Ask HN: Has anyone successfully renegotiated an AWS non-compete? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Has anyone successfully renegotiated an AWS non-compete?

131 pointsMeNotLawyer192 comments

I have an offer from AWS and as part of that they want me to sign a non-compete. I've signed non-competes in the past but reading through the AWS one is making me very nervous.

It basically limits me for working for a competitor of ALL of amazon for 18 months. Amazon does literally everything! I would pretty much be locked out of a job for 18 months if I left voluntarily or not.

All other non-competes I've signed have been scoped to just the areas of the business which I have confidential info about. This amazon non-compete make me worried I could be sued for even getting a job as a grocery bagger because it competes with their grocery chains?

Have any of you who work for AWS re-negotiated your non-competes? I would be ok signing a non-compete that is just limited to areas which I have confidential information about but I'm worried that asking the hiring manager about this might cause them to pull the offer.

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I can’t answer your specific question, but I would really encourage you to think more about the AWS offer.

Having spent a decade at Amazon, across several organizations, I don’t recommend it as a place to work.

There was a NYTimes article about the company in 2015. Everything there still reflects the day to day culture of the company.

For me Amazon took an unprecedented toll on my mental and physical health. I did earn enough money, but I immensely regret all the time I didn’t spend with my family over the years, all the friendships that faded, and the constant reminder from leaders how I could always do better - nothing was ever good enough.

Amazons leadership fundamentally does not see their employees as human beings. As I grew the ranks over the years, I was directly coached on removing myself from certain day to day interactions, because it would simplify decision making if I didn’t have an interest in my own people, that simply forming just work bonds was a conflict of interest in terms of doing what’s “right” for the company.

Any non compete you’re concerned about isn’t even the tip of the iceberg.

Good luck to you.

Thank you for this. I'm currently (today) trying to negotiate an offer with AWS and while the brand/tech is making it really tempting, Work/life balance is really important to me right now as a father of a 3 year old (the only child I am planning to have).

From one dad to another - cherish this time with your child. It goes SO fast.

Yes, please believe us. It sounds so cliche but it goes too fast.

There is a limited period of time where you (the parents) will be the sun rising and setting for your child. (A few years.) That was special for me; there's no love like the love of a young child.

After that, your kids will start to turn towards friends, teachers, and other relatives. As they should--it's an important part of becoming a full fledged human.

But it's still a bit bittersweet to see the end of being able to do no wrong in your kiddo's eyes.

> The brand/tech is making it really tempting

Really? I’ve always felt that the Amazon brand is relatively low quality. I’ve also heard that tech-wise it’s less interesting than you might assume from the outside, and they just burn out engineers on problems rather than solving them well.

I’m relatively uninformed so don’t make a decision based on this, but maybe something to consider.

What I really mean to say is that most startups are using AWS. While you don't have to work at AWS to get AWS skills obviously, having worked there would potentially signal that you really know AWS well and can bring that knowledge into the cooler/smaller company. The interview process is fairly difficult, not google/meta level, but not a walk in the park.

I don’t think that’s the case. When working on AWS, you’ll be assigned to a team doing some AWS product and so you’ll probably get to know it really well, but you’ll be more or less oblivious about the other 50+ products. Whereas, as a mere user of AWS, you’ll get more rounded knowledge.

We've had guys on our team recently get some patents issued in their name, because what we are working on is a hard problem at a massive scale, and we are solving things that have never been solved before.

I will agree that Amazon has some weird stuff around their internal development environment, which I think is well documented elsewhere. OTOH, when you're building services to handle billions of customers all around the world, there are some things you have to do a little differently.

That fifth paragraph is dark.

And it's the crux of the whole problem.

> Amazons leadership fundamentally does not see their employees as human beings

I'm there right now and this is very true.

It isn't even a hidden truth about working there. In fact, the company has a set of principles [0] that are necessary to adopt and use to justify all decisions you make or feedback you give to others.

And missing from this set of principles? Any mention of the humanity of those you are leading. The only empathy encouraged is for the customer. It's a cold cold place to work.

[0] https://leaders.com/articles/leadership/amazon-leadership-pr...

This isn't a meaningful criticism because -- well, watch what people do, not what they say. But it isn't even coherent because you're working with an out of date list: https://amazon.jobs/en/internal/principles

Paywall. Try again.

https://www.aboutamazon.com/about-us/leadership-principles

https://www.geekwire.com/2021/amazon-adds-two-new-leadership...

https://aws.amazon.com/executive-insights/content/leading-an...

https://www.carrus.io/blog/amazon-newprinciples

Alternate links

I've been asked to reword my peer reviews to be a function of leadership principles only. And my promotion is justified as a function of them as well. They run very deep. I cite them on a weekly basis.

The two new principles are less than a year old. They aren't taken as serious as the other originals. The culture is already established.

> And missing from this set of principles? Any mention of the humanity of those you are leading.

If you want to argue that the culture doesn't match them, whatever, but you can't say nothing's mentioned.

I think "only added to the principles this year" for a company as mature as Amazon is pretty telling. Going to take another 20 years to reset the culture to those last two principles.

