Last Updated on January 17, 2026 by flyhighc
Non-compete agreements can shape your next move and your employer’s risk. In this episode, CEO host Porschia and attorney Eric Sarver explain what non-competes are (and aren’t) in plain English, so you can spot red flags fast.
You’ll learn how non-competes differ from non-solicitation and confidentiality clauses, and why courts and states are tightening limits. Expect clear guidance on scope, duration, geography, and how to negotiate terms that won’t stall your career.
They also cover what companies should improve now on their employment agreements: state-by-state tailoring, reasonable terms, paid “garden leave,” airtight trade-secret language, and smart alternatives if non-compete agreements are restricted or banned.
Eric Sarver is the founder of Sarver Law Firm (NY/NJ), a Manhattan-based employment and business attorney advising small to mid-sized companies on compliance, litigation, handbooks, and agreements. He blends courtroom insight with practical drafting to keep employers protected and professionals informed.
What you’ll learn:
- Non-compete agreements 101: where they appear, how they work (scope, duration, geography), and what’s enforceable.
- Key differences between non-competes, non-solicitation (clients/employees), and confidentiality/trade-secret protections.
- U.S. trends with non-compete agreements: growing state-level limits/bans, shifting federal signals, and courts trimming overbroad clauses.
- Tips on how executives/professionals can review and negotiate their non-compete agreements
- An employer playbook for enhancing employment agreements: tailor by state, time the agreement (offer/stock/severance), and draft for enforceability.
- What to do if non-compete bans expand, along with risk hotspots (remote teams, national territories, sales books) and compliant ways to protect client relationships.
As a thank you for listening to this episode of the Career 101 Podcast, we are sharing our FREE master class – Career 911: Solving the Top 5 Challenges Executives and Professionals Have! It’s a training based on solving the common problems our clients have experienced to reach their goals. You can get access to the master class here!
Resources:
-
- Episode Transcript
-
Porschia: [00:00:00] Hello, I’m Portia Parker Griffin, and I wanna welcome you to the Career 1 0 1 Podcast, a place for ambitious professionals and seasoned executives who want an edge in their career. We’re talking about all of the things you were never taught or told when it comes to career growth, development, and change.
Now let’s get into it.
Today we are talking about non-compete agreements with Eric Sarver. Eric Sarver is a Manhattan based employment law and business attorney who counsels defense and represents small to mid-size businesses in various industries. A Long Island native who went to SUNY Binghamton and Hofstra Law School.
Eric is the founding attorney of Sarver Law Firm. Eric and his associates help small to mid-size companies seeking to navigate the ever-changing [00:01:00] world of federal, state, and municipal law labor and employment law, law, while defending employers in federal and state courts arbitration or in government investigations.
Hi Eric. How are you today?
Eric: Hello. Push. I’m doing fine. Thank you. Really things are going smoothly. It’s been a good week so far, knock wood. So I’ll, I’ll take it.
Porschia: Yes, that is great. Well Eric, we are thrilled to have you with us to discuss non-compete agreements, but first we wanna know a little more you, so tell me about 7-year-old Eric.
Hmm.
Eric: Sure thing. Wish I’m happy to, to start with a little background about me and who I am. Well let’s see, 7-year-old Eric. He was smaller than I am now. Shorter than I am currently. I’m joking, of course. Right. But that is true. I’d say, you know, right. 7-year-old Eric was a very energetic social and creative, you know, kid, young boy, right?
Who, you [00:02:00] know, loved learning new things of exploring, finding out different just, you know, aspects of life. I think 7-year-old Eric also was. Always sort of a champion of the underdog. I remember like being in second grade, I guess, and sort of protesting an unfair policy at recess where there were lunch aids.
If somebody was, you know, quote unquote out of line, they’d have to write the whole class. I have to be penalized. I was unfair and I would, you know, protest that to the. Teacher, principal Princip. I think also I love to play, I had a great imagination is to, I was fascinated with time travel. I remember that.
