Labor and Employment chair Laurent Drogin and partner David Kleinmann authored an article featured in the Association of Corporate Counsel’s summer 2019 newsletter titled, “Restrictive Covenants – Choosing Between New Jersey and New York Law for Multi-State Employers.” In the article, Laurent and David discuss restrictive covenants for employers with employees in both New York and New Jersey.

Laurent and David explain, “Employers with employees in both New York and New Jersey confront a choice: Apply one state’s law to their employees in two (or more) states or select several state’s laws to apply dependent upon geography. This decision is of critical importance when applied to agreements containing restrictive covenants, regardless of whether those covenants forbid competition, soliciting, accepting business from or servicing clients, the poaching or hiring of employees or other activities.”

Provisions for employers to consider include which state’s laws best advantage enforcement of restrictive covenants in light of the company’s specific protectable interests; whether the company can extend a state’s laws beyond its borders to cover employees in a different jurisdiction; whether or not it is logistically and administratively feasible to have a different state’s laws applied to different categories of employees; and whether the company should implement a new agreement containing revised restrictive covenants to new hires and/or existing employees.

Over the past several years, Tarter Krinsky & Drogin, accompanied by general counsel guest speakers, has presented several ACC CLE presentations on an array of topics in the labor and employment field.

Read the full article.