Not to mention the backweighted RSU vesting schedules. AWS comp is designed around recovering comp back from employees that put in, say, 2 years and decide AWS isn't the place for them. Not how I run a business, but to each his or her own.

Sounds like Severence

This is incredibly enlightening, thank you for this.

I've hired several AWS engineers. Everyone of them, despite of having left AWS had nothing but good things to say. You'd think that since they left AWS, they'd have a boat load of things to unload. The only gripe I heard was occassional work/life balance during launch or critical times. Otherwise, AWS/Amazon is akin to working at Intel, GE, IBM, Oracle, etc. Bog standard corporate job. You are a cog in the machine, get used to it. In return you get a stable career, can raise a family and do better than 99.99% of the people on this planet.

NYT's story was very controversial.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/08/17/432555175...

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/10/amazon-...

https://www.vox.com/2015/8/17/9166023/new-york-times-amazon

NYT has a tremendous agenda and often goes unchecked.

To be fair, it's generally discouraged to speak ill about a previous workplace when interviewing/working at a new job as it may reflect more poorly on you as an individual than the company you are disparaging.

Yes, but the same people had no problem talking about their previous employer prior to AWS. One guy was ex-Siemens employee from their Swiss office in Zurich.

That explains why Amazon seemed great to them.

Were you speaking to them about AWS before hiring or once they were hired? I could tell lots of justified shit about my previous employers but none during an interview.

After onboarding and getting to know them better. Of course, speaking ill about your current job in an interview is unprofessional.

Anyone who worked at Amazon is smart enough to not bad mouth their old employer.

Anonymous discussions are as far as most people will go.

Interestingly, my experience has been the exact opposite. I live in the Seattle area and always ask Amazon tech people how they liked their tenure there. No one has said they thought it was a good decision to work there.

> I did earn enough money, but I immensely regret all the time I didn’t spend with my family over the years

How many hours a week did you average at work? A lot of tech jobs will expect working 9-6. If it was over 40-45, did the money scale linearly to the hours you put in? If it was 40-45 then it's equal to most other jobs except with higher compensation?

Money does not scale linearly. It’s more of a function of the amazon stock growth. I was able to build wealth because I did the less orthodox path and held on to every share that ever vested for me starting from 2012.

But even here, the company is not generous at all. Your stock grants vest 1-2 years out. If the stock climbs during that time, then in next year, you get no additional compensation. My initial years at amazon, I received little to no compensation increase, even with multiple promotions, because the stock had climbed significantly in value.

So if they don’t give you more shares when the stock appreciates, then what happens if it doesn’t grow or declines? They try to compensate you by giving you more shares that vest over a 2 year time frame. So if the stock does good, you get screwed. If the stock performs poorly, you get screwed too.

> So if the stock does good, you get screwed. If the stock performs poorly, you get screwed too.

Did something else bad happen at the company?

I guess our definitions of screwed are slightly different. It sounds like they are giving you extra compensation in case your options happen to do poorly one year. They could have chosen to say "we can't control the market, you received 10 shares and whether they go up or down is out of our control". This way you win some and lose some based on the market. Even with having to wait for 2 years that's not too bad (it's basically free money).

Holding for a year also means your stock compensation is taxed at long term capital gains instead of income. If I were working at a stable and successful public company I'd prefer stock options if you were comparing $1 in cash vs $1 in options. After taxes, etc. your options are going to be likely 20-25% more valuable due to less taxes (no risk) and it has the chance to potentially to go higher (risk involved). The only time it's worse is if the stock tanks hard (the 20-25% tax difference) but that's not going to be a common event in a company like Amazon.

Combine that with you entering in 2012 when they were trading for 215 a share, that's a 15x return vs today. I guess I'm just having trouble seeing how that outcome isn't good. If you worked let's say 45 hours a week, combined with 10 years of a competitive tech salary + having options in a company that has had massive growth that's a combo where you end up being pretty much set for life (multiple millions of post-tax money available).

Were you working something like 80 hours a week for 10 years straight? That would make the decision much harder but at the same time you're trading 10 years to never have to worry about money again so even then it's not a hard no, 80 probably is a hard no because but 60 hours brings it closer to "maybe, it depends".

>I guess our definitions of screwed are slightly different. It sounds like they are giving you extra compensation in case your options happen to do poorly one year. They could have chosen to say "we can't control the market, you received 10 shares and whether they go up or down is out of our control". This way you win some and lose some based on the market. Even with having to wait for 2 years that's not too bad (it's basically free money).

I will try to explain again. Let me offer an example that captures one part of the problem.

Let's say you join Amazon today (Day 1). In a year from now, let's say I promote you and give you increasing scope and responsibility. Now if the value of your previous stock grant (from Day 1) has appreciated, I will give you no additional compensation. As your manager, I can get you through multiple promotions without providing you any meaningful compensation increase since Day 1.

Now because your compensation weighs heavily on stock vests, let's say Amazon's stock performs poorly, falling behind even the SP500. So, your total compensation this year will drop significantly. I will offer you additional stock grants that vest in a year from now and two years from now. So if you stay with me for at least two more years, you can "earn" the compensation that you did not receive THIS year. If the stock continues going side ways or drops next year, you can make next's years losses by staying another 2 years (3 years total).

