If you are the employee and you have signed a non-compete agreement, the first question that you always have is how to get out of this non-compete agreement. We get calls all the time from employees who either signed a non-compete going into employment or were asked to sign a non-compete contract and confidentiality agreement during their employment. They sign those thinking, of course, that everything will go great for life and all of a sudden there is a downsizing or you get fired, or there’s a change in management, and you wonder what your options are going out the door.

Non-compete agreements typically are very broadly drafted, and so if you happen to be a person in the technology field and you’ve signed a non-compete agreement, many of those non-compete agreements are drafted so broadly that you couldn’t go work as a local web developer doing your own internal web design, for no customers. These things have to be limited to a legitimate business purpose. You, as the employee, typically have a much smaller budget for your lawyers to work with than the employer has. Negotiation is typically the approach that we use when we have an employee who wants to know, “How do I get out of this non-compete agreement. I’m either still employed or recently laid off. I’m looking at this other employment opportunity, and I don’t want to get their new employer in trouble. I don’t want to violate my non-compete.”

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