Mm-hmm. And so everything was an opportunity to pretend I was back in the middle ages or, you know prehistoric times. Yeah. You know, just went to school. Some, my friends probably at times felt my younger sister. Who I’m now very close with, you know, but, and that’s kind of a, maybe a snapshot of myself.
Porschia: Age
Eric: seven, though.
Porschia: Yeah. Well, you know. A lot of interesting things there, [00:03:00] Eric, but I could hear the perhaps future lawyer in you protesting to the teacher Right. On behalf of the other students and the unfair policies that they were making. So I think that is what we’re gonna get into to, but tell us about some highlights or pivotal moments in your career before you started your own firm.
Eric: Yeah, sure thing. Portia happy to address that as well. Let’s see. Good question to think about here. Right. I would say in terms of pivotal highlights, you know, I started my firm pretty young. I. Pretty relatively quickly outta law school. So I graduated from law school in May of 98. Took them a New York State bar exam, passed it, got admitted in the state court, federal court, appellate courts, et cetera.
And I worked at two small law firms out of law school. So between the fall of 98 and. I’d say the early winter 2001. [00:04:00] So I, I started my firm in 2001. So in terms of like pivotal, say, career moments, I’d say before my practice in I guess one would be working on a trial assisting in, I would say, I think it was the winter, it was January and six week trial, January and part of February.
Of 2000 at a law firm on an employment law, business law matter in state Supreme Court. I remember everything, just taking all the notes and, and helping to write some of the questions. And I was just like, riveted. I thought it was fantastic. And then I remember also right, pivotal moments of being intricately involved in some big settlements but also getting a sense.
That law is both a practice and a business, which at first I resisted. I hated the idea of this being a business. It was, it was all about justice and helping the client and being a zealous advocate. And what I learned over the years is that, especially if I want to thrive as my own practice, [00:05:00] in order to do that.
It needs to be a business component. And so I think another pivoting turning point for me was being at a small firm in 2000, 2001, where they required different marketing and development, business development techniques. And I would do those and I started to like them. So I started my own practice.
It was enjoyable to network, to market, to promote.
Porschia: Yeah. And it’s amazing, Eric, that you got that experience, you know, with a trial before the State Supreme Court, so early in your career. I’m sure that was really exciting. So why did you decide to focus on employment loss specifically when you started your own firm?
Eric: It is a great question. When I was in law school, I considered civil rights law, which I did practice some of in my earlier career. I liked the employment law because it was not so [00:06:00] cut and dry. It wasn’t along the lines of tax law, property law, and there was, there were a lot of shade to graying and, and a lot of room for argument.
And I also enjoyed the human drama aspect. Of employment law, you had two, two sides that originally start out amicably, right? They go into this situation especially in employment, litigation, feeling optimistic. Somewhere along the lines, things go awry. So I enjoyed litigation because it gets a chance to help the the party that’s been aggrieved.
But also I like that there’s a proactive element to it. I like the fact that there are all these laws that come out that are open to interpretation and how we apply those laws and situations, and how we draft policies for. Business owners, let’s say, could be the difference between them being sued and facing fines and penalties, or potentially having situations where they won’t get sued or where [00:07:00] if they have a Department of Labor inquiry into their business, they might come off.
With a clean record. And so that was actually pretty painless. So that’s I think why I chose employment a lot. It was a good human drama aspect. There’s room for creative arguments, and I love dealing in shades of gray as opposed to more dry, black and white like taxes or numbers and such.
Porschia: Yeah, so we discussed employment agreements on the podcast back during episode 41.
Mm-hmm. And non-compete clauses or agreements are often included as part of a larger employment agreement. Before we dig into non-competes, in your opinion, what are some other important sections of employment agreements?
Eric: I would say. Other sections of employment agreements that are important. And when you say important, you’re referring to from the business owner’s perspective, the employer or from [00:08:00] the employee’s perspective of what to look for.