To put it bluntly, if you perform well and the company's stock increases, thank you very much. You previous stock grants have brought your compensation this year to its maximum. We won't have give you another dime.

If you perform well and the company's stock doesn't increase or drops – that's too bad for you. This year, that's YOUR loss to deal with. If you stick with us two years, we'll "try" to give you back the money we "hoped" to pay you this year.

>Were you working something like 80 hours a week for 10 years straight?

There are few people in Amazon engineering that work 40 hours a week, and any organization that normalizes that will get either re-org'd or have their products/services completely canned. 55-60 hours is a baseline. 80 hour weeks is not unheard of, for even 6 months at a time. There is NEVER a down time. You do A and then you move on to B and then C. If you fail to do A or if you decide to take a break between B and C. We do stack ranking and drop whoever falls at the bottom of the stack, even if they're pretty dang good. Somebody HAS to be let go. No way around it.

It's not just leadership, it trickles down to every aspect of work.

From the poor tooling to the most toxic "team" of co-workers I've ever been on.

I don't regret joining but every month I deeply regret staying. Props to Amazon for providing me with the motivation to find something better.

I’m a recently joined SDM in AWS. I do not mean to negate your years of experience. I expect to find exactly your experience as my time progresses and I see more teams.

I find that a lot of Amazon’s management systems appear to be built as safeguards against the pitfalls less experienced leaders might not know how to handle. Unfortunately it is optimized for the “least common denominator” of human collaboration, which is basically coercing individuals to behave like machines. I agree with your characterization of the problem.

I would go so far as to say that I disagree with the system in a philosophical manner. It is opposite of good leadership, in motivating humans to grow, innovate, and create success, in my understanding. Yet I cannot ignore Amazon’s market success; it may have succeeded in spite of these flaws.

I do not know how long I will stay. I anticipate a deep enough philosophical conflict to motivate my eventual exit.

Until then, my team will benefit from stronger cohesion, shared knowledge, clearer prioritization, growth, work life balance, and ultimately happiness. Some of them have taken their first vacations in the last few years, in the few months of my tenure so far, because of the changes we’ve embraced.

I will create a healthy environment of leadership for my team, and we will succeed. We will show Amazon what is required, as long as I can.

If past experience is any indication, I will carry my team’s allegiance because I look out for their interests, individually and collectively.

And when we deliver strategic advancements, we will gain autonomy. If not, I know that my talents can be impactful elsewhere.

I hope that I can quell the tide of dynamics of which you warn.

I joined AWS in September. I've heard about problems that some other teams have had, but in the six months I've been on my current team, I haven't seen any such issues.

I keep waiting for that shoe to drop, and so far it hasn't.

We recently had an off-site meeting for everyone in the organization under our L10, and I now feel so much better about where we are going and how we are going to get there. I didn't realize how much pent up angst I had until the end of the first day of the off-site, and I felt like a huge weight had been taken off my shoulders, and that I had finally seen the light.

That said, my history with employers is that everything can be perfect and great up to a certain point, and then there is a sudden change. In the past, that change has usually been because of a change in leadership somewhere, possibly just down at the level of the new manager hired right above me.

After that change, what was one of the best places I've ever worked suddenly becomes one of the worst. I've seen this happen time after time at virtually every single employer I've had since 1989. I can count on one hand the number of times where this didn't happen.

So, I will continue to keep an eye out for that dropping shoe. But I will also continue to enjoy working on this team, with these people, and this leadership.

And with any luck, we will be able to successfully change the world for the better.

You should better consult a lawyer than a bunch of random people if this is important for you. Or better yet: not work for a company that tries to make you sign such agreements. And especially not this one :)

I don't know where you live. In my country (France) overly broad non compete are not enforceable, and also you need to be paid during the non compete period (at least 1/3 of your compensation or something like this), which means that employers will almost always waive them except for very rare exceptions.

I'm curious then what people do when they leave AWS. Do they just not work for 18 months?

They hope AWS won't enforce it. If you aren't very important (L7+, senior management), and you don't work on the _same exact_ project at a competitor, Amazon will probably not attempt to enforce it. Is it right that Amazon are doing this? Hell, no: they're awful for doing this. But that's not even one of the top-five awful things they do to employees.

I am genuinely curious -- what _are_ the top-five awful things in your mind?

I think #'s 1 & 2 have to be 1) stack ranking & forced PIPs, and 2) comp policies overall (the stock vesting schedule being part of it, the bonus program covering the first two years being another, and the [until this year] low base salary cap being a third).

For office workers, yeah. And disregard to work-life balance on many teams.

For warehouse and delivery workers... There's probably a chapter in the Bible just covering that.

The bonus program for the first two years seems like a good/balanced thing for Amazon and the employee (to cover the “missing triangle” of comp while RSU grants begin to stack).

I’m not now and never have been an Amazon employee, but the bonus plan just seems sensible to me.

Or they live in California where non competes are not enforceable.

Does that include non-competes signed before you moved? Could your plan be to quit and move to CA?

