November 27, 2018

When is the last time you dusted off your non-compete agreements to ensure it was still compliant with your jurisdiction’s laws?  If it’s been awhile, there have been some major developments in this area of the law lately that may call for modifications of your current agreement or outright doing away with them completely.  In California and North Dakota, for example, non-compete agreements are only allowed in VERY limited circumstances. In Illinois, you cannot enforce a non-compete agreement against an employee making less than $13.00/hour.  In August of this year, Massachusetts enacted the Massachusetts Noncompetition Agreement Act which has a litany of requirements including that the agreement expressly state the employee may consult with an attorney before signing, that it not be longer than one year from the date employment ends, and that they are unenforceable against any employee classified as nonexempt or employees that have been terminated without cause or laid off.  If you have a non-compete and this amalgam of varying state laws is making your head spin, contact one of our attorneys at myHRcounsel to help you make sense of it all.