Porschia: I would say both.
Eric: Or both. Or both, right? Yeah, sure. Why not? Why don’t we start with the employer side first? I do represent a handful of employees. It matters, but I’d say 80 to 85% of my work is for the small, mid-sized business owner, the tech company, the startup, the restaurant. So we’ll start from the employer point of view.
Other important aspects of an employment agreement. If you’re the business owner, the employer, number one, would be right. Confidentiality. Confidentiality clause in the agreement. And I say the agreement, I mean usually the employment agreement or some sort of NDA nondisclosure agreement that basically.
Forces or forces a harsh word that ensures that the employee complies with the, you know, the keeping of certain, let’s say trade secrets of proprietary information, making sure they don’t disclose that to a competitor to the public. So you wanna have the sound [00:09:00] confidentiality clause and provisions in an appointment agreement.
And number two. Conflict of interest provisions that let’s say if an employee, for example, wants to try to work on the side hustle for your, one of your customers or clients, that might create a conflict of interest. And so you want to make sure you prohibit that. Like I’ve had clients where they didn’t have those clauses and they did not have a non-compete, and yet one of their.
Top managerial employees was working for an affiliate company that was a semi customer, a huge conflict of interest. They were double dipping on their commissions and there was little recourse. So I’d say number two is a good conflict of interest provision. And then maybe number three, ’cause just to take a time, maybe I give three examples, right?
Would be and think and protection of. I’d say number three would be a protection of proprietary information, right? Meaning that a client won’t steal or take your trademarks, won’t [00:10:00] use your copyrighted materials and infringement upon those copyrights. So those are just some main. Clauses besides the non-compete, and maybe one more if I may, a non-solicitation clause, non citation clauses are basically telling your employee, Hey, while you work for me and for a period of time after you leave the employment, whether you’re fired, resign, or otherwise.
You cannot poach or steal our clients. You can’t poach or take our prospective clients and you can’t poach or steal our employees or undercut our vendors. So those are like the four big ones I’d say for from the employer’s point of view.
Porschia: Love it. Love it. So many professionals and executives struggle with understanding non-compete agreements.
Can you explain what a non-compete agreement is?
Eric: I sure can. And I’d add quickly that with the employee side of the [00:11:00] employment agreement, as, and that’s part of your question mm-hmm. That you wanna also have those clauses in place to make sure that they’re reasonable in scope, if they’re reasonable in terms of how long they govern for, like the non citation, or how, how broadly they’re drafted.
You also wanna make sure that your compensation is very clearly delineated in the employment agreement. So, and to your question about the non-competes, could you repeat that one more time because I just Yeah,
Porschia: yeah,
Eric: yeah. Mm-hmm.
Porschia: It was that many professionals and executives struggle with understanding non-compete agreements, so I just wanted you to explain what a non-compete agreement is for us.
Eric: Sure. Yeah. That’s a good starting point, right? Start from the basics. What is a non-compete agreement? So a non-compete agreement, essentially. Is a part, usually a clause or provision in a contract. It’s usually in an employment contract, but it could also be, let’s say, if you are looking to bring on a business partner or [00:12:00] sell your business, and what it says is that the, let’s say for employees, take that context.
It says that the employee cannot essentially go and work for the competition either. While they’re working for your company or after you terminate them or after they resign, it basically defines what’s considered a competition, right? And what’s, who’s a competitor and what are considered competitive activities.
And then it has a scope and duration of how long you can’t work. Usually it’s six months to a year. So that’s, and then usually have the geographic location elements as well. So basically non-compete. It means is you basically can’t go, let’s, let’s say if you are top level, you know, marketing executive at a tech company and you have access to all the customer lists and the, and the marketing campaigns and pricing and you know which customers you know are right for your services, and then you work with tech company A, let’s say you can’t just go over to tech company B if you.