The law applies to where you are, not where you were, so IANAL but yes, this would work. However, if you moved purely for this purpose, it might be interpreted as fraud. Also, Amazon may sue you in their home venue (Washington, or perhaps Delaware if they are incorporated there). If someone has access to Lexis Nexis it'd be interesting to see how many such cases Amazon has brought, and what happened.

I think it's based on where you are when you sign the agreement, not where you are when you leave. When you say the law applies to where you are, this is all in the action you're taking. The promise not to compete is the action in this case.

I am also NAL, but I don't think moving to CA gets you out of non-competes and I've seen evidence of this (one well covered story involved an Amazon exec going to a Bay Area company and getting sued).

It’s very possible you will not ultimately get the next job. Most competent firms that are near competitors will ask if you are bound by a non-compete as part of the recruiting process. Even if ultimately unenforceable, a “yes” could stop you right there. A “no” could be something problematic with the new employer down the road.

I don't think this can be emphasized enough, it's something I saw a few times in my career which was outside of California. Just having a non-compete that might apply with a former company is enough for many companies to hire someone else who's not got such entanglements. If that company is known for litigating them all the worse.

How would your previous employer even know what you are working on in your new company? It's not like you are going to report back to them.

If you're important (VP+), it will be in the news. Otherwise, maybe blog posts. They very rarely enforce this. They mostly try to pressure employees into staying at Amazon with these shitty tricks.

I'm not sure, but I feel there might be companies that are not selling cloud hosting solutions ;)

Also, once again, do check the law where you live. It's very possible that non-compete only apply on stuff you worked on. For example, maybe if you did not work on S3 specifically, you might even be able to work on Google Cloud Storage if all you are considering are companies that make public clouds.

> I'm not sure, but I feel there might be companies that are not selling cloud hosting solutions ;)

> It basically limits me for working for a competitor of ALL of amazon for 18 months.

Amazon have an incredible long-tail of badly-made products across the entire software market. They do a lot more than cloud hosting & book delivery.

Notice it doesn't say AWS, it says Amazon. That covers a lot more than cloud hosting solutions!

They just ignore it, probably. It’s like those agreements that prohibit you from having other jobs. Forget about it.

> [in France] you need to be paid during the non compete period (at least 1/3 of your compensation or something like this)

Oh that's interesting. That is the first time I've seen a justifiable contractual consideration on the employer's side for a non-compete.

It’s the same rule as California… you can have a non-compete, but that time has to be paid for separately than your normal wages.

This is probably one of the biggest reasons I'm unlikely to leave the state until other parts of the US make similar determinations. It boggles me that we allow employers to have so much control over an employees life after they have left said organization.

We almost had the same in Washington state until the big tech companies lobbied (i.e. bribed) corrupt politicians for the law to only apply to those earning under $100k.

https://lni.wa.gov/workers-rights/workplace-policies/Non-Com...

So non-competes are only for people who can afford a house. I guess it makes sense to give up some freedom for the privilege of owning property.

The reasoning obviously is to protect low earners from employers who abuse non-competes. Non-competes are not a complete insanity, as long as the workforce they apply to has (pragmatically, not just theoretically) the ability to chose where to work. And of course they have to acquire some transferable skills or knowledge thanks to their employment.

These things are generally very unlikely to happen when the employee is a low earner.

The fact that California has no problem with pumping out innovation and globally important companies even with a total non compete ban shows that there is zero reason for any employer to have that additional power over an employee. I would even say the non compete ban contributes to CA’s success.

To really drive home how much of an advantage employers have, even with a non compete ban, employers in California were found to be colluding to suppress employees’ wages.

https://www.latimes.com/80014970-132.html

For all but some very egregious cases this will not be enforced. AWS lost a bunch of VP-level execs and they went to work at Microsoft... If they didn't use it against them they won't use it against anyone.

I agree, but it's still problematic. A couple concerns off the top of my head:

1. This can impact behavior of the labor force despite lack of enforcement. Not everyone can afford to pay a lawyer to review their employment contract, and not everyone will have the knowledge to know if such terms are applicable or enforceable to their situation. This causes fear and hesitancy which in turn drives behavior and decision making.

2. If you're unfortunate enough, there's nothing stopping a company from attempting to make an example out of you. Even knowing it's unlikely a former employer will come after you, why should individuals be forced to take on that risk to earn a living?

You really have to “be somebody” in order to have a non-compete enforced against you. If you’re like most people the company you left couldn’t care less where you go. Yes yes, there’s exceptions, but in general they’re rarely enforced.

But if your old boss was a total dick and that's why you left then he might try to enforce it. Leaving yourself open to expensive legal action isn't smart. Even though they would likely lose the case (noncompetes are on shaky legal footing) you still lose many hours and legal fees fighting it.

Even being 'somebody' may not enforce it. A few years ago Salesforce hired so many execs from Microsoft that it looked like there's no end to it.

This is common in the financial industry above a certain level; it's called "garden leave".

No; that's different from a non-compete. The practice of "gardening leave" is giving an employee a relatively long notice period (say, 3 months). If the employee gives notice, the employer tells them to stay home during the notice period; they are still technically employed during that period, however.

