{"id":126,"date":"2009-10-28T09:03:23","date_gmt":"2009-10-28T16:03:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/?p=126"},"modified":"2009-10-28T09:03:23","modified_gmt":"2009-10-28T16:03:23","slug":"3-trade-secrets-customer-lists-company-gold","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/?p=126","title":{"rendered":"3. Trade secrets + customer lists = company gold."},"content":{"rendered":"

Don\u2019t take from others and don\u2019t let others take yours.<\/em><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/em><\/strong>We must pause in this journey toward building an overwhelmingly successful business with an admonition that may seem obvious to some and completely sail over the heads of others.\u00a0 Most entrepreneurs arrive at the starting line of a new business with a vision for the future and some degree of experience from the past.\u00a0 Often, that experience comes from being employed within a business that was similar, but whose senior management may have missed or deliberately ignored what the entrepreneur sees as a great opportunity.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 And most senior and middle level managers will understand when a subordinate comes to them to resign and begin a new business.\u00a0 But all will immediately question whether the new business will compete in any way with their enterprise, and react to the future entrepreneur in either of two very distinct ways based upon those fears.<\/p>\n

[Email readers continue here…]<\/span><\/em>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 If the employee who is about to resign is off to conquer the world in a completely new arena, there is almost always the unspoken sigh of relief and a cooperative attitude that flows from the senior manager \u00a0from that point on in the conversation.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 But if the employee is even a little bit reticent to tell of the plan envisioned,\u00a0 the result is the first stage of what could become an outright war between the present employer and a newly separated past employee, sent away that day with an escort out the door.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The same attitudes from past employers can be expected if a past employee resurfaces after a layoff, resignation or after being fired, with a plan for a competitive business.\u00a0 Most employers have all their employees sign non-disclosure and confidentiality agreements to protect the company\u2019s trade secrets, customer lists and business plans.\u00a0 Many states recognize the right of a former employee to work, even if in direct competition with a past employer.\u00a0 But that right clearly stops when the entrepreneur uses any trade secret data from the past employer, especially customer lists for contacts and confidential business plans as bases for new businesses.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Anyone can be sued even if without merit, and responding to a suit can be traumatic in many ways \u2013 from expenditure of cash and valuable time to emotional drain from worry over a negative outcome, to loss of industry goodwill by an entrepreneur perceived to have stepped over the line.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This is especially true for someone who has sold a business only to surface later to compete in some way with the buyer.\u00a0 Never underestimate the venomous response from such a threat. \u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 So no matter what your circumstance, never, ever be guilty of using trade secret materials or ideas from your past employer, especially customer lists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Don\u2019t take from others and don\u2019t let others take yours. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 We must pause in this journey toward building an overwhelmingly successful business with an admonition that may seem obvious to some and completely sail over the heads of others.\u00a0 … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ignition-starting-up"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=126"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/berkonomics.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}