Shhhhhhh, It’s Confidential

November 14, 2008

Confidentiality agreements or non-disclosure agreements (“NDAs”), as they are often called, play an important role in protecting your company’s trade secrets. When used in business-to-business collaboration they can lead to new product development and other opportunities for profit and growth. When used with employees, they make your trade secrets less portable when your employees decide to join a competitor or set up shop on their own.

Keeping it confidential not only protects your valuable information, but also third party information that is entrusted to you. That’s why “keeping it confidential” is one of my 12 Rules for Avoiding Smoking Guns.

Employees may not realize, for example, how quickly a confidential “tweet” on Twitter about an exciting project at work can turn into a smoking gun document and a lawsuit. Training can therefore go a long way towards making NDAs more robust and keeping your business safe.

For more information see www.legalliteracy.com.

-Hanna Hasi-Kelchner Guest Blogger
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Filed under: Leadership, Managing, Starting, Success, Women in Business

Tags: business, confidentiality agreements, contracts, entrepreneur, Law, lawsuit, legal, NDA, non-disclosure agreements, smoking gun