Gotcha; never been subject to gardening leave myself, but I always assumed it exists for the same purpose as a noncompete, i.e. to provide a 'cooling off' period to lessen the competitive impact that the exiting employee can have by switching to another firm. I assumed that since it's been around a while in finance that the "paid noncompete" idea became a negotiated part of the comp.

So funny to hear this. 3 month notice periods (in either direction) are bog standard in parts of Europe. And it's entirely normal to just keep working, training your replacement/finishing off stuff.

I'm not sure that's quite the same (no clue if the garden leave terminology is used in the parts of Europe you refer to). https://www.investopedia.com/terms/g/gardening-leave.asp

That's my point about it being funny. In one place a 3 month notice period is considered a gardening leave for special higher level employees and you still basically get escorted out of the building.

In other parts of the world it is just the bog standard notice period and nobody is escorted out of any building and expected to keep working during that 3 month period.

I've heard of them in finance in the states, mostly, but I believe they do exist.

I am French and discovered a few years ago that a non-compete could be one-sided.

I saw that on an offer and asked about the compensation, ready to negotiate at least 50% pay for that part.

The person on the other side was surprised, also when I asked if anyone actually signs this.

I do not understand how a non-compete compete for key people can be one sided.

This why I turned down a job offer from AWS:

https://www.lastweekinaws.com/blog/why-i-turned-down-an-aws-...

They made me feel like a jackass when I did.

Less than a year later I was vindicated:

https://www.lastweekinaws.com/blog/aws-ruins-own-attempt-at-...

And your timing is apt! "Should I Accept an AWS Job Offer?" went up yesterday: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCiUulzr9f8

If you’re asking us here in HN, then it’s very unlikely that you have the sort of negotiating power required to get any sizable company to approve a customized set of legal documents relating to your hire. Changes to the standard set of hiring paperwork often require multiple managers and lawyers to sign off on it. For most positions and candidates, the effort isn’t considered worth it. You can certainly ask, but don’t be surprised if you get a hard “sorry, but no” in response.

If you were being hired in as a VP or CxO and were extremely well known, that’d be one thing. But only a few people have that sort of privilege and clout.

(Disclaimer: I work for AWS but am not involved in the hiring process other than interviewing. My views may not represent those of my employer. Opinions are my own.)

I was able to add an addendum to my rental agreement created by a fairly sizeable property manager.

Addendums are much easier for them to agree to.

First, a lease is not an employment agreement. Different situation.

Second, did the addendum directly contradict or void language in the standard form lease crafted by corporate legal? If not, there's probably more room for negotiation there.

Even in standard employee agreements, there's often an "invention disclosure form" that sort of operates as a built-in addendum for the new hire to fill out. This helps prevent the employer from claiming ownership over things the employee worked on prior to hire.

Yes, it contradicted and voided certain ridiculous language in the first agreement.

I didn’t ask for much but I limited my liability back to common sense.

I frequently get exceptions and changes to contracts. This has included me telling I flat out would not sign a particular document.

Never actually had it be a blocker or a problem. I'm just an engineer.

Lots of people will say it's a problem. They will claim it's going to be a big issue.

It isn't. Just stick to your guns. Be polite and be patient. Make it clear you have plenty of time available.

I had someone try to get my spouse to sign a contract without seeing it. The woman even had the gall to be offended when we declined without seeing it. After some hutzpah, we ended up literally sitting at this random employees desk for 20 minutes reading the contract before signing it.

Even that, while stupid, was not a big deal.

You always have the right to have a lawyer review documents. You can always take it home with you. You can always ask for changes. The worst they can do is say no - and usually they will say yes.

When I signed the paperwork for my house I stopped to read all of it first. The escrow person then asked my wife if I was a lawyer or an engineer. Apparently nobody else ever reads them before signing.

Out of curiosity, what was the size of the largest employer you were able to negotiate an employment agreement with, and what was the term at issue?

At an international corporation with 60k employees I was once able to leave an amendment to my contract unsigned. I told them straight that the amendment is impossible to fulfill and I won't sign it. Legal told me, oh then just put it into the paper shredder. The amendment granted me significant benefits. My line manager panicked and said you won't see the money. Howewer, the money appeared into my account as originally agreed even though I had not signed that part of the contract.

Yes, I was already an employee, which probably changed things. Still I was very surprised how easy it was. I would not count on that every time, especially if you are not an employee yet and like me not a really famous case that your employment would make headlines.

P.S. I did not shred it, but kept it for the case I would need it for any purpose. I never needed it, I was fully paid as agreed by email but never signed on paper.

I'm not a lawyer, and this is almost certainly misguided advice. But when faced with the same, I requested (and got) in writing that the non-compete clause was nonnegotiable, hoping that, should push come to shove, the clause could be found legally non-binding as a contract of adhesion [1].

Also note that Massachusetts recently (2018) signed into law restrictions on non-competes. One of the major aspects is that such a clause provide "garden leave" pay for employees during their noncompete period. [2]

You can alternatively/also simply ask for more pay in compensation, claiming such a clause is non-standard in the field (personally, I've seen very few), and thus it's a material change to what was previously negotiated. That didn't work for me (I was already at the top of the salary range for the level I was assigned to), but since it doesn't involve lawyers, it's more likely to happen.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_form_contract#Contrac...

