Trade Secrets, Non-Competes and E-Mail Do Not Go Well Together (Unless You Like Punitive Damages) - Part 1

2.16.10    By Joe Kelly    Tags , ,

Let’s say you are a key employee for a company and have been for years. In fact, you are such a key employee that you are the primary point of contact for significant portions of your employer’s business. Let’s say the employer reorganizes and offers you a new job as part of the reorganization. What if you don’t like the new job that is offered? What do you do?

There are a number of options. You could swallow your objections and go along with the employer’s plan and see how it turns out. You could buy a disc of Johnny Paycheck’s “Take this Job and Shove It”, play it over the intercom, and then walk out to your new life as a cabana attendant in Tahiti.

Or, you could e-mail yourself all the client data for the clients you work for; resign and negotiate a severance for yourself (and collect unemployment). You could then start a business that competes with your employer the next day that services the (now former) major customer of your employer. A recent Tennessee case, Hamilton-Ryker Group, LLC v Keymon, indicates this could be an expensive choice (in that case almost a million dollars). Along the way, the case has a lot to say about trade secrets, non-competes and punitive damages. I’ll explore different facets of this case over the next few posts.


Related content

  1. Trade Secrets, Non-Competes and E-Mail Do Not Go Well Together (Unless You Like Punitive Damages) - Part 2
  2. Trade Secrets, Non-Competes and E-Mail Do Not Go Well Together (Unless You Like Punitive Damages) - Part 6
  3. Trade Secrets, Non-Competes and E-Mail Do Not Go Well Together (Unless You Like Punitive Damages) - Part 3

Comments