While there are many businesses that operate in the same industry, doing the same thing in the same exact way, the organizations that stand out and excel are the ones that have a “secret sauce” – some technique or product or process that is theirs and theirs alone. No matter what your company does or how you make your money, if you feel that there is something that sets you apart from your competitors, protecting it becomes a priority. That is the reason behind non-compete agreements.
A non-compete agreement is a contract between a company and its employee. It sets out parameters for what the employee is allowed and not allowed to do once they leave the organization. These boundaries may seem arbitrary at first glance, but they’re not: Their intent is to prevent trade secrets from being shared.
It is easy enough to understand the dangers of having an employee teach confidential sales techniques to your competitor, and the same is true of pricing, product information, or any other proprietary information, Once your trade secrets are known they lose their power, and there is a strong potential for you to lose market share, the element of surprise about a new product, or your ability to create something that is truly unique to meets a market need. Because it would be impossible for your business to operate without certain employees knowing these trade secrets, those are the key workers whose ability to share you most need to limit. A non-compete agreement does that by restricting the industry, position, or geographic region they can work in, though only for a defined period of time or distance that the courts agree reasonably protects your business interests without unreasonably preventing the employee from earning a living.
A well-crafted non-compete agreement will effectively protect your business from having its secrets shared. Not only does it do this by establishing rules about employees’ ability to go to work for a competitor, but it can also include terms that restrict the information that they are able to share. In order to make sure that the language in your non-compete matches your competitive needs, contact our experienced law firm today. We will help to protect your business.