Quit or [00:13:00] you lay it off and say, Hey, I’m gonna take with me. I’ve got all these great customer lists and sources and information, and let’s use that to compete with an undercut company. A. So it’s saying, no, you can’t do that for at least a period of time, six months, nine months. I’ve seen them go so much as a year, and that way it gives the company a chance for a fair competition so that you’re not undercutting them.
And that’s kind of what it basically says.
Porschia: Right. So there any, are there any major differences between a non-compete clause or agreement and other types of agreements?
Eric: I would say so, yes. Great question. Couple of differences. One is that, and a lot of employment agreements, the clause. They’re, they end the obligations from the employer and the employee.
They stop when the employment stops. So for example, you are in promise a certain amount of pay commissions, compensation usually when the, when the employment ends, [00:14:00] that compensation or commission stops and shut off. And like likewise, you and the employment have certain obligations to your employer also that cease when the employment ends.
But a noncompete provision. One difference is that it’s called a restrictive covenant, and it survives the contract. So that means that let’s say your employer says, Hey, listen, you know Porsche, it’s been great working with you. Right? It’s time to part ways. Or let’s say you say to them, Hey, listen, I think I want to part ways and move on.
That’s all well and good, but the confidentiality provision, the non-solicitation and the non-compete are known as restrictive covenants, and they survive the contract. That’s one way in which they’re different. Another way in which are different is that they can be enforced against a third party. So in typical employment agreements, employment contracts, when, let’s say the employee reaches the employer, might be able to go after that employee.
Or if the employee breaches doesn’t pay what’s promised, or you know, [00:15:00] stiffs them on commissions, the employee can sue. But with a non-compete, if it’s in existence. Let’s say someone works for Verizon and they wanna go work for Sprint, something like that. Verizon can actually enforce the non-compete against Sprint.
They can say, Hey, listen, we’ve got a non-compete with Eric Ver, our top Chief Technology Officer, and he signed it. And we signed it. And if you take him on knowing he’s in violation, we can come after you under certain business law Torts, causative action. So those are a couple of ways in which a non-compete provision in an employment agreement or in a contract are different than other types of employment agreements and other types of provisions.
Porschia: Yes. Yes. And I’ve actually heard of that happening. Prior to starting this business, I was in consultative sales and you know that companies try to poach salespeople all the time to get [00:16:00] a book of business and everything like that. So I actually heard of some Oh yes. Of that Eric. So in the US non-compete agreements have been in the news for the last few years.
I know that things can be different at the federal level and at the state levels, but what are some current trends that you’ve seen when it comes to restriction and full use of non-compete agreements?
The Career 1 0 1 Podcast is brought to you by Fly High Coaching, where we help our clients soar to their full potential. Entrepreneurs are setting out to achieve their business goals, but without the right support, it can be difficult, if not impossible. If you need business coaching, we’re here to help.
Check us out on our website, high coaching com.
Eric: Sure. That’s a great question, Portia, and you’re right. [00:17:00] Non-compete agreements have been in the news so often when I post on LinkedIn about non-competes.
Whether it’s an article or a podcast that talked about the issue on, I see so many comments and re-shares because it’s such a key issue and I see comments six months later. So in the news, right? We, over the last few years, we’ve been seeing the beating drum, the drum beat, sort of marching towards banning.
And or limiting non-compete agreements, the use of non-competes. Right. So what we’ve seen on the state legislature level, a number of states that have banned non-competes. For example, California right, bans it even retroactively in many cases. I. States like Minnesota. It’s funny when you see North Dakota, Oklahoma, and California all in the same sentence, right?
In terms of they all ban non-competes because they’re so different politically. But we’re seeing states that are banning non-competes. We’re also seeing states that [00:18:00] are being partial bans, having like a minimum salary threshold. Like to say, Hey, listen, if someone’s making $400,000 a year or more in an executive position, then it’s okay to have a non-compete agreement.
