So, our marketing team was all geared up to publish an article called “NLRB’s GC Doubles Down on Position against Non-Compete Provision.” Because their General Counsel recently issued a memorandum outlining how to protect employees – and punish employers – for non-compete provisions that violate the NLRA.
But then Trump was elected president. And President-Elect Trump loves non-compete documents.
How much?
Word on the street is that the non-compete section of his campaign’s employment agreement is five pages long and that the organization leading the Texas litigation on this matter was a significant Trump donor.
So, now what?
Well, from all outward signs, the FTC wants to ban non-competes while the incoming President is all about them. Basically, we’re on notice that things are about to get sloppy.
What does “sloppy” mean? It’s possible that non-competes will be permitted federally but banned in some states. And even though they are kind of sort of currently banned, there are are several things the new administration is likely to do to stop the FTC’s anti-non-compete action (committee appointment, the appointment of a new FTC leader, order to withdraw the FTC’s cases, or congressional action).
So… yeah. Sloppy.
As Natalie recently discussed [link to social post from today] we only know what we know – and right now we only know the following:
- Lawyers can’t rescue their clients with old-school non-competes anymore.
- But we can use them! Probably. Maybe. At least with some employees. But probably mostly with executive-level employees.
- Companies can still protect themselves better than lawyers by safeguarding their trade secrets and confidential information.
During her presentation, she went through some super practical steps for doing this, so reach out if you need some legal and practical help on your non-compete activities.