[2] https://www.slnlaw.com/massachusetts-non-compete-act.html

The problem with "contract of adhesion" here is that while one term may have been non-negotiable for one of the parties, the contract as a whole likely wasn't, and you negotiated things such as pay.

If you are in certain states (e.g. California) non-comps are almost wholly unenforceable and many folks will happily sign them knowing even a company like AWS won't be able to do squat.

Jurisdiction matters, as non-comps are common, and many firms rely on a lack of knowing to pressure folks into behaving the way they like, regardless of actual legal sturdiness.

Signing such an agreement for a California job might still affect your ability to relocate to another state for a position with a competitor.

I'd be surprised if their CA employment agreements even have the non-compete in them, and any halfway-competent lawyer will be able to redline that portion as un-enforceable. This is a bedrock rule in CA employment. If it had any enforceability at all, we would know.

What's the punishment for companies that try to put illegal clauses in contracts? If you have the resources to fight it the clause gets nullified but that's about it. Companies aren't generally punished for abusive contracts, or at worst they get some tiny fine.

As long as this is the case they will continue to try pulling crap like this.

I've never heard of any company being punished. I've been fortunate in my career and only ever signed one non-compete agreement. It was in California, and before such things had been struck down by the courts (1980). I took the time to read it before I signed, and it basically said that any invention I produce henceforth (even after my employment was terminated) would belong to Teledyne. I knew it would never stand up to scrutiny in court so I wasn't too worried about signing it.

One clause I still see is the one where the company owns everything you make in off hours in your own time. It's blatant theft and yet they still try to get away with it.

Save this link for the day when AWS enforces the non-compete against you: http://www.byrneskeller.com/attorneys/keith-d-petrak/ As far as I can tell, this gentleman's entire business is to handle AWS refugees, at least in Seattle. I personally know dozens of people, of all levels, who have used his services.

Some commenters on this thread think that they are too unimportant for AWS to harass them after they leave. The issue is not how important the employee is, but how dangerous a competitor the next employer is from the perspective of AWS. If AWS wants to slow down the competitor, they will use all legal means available to them.

I got a lawyer to look over mine when I was leaving AWS, not for a direct competitor of the team I was on but for a company that does work in an area Amazon is involved in. Washington state.

His advice was thus: technically I am prohibited from working at this new company; Amazon would need to be aware of my new role to enforce it; courts have expressed criticism of over broad non competes so I could challenge it if it came to that. I was not L7+ so his added advice was basically keep your head down for the next 18 months.

It’s bullshit though, and from now on I will always engage an employment lawyer before signing on anywhere. He looked over my new company’s non competes and they are much more reasonable.

Get a lawyer.

I used to work in LegalTech, and contracts have a ton of little bits and things that can get the outcome Amazon would want in a legal battle. Provisions, Certain wording, etc. I've seen all kinds of nasty shit employers try to pull, from trying to prevent interactions with (any) "institutions", to my salary being "conferred" (a gift, not consideration) to me by the company at it's discretion.

For one, in this comment section, I see people suggesting you move to California, but in my experiences contracts often have a Governing Law provision, usually set in a jurisdiction the assigning party would feel comfortable in. Again, not a lawyer, I don't know how California's law works, but, if you worked in California, and the Governing law provision says Delaware, well, guess where you're (probably) flying to for those proceedings.

The only time I would ever sign a noncompete like that is if it came with 18 months of severance pay. That's ludicrous.

That sums up non competes in Europe. Usually companies are required to pay 25%-75% of a former employee's salary in order to make a non compete clause enforceable.

Not high enough, it should be greater than 100% to penalize the employer more.

Yep. If you don't want me to work, you can keep me at my current standard of living plus a penalty for the 18 month resume gap and potentially rusty skills.

If it's not worth that much to you, I probably don't possess enough super secret special sauce stuff for you to need a non-compete anyways.

Well, you are supposed to get it every month until the clause expires, which can be a long time after you stopped working for them. I've only seen it happen to C-level guys of big companies.

Caveat that doesn't (AFAIK) apply in the UK. Here it looks like un-payed non-competes are enforceable but if they're too long/too broad that would likely make them unenforceable.

How does 25% of your salary "sum up" 18 months pay for 18 months non-compete?

25-75% of your salary every month, until the clause expires. So if you were making $100k a year you are getting $25-75k a year until it expires.

It's something but honestly anything less than 100% is not great though. You can't easily go from living on 100k a year to 50k or less. It's still fulfilling the purpose of being an unfair deterrent from finding employment elsewhere.

I had one of those clauses myself and I knew it was bull before I signed it. I have only seen it enforced once in the wild, to prevent a CEO from creating a competing company for a couple of years.

Non-legal opinion: you are unlikely to be able to get the company to deviate from the standard agreements, they are enforceable in WA, and in practice they would have to show harms to really have any teeth on you besides making your life tediously miserable with legal paperwork. I am not a lawyer, if you want advice you should talk to an employment specialist who practices in your jurisdiction. If you are in WA and e-mail me I can recommend someone I've worked with in the past.