But if they’re making. 75,000 in lower level management. You can, and some of that has the rationale of that. A non-compete should not be economically unduly burdensome, right to a person’s livelihood and their career, but it shouldn’t cause economic duress. And so I think the understanding is you’re making $250,000 a year plus a hundred grand in bonuses.
You might be, let’s say after a few years, you might have enough of a nest egg in savings that. You get a big difference payout and maybe you can ride out the non-compete more than somebody who maybe makes 60,000 a year. And also you might be more privy and more prone to top secret confidential information.
So the state legislature we’re seeing move towards, move towards banning and living non-competes in the [00:19:00] regulatory agency. We’re seeing on that front, in that plane. Of agencies like the Federal Trade Commission, the FTC, what’s known as seeking to Ban Noncompetes and actually. Finally got a ban in place arguing that non-competes create unfair restrictions on competition for workers.
And they say they’re unfair in other ways, and they, you know, interfere with the natural thought business and commerce. So they started to enforce the non-compete ban. Then another business group, other groups filed a, a federal case and injunction against that non-compete, and the court stayed the non-competes.
Now under the new administration, the federal administration, we’re seeing, we’re predicting that the FTC will pull back on seeking that bank. Likewise, the National Labor Relations Board has been in the news in the last two years for under the Biden administration, right, for writing opinion [00:20:00] letters.
Basically saying that they believe non-competes will violate the National Labor Relations Act, which was a bit of a stretch. Basically what they said is that right? Let’s say an employee wants to. Unionize or protest unfair working conditions. If that employee knows that they’ll never be able to leave because they’re locked in from a strict non-compete, they might be chilled, deterred their speech.
That’s in favor of workers’ rights. So that was it. But that agency also is under new management, new people stepping in. Under the Trump administration, we might see them pull back. And the last but not least, the courts have been consistently striking down non-competes for being too long in duration and maybe too broad in scope.
So we are seeing, it’s an interesting balancing where the federal level regulatory agencies are pulling back now into new administration, but the state legislatures are picking up the slack and trying to ban partially [00:21:00] ban noncompetes, including New York State. Which is coming back with a second ban after the first bill was rejected.
Wow. Wow. A lot, right? Yeah. A lot to digest and take and maybe we can yeah, no,
Porschia: no. I mean, it’s great. I, I am mm-hmm. Really interested in this topic and we have a lot of our clients. Mm-hmm. On the individual side and on the organizational side that are interested in non-competes for the reasons that you mentioned earlier.
You know, protecting confidential information, proprietary information those sorts of things. Yes. You started telling us. Some of your predictions. In terms of, you know, with the new administration, the FTC might do some pullbacks for certain things, but where do you predict the courts will land on allowing or banning non-competes in the next five years?
Eric: I think the courts Porsche will follow the legislature in their respective [00:22:00] states. I think that most non-competes, not all, but most of them wind up in state court. ’cause the state court issue has to breach a contract. So I think, and other issues that are related to the state and often the workers, well actually it’s interesting.
Often the work is work in that state, but now with the advent of remote work, you might have. Employees, other states from the company, and you might have what’s called diversity jurisdiction. So federal courts might look at these as well. But what I think is that the courts are going to look towards the state legislature, wherever the case may be located.
And I think if the states that they’re in are moving towards restriction, the courts will follow. And I think also that in some situations, even when the states are not moving towards restriction or more so than usual, I think courts are starting to look at. Noncompetes is being an unfair burden on employees, and I think they’re going to either strike them down or remand them to the company.[00:23:00]
Better term basically says, they said by saying to the company, Hey, we might not strike down the whole non-compete, but we’re gonna ask you to limit the scope from 18 months to six months. Or, Hey, this person’s a traveling sales person for your company, and so you can’t ban them from competing in the whole East from Seaboard.
So let’s keep it more restricted. I do think though, the geographic restrictions are gonna be less of an issue because. We are becoming much more of a remote workforce and a much more of a virtual society where people’s sales territory, for example, they can make their sales or presentations and pitches on Zoom or teams and share contracts through Google Dropbox.
