In Jacksonville, a former employer recently successfully sued an employee for breaching a noncompetition agreement, and the employee is prohibited from continuing in his current job until the suit is is final.
Under Florida law, employers and employees can agree on terms under which an employee will still be bound after terminating employment. These are commonly referred to non-compete agreements, and they usually cover numerous topics.
Typically these agreements contain provisions prohibiting the employee from working in a competing industry for a set period of time after leaving his or her position usually within a specified geographical territory.
Almost all of these types of agreements prohibit an employee from utilizing any of the information they learned about customers, processes, vendors and business practices in a new or competing business. These agreements also typically prohibit an employee from attempting to persuade his or her former coworkers to join in a new enterprise or with a competitor.
If you are an employer who is concerned about employees being able to utilize the information they obtain while in your employ, it is prudent to seek the advice of an experienced attorney to help draft agreements that are valid and will be enforced by the courts. If you are a person who has been asked to sign a non-compete agreement as a condition of employment, you should consult an attorney who is knowledgeable about these agreements and can assist you in understanding the potential issues you could face. Courts will enforce these types of agreements, and litigation is an expensive way to resolve an issue which perhaps could have been avoided.