Not a lawyer, but I have seen this exact thing in the past and discussed it with our lawyer. He advised to say that the scope was overly broad, point out as you have that AMZN does absolutely everything, suggest that you either see what they say in response, or you suggest you would be happy to agree to a reasonable narrowly scoped provision (e.g. not to work on products directly competitive to the products you worked on at AMZN).

I'm not sure making this about confidential information is helpful -- there are already other provisions in the contract, I'm sure, relating to that.

In general yes all contracts are up for renegotiation and in house lawyers fully expect this kind of push back. If they rescind the offer then they're a.holes and you shouldn't work for them anyway.

It seems to be a concept in law that you can't enforce overly broad and unreasonable provisions like this so they are being a bit cheeky slipping it in anyway. Again there's a legal term I forget for this but it means "something only a fool would agree to".

My wife is a lawyer. She checks all contracts that either of us sign. And we realize that there's a lot of stuff we can't change with regards to a contract we sign with large companies, like Amazon.

Nevertheless, we do push back on those things that are most important to us, like my ability to support existing open source projects like NTP.org, which I have been involved with since 2003.

I'm personally not too worried about the non-compete, because I'm so low on the totem pole that I really don't think the company will care about me if/when I leave. I strongly suspect they won't even notice -- there's at least six or seven layers of management between Andy Jassy and me.

You're misreading the agreement (unless it's changed significantly very recently). Like any non-compete I've ever seen/signed, it only applies to products/services that:

> Employee worked on or supported, or about which Employee obtained or received Confidential Information.

Totally fair if you don't want to enter that agreement, but the language is pretty standard.

Amazon can simply argue that all engineers receive Confidential Information about products/services that they did not work on, but were aware of due to company memos, access to internal documentation, etc.

Without seeing the clause verbatim, I also suspect there is a misreading going on here. Having dealt with noncompete clauses in a previous job, writing one like what the OP suggests is one of the surest ways to get a judge to find that the clause is unenforceable.

I think it should be federal law that any non-compete pays the employee salary and full benefits for time spent under the enforceable period of the non-compete if the employer tries to enforce it in court. If it's SO important that an employee not divulge any information that you need a contract for it, companies should have to pay for it.

I can't give you legal advice, but I can ask you to consider if you really want to work for AWS. It may be a generic clause, but they are basically saying they don't trust you. Also telling recruiters of other FAANG / big corp / etc. you got an AWS offer should increase your leverage.

Non-competes are commonly used in most employment contracts.

If that's your measure of "are you really sure you want to work for this company", then I think I would ask if you're really sure that you want to work for ANY company. Or even just work at all.

If it helps: Amazon, Google etc are using these non-compete agreements almost exclusively against the executives who jump ship. Here's are some cases of AWS→ Google Cloud:

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/11/aws-case-against-worker-who-...

https://www.brodyandassociates.com/blog/even-amazon-trouble-...

I personally as an individual contributor (IC) who's not a distinguished engineer would not worry much about Amazon chasing me down to my next job. Not a legal advice obviously.

Former Amazonian. I didn't renegotiate the non-competes and I wouldn't stress much about this.

To my knowledge, this is one of those overly broad statements they put into the contract because it's advantageous to them and to reserve the right to sue the "VP of something" who took the knowledge and ran away. They won't act on it for your regular employees because it costs them money to do so and developers _routinely_ jump ship, though they want you to know that they technically have the power to because you signed that contract.

Like others said, there are other problems with Amazon you might want to focus on. This one may not be worth fighting over, but you can use it as part of a response with multiple requests, to let them say no to something and accept your other requests.

> They won't act on it for your regular employees because it costs them money to do so and developers _routinely_ jump ship, though they want you to know that they technically have the power to because you signed that contract.

This kind of thinking is exactly why these clauses get worse and worse and worse over time, I'm afraid.

People should be prepared to argue the toss over every single line of an employment contract, and seek advice for every single line.

Sure, but it's prisoner's dilemma. In practice, the company almost always denies the request to remove the clause, and if I then refuse the offer, I'm worse off because few others are refusing offers over this clause. The only way we win here is if most people walk away, which they should, but they're not.

Anecdata: at a different FAANG, I requested a less important clause to be removed and the lawyers denied even that request. Lawyers will tell hiring managers to pass on a candidate in the name of protecting the company. They won't pass on everyone, but it's a long way to get there.

I think that having access to specialized legal council would have helped, but attorneys have a reputation of being expensive. I wish levels.fyi offered a legal service as well, in addition to their negotiation coaching service.

This is a fair assessment.

There is another strategy than asking them to remove it, though. Ask them to qualify it. I've done this in the past (a long time ago, mind you, and in the UK, where employers are still somewhat bound by decency as well as law). I was asked to sign an extensive NDA for a short period of employment, and I agreed, on the condition that I could decline to join any meeting that wasn't strictly related to the project I was hired on, and that the same NDA bound them when discussing my personal projects.

I am surprised by the many post who make this statement. I mean this is significant financial risk based on the notion of "I guess they won't really enforce it".

It's low risk high reward. I agree with you in principle, but in practice, it depends on how strong your negotiation position is. Mine was rather weak so most things I asked for were denied.

