I was approached by a technical consulting firm who has a short term assignment available, but to become a subcontractor of theirs, they want to me to sign an NDA with way too much legal verbiage in there and something to the extent that I cannot solicit business or accept employment from their “customers” for 2 years. How am I to know who their “customers” are and if my contract ends as a consultant with this agency, why should I not be able to accept an offer of employment from these companies. Say I accept a job offer from company XYZ, and company XYZ happens to be a customer of ABC consulting services, for which I signed a contract preventing me from being employed with company XYZ. I don’t need the legal headaches and I don’t want to screw my own opportunities for employment. Are these NDAs’ and non-complete clauses even legal? It looks as if they are worded to give the impression that they violate our basic constitutional right to employment of our own free will. Has anyone been in this situation where an NDA was required to work as a consultant? I am very weary of signing it for fear that I may hurt my career by not being allowed to legally seek work from certain employers.
