signed 3 i think. it's not really a big deal. it just tries to keep things legal.
 
what do you do? it's mostly where you could steal clients from your current company or sell information to your new company. I have signed 3 i think. it's not really a big deal. it just tries to keep things legal.

I do calibration & metrology. Basically I check measurement equipment for accuracy. Whether it be hand tools to high end electronics, temperature, force, pressure, rf, linear speed, torque, liquid flow, vibration etc. We deal with hundreds of companies in the mid eastern states to calibrate their test equipment.
So basically if I knew a clients equipment list I could potentially steal business. The only difference is that my old company deals mostly with industrial companies and the new one I have an offer for deals with pharmaceutical companies, so they don't directly compete.
 
i have one for my current job.

it's no big deal for me, because there's really no one else in the near vicitinity that does the same thing.
 
it just means you cant do side work or they can sew you for the money that should of been made- you can work for anyone if you quit -but if you leave and go into bussiness for your self you have to do it out of there territory
 
No no no no no.... No.


The Non Compete agreement means that you won't share secrets with their competitors or any competitor to enter the market from the time of your signing.

I can have a job now at another hospital or college. If they release something that is traced back to me sharing trade secrets then I can be sued.

Like Chris said, you sign them ALL the time in I.T. The difference between the IT one and perhaps yours (or another) is that in IT we have knowledge of trade secrets and more (Emails, for instance) that can easily be used to bring a company out of business.

In normal ones, they just don't want you to either work for their competitor during their product cycle (Anywhere from 30 days to many many years) or they don't want you to work in their area of business for a specific amount of time (again, their business cycle) You can't start your own business in their line of work. So, you can't learn all sorts of shit, get intimate with their clientele and then run off and do it independently. Their time that they forbid this is decided not by them but by a regulating body. In my business (the one which I own a permit) my business cycle is 30 days. The moment I filed for a patent under my old one, it became 2 years. (R&D, sales, and life cycle of product). They chose those times because I held a patent in an automotive design.

Now, I change oil and try to stay on the down-low every year with my money. At least for now. When I get back on my feet, I'll have a few things laying around the workbench that I don't want others to see. So I'll also have a non-disclosure agreement with any employees or constituents.

This stuff won't prevent you from getting a job anywhere. Trust me on this. It only gives them the right to sue you if your new employer copies one of their ideas, and they can prove that it was you that gave it to them.
 
The non-compete I'm in now says I shouldn't work do ANY of the same or related work for one year in the mid eastern states whether or not I quit or get fired. Kinda sucks because if something did happen it kinda forces me to move, and what if I don't like the company. So I am wondering what would happen if I were to take my chances.

And there are no trade secrets associated with this job. The new one I applied to deals with different companies that have trade secrets, so I had to go through a background check.
 
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NDA and non-competes are almost worthless, we've run into it a few times, but you can't restrict a person from making a living, well you can try.

For example, I work with a fellow who signed a non-compete for a company he worked for for many years, they made wigits. He also streamlined their production etc... Well he was laid off, and we hired him and started a product line making the same widgits but went after a different market segment, he also helped improve our production on all product lines. He's been a professional Product Engineer for years, the company he left threatened to sue based on his non-compete, but it all came down to the fact that you can't prevent a person from making a living, If you're a professional widgit maker and that's all you know how to do you can't be forced to never make wigits again. most courts will not uphold an unreasonable non-compete agreement.

in general non-competes are scare tactics.
 
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