So I think you might find, I see many Noncompetes these days where it covers like North America and they’re upheld because it’s an e-commerce type position or an online company. But I do see the courts moving towards, at the very least, restricting [00:24:00] and having companies pull back on some of the draconian non-competes.
Porschia: Mm-hmm. Great, great information. So what do you think is important for executives or professionals to know when they’re reviewing their non-compete clauses or agreements for the company that they work for?
Eric: That’s a great question because it’s taken all this sort of academic, this intellectual this, this information and kind of like practical approach, right?
How does it apply to the executive, the employee, or the employer? So answer your question, beginning with the executive, I think like they need to look at, well. Quick is a non-compete, how much of a, how overly broad is it? So if they’re coming in, let’s say in sales, where as you know, there’s the very common area, or they’re coming in, let’s say as an inventor, as an engineer and a tech company, I would look to the non-compete and say, how broadly [00:25:00] is this written?
If I’m in sales and I’m a truck sales person. This non-compete saying, I can’t work in sales when I leave this company because sales is pretty darn broad. Right? That could be. I mean, I, well, I can’t sell you know, other services or products or I, if I’m in tech sales, why shouldn’t I be able to sell real estate or, you know, cars, right?
So I think when I make sure it’s not too broadly written, number one. Number two, if you’re an executive. You’re negotiating your non-compete, I think you want to make sure that you have a clause in there that basically says that if you, you have a right to petition the company for like a carve out exemption, basically to say, Hey, if I get a new job offer, I will notify you and I’ll ask you to review and in good faith.
Review the job offer, and in good faith, consider A, if the non-compete applies, and B, if it does par, that exception. If having this [00:26:00] non-compete would unduly burden B. And those I think, are some key provisions. And number three is to make sure that, and it’s not too long in duration, and if it is, you might want to negotiate for pay during that period and say, listen, if you wanna time me up for a year after I leave this company.
I might not get a job for a year, right, because I might not be able to work for competition. So in that case, I want you to pay me whether it’s pay out on paid garden leave for a year, post-termination, or sort of post-termination. You pay out the garden leave and then the appointment ends or just pay me a, a, a tail severance that last for the time of the non-compete.
Those are the factors to consider for the executive slash employee. Facing on compete clause. Mm-hmm. Right. The company there are different factories.
Porschia: Okay. Yeah. So that’s exactly where I was gonna go, Eric. So from the company side or the employer side, as some [00:27:00] people say, how do you, what are some important things that they should be thinking about when it comes to improving their non-compete clauses or agreements?
Eric: Well, I think first and foremost, the company, like my clients for example, when they’re drafting their employment agreements or non-competes, they need to look at what, where is the employee located? Where are they working from? Where do they live? What state are they in? Because if the company has a remote employee in California.
And they’re running a non-compete. Not only is the non-compete know and void under California state law, but the employee might have a grounds for a cause of action if the company tries to enforce it. So I think first step is when you’re writing your employment agreements with your new employees or your existing employees, look at what state they’re in.
Number two, I think they need to look at right, how long they want to restrict. Their work [00:28:00] is for, and that period of time might change if they really think an employee is top level C-suite chief marketing officer who knows all the secret sauce of all the marketing and all the customer list and client list, they may need to consider giving them payment of enhanced severance during the non-compete period.
And number three, right? They wanna look at it, say when do they bring up the non-compete? Is it in the employment agreement? Is it, let’s say they’re offering their employee a restricted stock down the road or when they give them severance? So I think you want to be mindful of that and not make scope too broad and too long.
Because if you put in, I recently saw for a client and negotiating for the employee and it noncompete is two years, and I find that just to be. Not enforceable. I’ve never seen a court that never, maybe like 25 years ago, I saw a couple of courts enforce that, but they’re shrinking the period to [00:29:00] nine months, six months, maybe 12 months tops.
