Microsoft announced the deletion of the non-competition clause for ordinary employees.

Microsoft announced the deletion of the non-competition clause for ordinary employees.

Has Microsoft announced the deletion of the non-competition clause for ordinary employees? For employees, paying wages, deleting non-competition agreements and allowing employees to form trade unions will undoubtedly improve their "right to speak" in company negotiations. Microsoft announced that it would delete the non-competition clause for ordinary employees.

Microsoft announced the deletion of the non-competition clause 1 for ordinary employees. On Thursday, local time in the United States, the software giant Microsoft announced that it would no longer enforce the Non-compete Clause (NCC) except for senior managers, and most ordinary employees were free to jump ship to competitors such as Google and Amazon to find jobs.

Many companies will use NCC to prevent employees from jumping ship to companies that are considered direct competitors. Although it is understandable to add these clauses to the contracts of senior managers, they are criticized as being too strict with junior employees and causing people to suffer more unfair restrictions.

Microsoft enforced these clauses in some employee contracts, but the company said that from now on, similar clauses in ordinary employee agreements will be deleted and existing clauses will not be enforced in the United States.

Amy Pannoni, Microsoft's deputy general counsel, and Amy Coleman, Microsoft's vice president of human resources, wrote in their blogs: "We have heard that some non-competition clauses in American employee agreements violate our employment principles, even if they are implemented under rare and reasonable circumstances."

These restrictions will still be imposed on the company's top management, such as partners, general managers, vice presidents and higher-level executives. But in theory, ordinary employees are no longer prohibited from looking for jobs in any company that is regarded as a competitor of Microsoft. Large technology companies such as Amazon, Google and Salesforce are usually regarded as Microsoft's main competitors.

Microsoft's move is in line with the current trend, and more and more companies no longer use NCC in their contracts. NCC is restricted in some American states, including Microsoft's hometown of Washington. There, NCC is not suitable for employees earning less than $654.38 million+. In July this year, US President Biden signed an executive order urging the US Federal Trade Commission (SEC) to restrict or prohibit the use of NCC to encourage the labor force to strengthen mobility.

In recent years, Microsoft has faced many accusations because of its toxic corporate culture. No longer adhere to the non-competition clause is just one of the four reforms recently announced by Microsoft. Other reforms include plans to abolish some confidentiality agreements in settlement or resignation agreements, conduct a civil rights audit of its existing work policies, and promise to provide "salary levels" for all internal and external recruitment.

Among them, in the plan to improve the salary transparency of job advertisements, Microsoft promised to publicly disclose the salary range in all internal and external job advertisements in the United States by June 5438+ 10 at the latest. In May of this year, Microsoft raised employees' salary and stock compensation to retain more employees.

Activists believe that hiding the income information of job seekers and potential colleagues will widen the existing gender and racial pay gap. Research by Reed, a British recruitment company, found that concealing salary details and using words such as "competition" will reduce the possibility of people applying for positions. Provide more information for women and people of color, so that they can get higher salary and a more level playing field through negotiation.

Colorado, Nevada, Connecticut, California, Washington and Maryland have all introduced state-level salary transparency regulations. After the new law came into effect last month, employers in new york must include salary information in job advertisements.

Microsoft said that the purpose of these reforms is to "further deepen our relationship with employees and strengthen the workplace culture". Panoni and Coleman wrote: "Microsoft is always evaluating employees' experiences and listening to their opinions to determine what changes we need to make to meet their needs and alleviate their concerns."

Microsoft announced that it would delete non-competition clause 2 for ordinary employees. Recently, Microsoft announced that it would stop implementing the existing employee non-competition agreement in the United States, and promised to conduct a civil rights audit of its human resources policy by 2023.

At the same time, Microsoft also said that it will disclose the salary range of employees in internal and external recruitment information released nationwide before 2023 1.

In addition, just last week, Microsoft announced that it would not boycott the activities of employees to form trade unions.

For employees, paying wages, deleting non-competition agreements and allowing employees to form trade unions will undoubtedly improve their "right to speak" in company negotiations.

Through trade unions, employees will be able to communicate with enterprises on salary issues such as different pay for equal work and various treatment issues, negotiate with enterprises in a collective form, and even threaten to "jump ship to competitors".

Microsoft announced in its blog post that starting from June 5438+ 10 next year at the latest, it will remove the non-competition clause from most employee agreements and disclose the salary range of all positions in the United States, but the change of the non-competition clause does not apply to "senior leaders". In addition, Microsoft will cancel some confidentiality clauses in the settlement or resignation agreement, which prohibit employees from talking about discrimination or harassment.

Microsoft said last week that it would not resist employees' efforts to join the union. According to the report, this shows that the acceptance of trade unions in the technology industry, which have long been dissatisfied with organized labor, is increasing.

However, it should be noted that Microsoft's adjustment of the non-competition agreement does not apply to the company's top management, which can prevent the company's top management from leaving their jobs for various supervisors or objective reasons and going to competitors.

Microsoft announced that it would delete the non-competition clause for ordinary employees. Microsoft announced four new employee plans, which will strengthen the relationship with employees, improve the workplace environment, including giving employees mobility, creating a safe workplace, improving the transparency of salary, and launching civil rights audits to promote the diversification of employees. Most notably, Microsoft will delete the non-competition clause of American employees, which will take effect from now on.

Amy Pannoni, vice president of human resources at Microsoft, said that Microsoft believes that all employees should work in the companies and jobs they like, and Microsoft strives to retain world-class human resources and establish a corporate culture to attract these talents.

Although the existing employees have signed the non-competition clauses, Microsoft does not like to use these clauses to retain talents. Due to the lack of implementation time and some people's doubts about the relevant terms, Microsoft decided to delete the non-competition clause in the American employee agreement and not enforce the existing non-competition clause in the United States, which will take effect from now on.

However, the cancellation of the non-competition clause does not apply to most of Microsoft executives, including partners and executives.

The abolition of the non-competition clause means that American employees of Microsoft are free to work in other enterprises after leaving their jobs, even if they are competitors of Microsoft. Nevertheless, Microsoft still emphasizes that all employees must still abide by the company's business principles or other responsibilities to protect Microsoft's confidential information.

In addition, Microsoft also announced that the settlement and resignation agreement between American employees will no longer contain confidential words that prohibit employees from disclosing what they consider illegal discrimination, harassment, retaliation or violation of wages and working hours. In order to ensure equal pay for equal work, Microsoft stopped asking job seekers about their past salaries a few years ago. This week, Microsoft further announced that it will publicly disclose the salary range of Microsoft's internal and external positions in the US market from June 5438+ 10 at the latest.