Employees are perhaps most vulnerable at the doors of employment — as they’re trying to be hired‚ or as they’re being let go.
That’s also when employers may be asked for signatures on contracts that either guarantee employment, or severance, according to Beca Mark, the founder and CEO of at Megastar HR. Those contracts, the Sandy-based human resources professional said, might include a confidentiality clause or nondisclosure agreement (NDA).
At least a third of the U.S. workforce is bound by some form of NDA. Their purpose, Mark said, is to protect sensitive company information.
But they are “often overused,” said LynnAnn Erickson, a professor of human resources and employment law at Utah Valley University. Confidentiality clauses that are “unreasonable, or too general in their scope,” she said, can do more harm than good — for both the employer and the employee.
Employees who were laid off from doTERRA in May told The Salt Lake Tribune they’d signed confidentiality clauses as parts of their separation agreements — which, according to the National Labor Review Board, now violate federal labor laws. DoTERRA said in an email to the Tribune that, at the time, it had followed all relevant statutes.