Porschia: Yeah, I’ve seen some two year non-competes. It was, you know, a while ago though. Yeah. So to stick with the employer side or the company. If non-compete clauses or agreements are banned, what are some other steps that companies can take to protect their trade secrets or proprietary information? If we’ll say an executive leaves to go work for the competition?
Eric: I see this a lot and it comes out in terms of clients approaching me with this dilemma. And I tell them it’s all about how well you draft the employment agreement and the offer letter and your employee handbooks for that matter. And so I, for example, write would draft an employment agreement that says that you has very strict protection.
I would draft an employment agreement with very strict protections for proprietary information. Trademarks secrets, [00:30:00] and I would expand the definition of that proprietary information. Basically to say that an ex-employee, when they become an ex-employee, cannot use the company’s customer list. You know, their, their client list their sales techniques, their marketing campaigns, that, that they can’t also poach their prospective employees.
So I would make sure that your, have your clauses against. Proprietary information being appropriated, or your confidentiality clauses and your non citation clauses are very robust, right? Very beat up. So I think that if you have those clauses in place and one of your chief executives tries to leave the competition, you can say, Hey, I have reason to be concerned that you are going to misappropriate misuse.
This proprietary information or the confidential information. And so you might have grounds to stop them from doing that. And in the process, it’s like a de facto non-compete, right? It [00:31:00] keeps them from, because they can’t bring that to the competition. Competition might say, well, they don’t really wanna hire you.
Right? So that’s how, from a company point of view, I protect the company’s pre secrets confidential information from being misused. Gaining an unfair competitive advantage.
Porschia: Mm-hmm. So, Eric, tell
Eric: us
Porschia: more about your firm.
Eric: Okay, sure. Yes. Right. So my firm ver Law Firm PLC, formerly known as lof, Eric sva.
I started in April, 2001, and in the beginning, I’d say from 2001 to 20 12, 20 13, I represented exclusively employees, believe it or not. I was an employee side employment, litigation, civil rights and appeals firm. So I did I worked on civil rights litigation in education law, in employment law, in free speech, and I also worked on immigration law and appeals.
I say [00:32:00] that because I think it gives me a window of insight into how the employee’s attorney works and thinks when I take on a case for an employer, because over the last, I’d say. 12, 13 years, 12 years, I started to shift my practice. So now my practice works with small to bid sized business owners. So our clientele include business owners.
They could be a new entrepreneur, tech company startup, could be a fourth generation. Family owned insurance, business, restaurant hotel, car wash, dry cleaner, et cetera. But what we do is on the employment law side, we defend companies from lawsuits, from ex-employees, the current employees, or that’s for wage and hour overtime issues or allegations of discrimination.
We sometimes, we often try to. Litigate and find solutions. We try to negotiate, we try to mediate, but I do defend companies. Also, [00:33:00] we defend companies from New York State or New Jersey Department of Labor Audits. Investigations and inquiries. So a lot of times the New York State Department of Labor will come after a company and they’ll say, Hey, you misclassified your workers.
You have all these independent contractors and freelance workers, and they should have been employees. So we defend in those audits, and then we also do compliance. We help companies to follow, you know, you have all these federal and state laws we talked about non-compete. So what about. S salary, transparency and wage and hour issues and notification of.
Sick leave rights fm, LA, we have companies, let’s get you on track, help you follow the law, understand what you have to do, and keep you outta trouble so you don’t get sued. And then last but not least, we draft employ handbooks and employment contracts, non-compete agreements. Right. We have companies to revise those, revamp those.
And then lastly, on the, that’s all the employment law side. Mm-hmm. And on the business law side, [00:34:00] which is about maybe about 40% of our practice. We do business formation restructuring of a corporation or company, buy sell agreements for companies. A buying company, selling company. We do commercial litigation.
