your hired help leaves....then what

[Five Star]

If you have them sign a non-compete contract, then you should have them sign an employee contract, with all terms of employment. Hours, Salary, Job Duties, expectations.



The reason being is if you promise them something, and don`t deliver. You are breaching the contract, therefore the non-compete is null and void. It also gives you a way to get rid of someone and still have the opportunity to enforce the non-compete if they fail to do their job duties or live up to your expectations.

[vosstire]

Non-compete clauses are necessary if reasonable (few years and few miles) and the state in which you are in upholds them in court.



Why should you put your business at risk to someone working for you who not only leaves and opens up shop across the street, but steals your customers (which he thinks are now his).

[robertrinaustin]

yeah i was thinking of a time frame about 1-2 years or so....not forever!



but they do hold up in court, maybe in some instances not, but they will hold up according to my lawyer/teacher in my law for small business class right now

You`ve got some bad information. There is also a bunch of other bad information in this thread. First, noncompetes are unenforceable in California with only a very few exceptions. In other states, it varies from state to state. There are many states where a well written non-compete is enforceable. In the last 5 years, I have beed involved in 4 non-compete suits in 4 different states (I worked for an international company that agresively pursued non-compete agreements) and in three cases, the employer prevailed. The one where the employer lost involved and employee that stayed in the industry, but in a different capacity (moved from a sales to operations position) and the judge ruled this did not violate the non-compete.

[imported_atlas]

IMO, successful businesses develope strong customer bases, rather than take their customers/employees hostage.

[imported_mirrorfinishman]

do you make your employees sign a NO COMPETE CONTRACT stating they cannot operate their own business in a certain radius from your location?

Think about it. Becoming a successful entrepreneur is not that easy. If it was, everyone would be in their own business. Always remain focused on your own business, not the competition.

[David Fermani]

As the old Italian proverb mentions: Keep your friends close, but your enemies even closer.

[Envious Eric]

just to clarify:



no compete contracts are illegal in california....I asked my professor and he confirmed it..

[safetyman2010]

A non-compete contract will more than likely mean nothing if someone you have sign one wants to open their own detailing business. The legal costs to try and enforce it (if you can even do that in most cases) would far outweigh the benefits. My suggestion is to have an iron clad employee manual and an employment contract. In the contract you can stipulate that an employee may not discuss anything that pertains to your business after leaving and can forbid them from using your confidential clients list to create business for any reason after they leave. You can also build in such things as having to pay you back for training costs etc.... if you outlay a lot of time to get them trained for thier position. A friend of mine signed such an agreement for a consulting firm he was hired by and when he quit with no notice he lost his last 2 weeks of pay as conpensation. This IMHO would be more effective as a deterrent and probably far easier to enforce.

[kpagel]

Eric, the only thing that should really worry you is an ex-employee stealing clients. As others have said, starting a business is hard work, not anyone can do it. I think one way to prevent clients from following an employee is to keep the employees away from customers. That is, YOU should deal with all the clients personally. Develop a personal relationship with them. Ask them about their job, their kids. Become a buddy of sorts. Make them trust YOU and make them understand that your employees are there to help out, under your supervision, and you`re doing the important tasks. If a client barely even knows your employees name, he might be less inclined to follow him should he leave and start his own business.



My old boss was like this. He got really friendly with most of his clients, to the point where he`d be invited over for birthday parties and such. He was a terrible detailer, but he had good people skills. More importantly, he didn`t let me get close to the customers and never let them know that I actually knew more about detailing than he did. I don`t know if he was worried I`d leave with his customers or what, but he had some really loyal clients, despite his bad techniques.

[CSTMCLN]

Do your best work and you should be ok.i do know if people i worked for in the past had not taught me the tricks to detailing i would not be detailing today.pay your help good and treat them like people not robots and they will stay .