That means, you know, a company is swinging on the business for an breach of contract or an account stated, or maybe that company is throwing their clients right, or poaching their workers in a non-compete. Violation. Right. So a lot of business law, employment law, compliance, litigation drafting, employee handbooks, things like that.
And I’d say in terms of our, we’re mainly in directly Jersey. That’s where I’m licensed and admitted. We do federal court, state court, new appeals, and then we also do some internal investigations for companies. So we’re pretty much industry agnostic. I say we have several of council associates that work with me whom I supervise, but everything goes through me.
I’m the final, [00:35:00] you know, the buck stops here. I’m the main I we’ll be facing. Clients can expect to speak with me regularly on all their issues and questions. And we have a small team of marketing consultant, a CPA bookkeeper, website developer assistant, so that our customers and our clients are. Fairly represented.
They know we have the resources to meet their needs.
Porschia: Yeah, that’s great. We’ll be providing a link to your website and other social channels in our show notes so people can find you online. But now Eric, I wanna ask you our final question that we ask all of our guests. Sure. How do you think executives or professionals can get a positive edge in their career?
Eric: Well, that’s a great question and I’d add that executives and professionals, by the way, if they’re negotiating employment contracts or commission agreements, we do those as well. But one way to get an edge, I think, is to [00:36:00] learn some new skill sets. This is me taking off my employment lawyer hat and just focus on the employment landscape.
I think that there’s a growing need for people with knowledge of technology, including artificial intelligence. So executives will learn that skillset can be really benefited when they’re searching in their career. Number two, I think, is the importance of networking. Being out there doing what you and I are doing right now, for example, having conversations with people guessing on podcasts, maybe starting your own podcast, but being.
Three dimensional more than just a name and your history of your work on a one to two page resume. I think that companies are looking for more well-rounded well-versed, well-informed people. And I, you know, if I had to do it over again when I applied for law firms back in the late nineties and 2000, it was a different time, [00:37:00] right?
You might, I dunno if you remember this, it might be aging myself here, but, you know, we would, we would fax their resume, you know, you type it and hear the crunching sound that maybe is not known to our younger audience members listening today. Mm-hmm. You’d put them in the mail, right. So, but, but I think that with the advent of technology and online recruiting, a lot of companies might get 500 resumes in a day.
So you wanna, you wanna make sure that you are out there on LinkedIn and video marketing, and that’s how I think executives, whether it’s to advance their career or to start their own business or to get a job somewhere, need to be out and about and visible.
Porschia: I definitely agree, Eric. We have clients that are baby boomers or sometimes Gen Xers, and they’ve told me before.
Yeah, Porsche, the last time I looked for a job, it was in the classified section of the newspaper. Mm-hmm. You know, we’ve definitely helped clients in those ways and I do remember fax [00:38:00] machines. There was a big thing a couple of years ago where they were saying a lot of Gen Z employees did not know what a fax machine was, so, yeah.
But Eric, you have shared a lot of wisdom with us today, and I’m sure that our listeners could use it to be more confident in their careers and when reviewing their agreements. We appreciate you being with us.
Eric: Portia, thank you so much for having me, and I’ll say that I hope the listeners also realize that another part of their job research might be using coaching, like you’re like fly coaching to help them with their resumes, their presentation skills.
Someone to just kind of mentioned. I make sure I added that as well. But thank you very much for having me. It’s been a pleasure being on your show. I really appreciated the opportunity to discuss. Topics that I feel passionately about. I hope I can help your listeners with their employment law and business law needs, so thank you.
Porschia: This episode was brought to you [00:39:00] by the Brave Bird Career Alliance, the go-to membership designed for seasoned executives and ambitious professionals with everything you need for career planning, strategy, training, and support. Thank you again for listening to the Career 1 0 1 podcast. I hope you have at least one key takeaway that you.
Can use in your own career. If you enjoyed hanging out with us, please rate, subscribe, and share this podcast. Until next time, here’s to your success.