Tell them this is significant to you and ask for, say, +30% of total comp to sign the contract in the current wording. This they will understand. If you say no or if you give reasons they will just try to make you change your mind and give you excuses. Don't waste your time.

Generally, are non-competes even enforceable? Especially in industries (like cloud providers) where there is a very small number of players.

This. Every time I see the topic come up, there are countless examples of them being thrown out in court without a fight, usually because they're either too broad (like OP's example of not completing with the entirety of Amazon) or too long (18 months is nuts).

But do you or a future employer want to go to court over this?

Not having it in the first place is a way better solution.

The couple of times I've had friends or coworkers deal with non-competes it wasn't an issue of enforceability but rather are the employee AND the new employer willing to deal with it.

Both times the new company withdrew its employment offers. It is pretty terrible. It leaves the employee at a company they don't want to be at.

This was in Colorado and Texas FWIW

Disclosing such a non-compete to a potential employer is such a dumb move that it’s pretty obvious why they would withdraw their offer.

Not because the non-compete is scary, but because the potential new hire is clearly an idiot.

I appreciate honest people, especially when they're honest even though it isn't in their best interest.

Easy to say, but I doubt most people would actually let that appreciation affect hiring decisions.

A potential hire might also open up about their casual drug use. Would that be points in their favor vs. the other candidate who might very well also take drugs but chooses to not advertise this irrelevant detail to potential employers?

When being hired by the DoD, and interviewed for your security clearance, you damn well better tell them about your drug use. If you don't, then you're hiding something from them that could be used as a lever against you in the future by spies from another country.

And lying to your employer about things like drug use will get you fired faster than just about anything else.

Yes, I did start work in the basement of the Pentagon in 1989 for what was then the Defense Communications Agency. I will let you ascertain for yourself what I may have told them during that interview.

Yes, obviously. Although admitting to casual drug use will pretty much ensure that you won’t get hired.

I think you know damn well that jobs requiring a security clearance are a special case. It really doesn’t make sense to bring this up in a general conversation about jobs.

> And lying to your employer about things like drug use will get you fired faster than just about anything else.

If your employer is the DoD, sure. If you work for a normal company, they’ll never find out unless you have a real problem (or are stupid enough to advertise it).

ouch. what awful advice. lying by omission is not only a terrible way to enter into a trusting relationship with a new employer but could also be committing fraud.

Not advertising the fact that you previously signed a non-binding unenforceable noncompete is not lying by omission.

Except that as we heard from many here, they might very well be binding and enforceable in many states.

>it wasn't an issue of enforceability

You literally said a "non-binding, unenforceable" so yes this post was about enforceability. You made a false statement with possible serious repercussions for a person following your advise. Now you backtrack that it wasn't about enforceability?

What? I replied to a comment saying:

>it wasn't an issue of enforceability

I’m not backtracking on anything. Are you ok? If it wasn’t an issue of enforceability, I think we can reasonably assume that the noncompete was not enforceable. Unenforceability was the premise of this conversation, and that wasn’t introduced by me.

I think you should go back and read over the thread and how your replies can be understood. You replied to someone saying that lying by omission is terrible advice, by saying omitting signing a non-binding unenforceable nocompete is not lying. Yes two levels up someone said the main issue is not enforceability but the uncertainty that it gives potential future employers.

So I unterstand you made the leap that the nocompete is unenforceable and therefore no binding. That's a pretty big leap and also ignores the point. Enforceability is typically a grey area and decided by the courts, and therefore there is a risk associated with violating the nocompete (for employee and new employer), and many employers might want to avoid it. If you were referring to the case where the nocompete is clearly illegal (e.g. you're in california), yes there is no uncertainty, but then there is also no issue about disclosing it, because there is no associated risk. In that case I don't understand what you were trying to add to the discussion?

I'm not a lawyer, but having been a hiring manager in tech for 20+ years, "materiality" (whether what you are omitting is material) is in the eye of the beholder (side note: great video game) aka the hiring manager and enforceability of contracts is up to lawyers. Neither of those people are you, in this case. So. I commend you for the fierce independence and protection of your career, but I stand by my statement that parent comment is still awful advice.

The employee didn't disclose it.

The current employer tracked down the new company after they gave notice, found the hiring manager, and started making threats ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

In many states they are.

Washington State (where Amazon is based) has a law invalidating non-competes in situations where the employee's W-2 compensation is $100k or lower. I would assume that this means lawmakers intend for them to be enforceable in situations where earnings exceed $100k.

https://app.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=49.62.020

making everything below 100k completely unenforceable doesn't make everything above 100k enforceable, there are still considerable tests to if a non-compete is considered fair or not which governs it's enforceability.

Amazon (and Microsoft) already sues former cloud employees. The question is not "is this enforceable?". The real question is "can you afford the legal fees?".

'Amazon is suing a cloud employee who left for Google, rekindling the debate over non-compete agreements' https://www.cnbc.com/2020/06/11/aws-case-against-worker-who-...

It varies widely by state.

In WA, and many other states, and many countries outside of the US, yes it is enforceable.

Move to California?

For those that don’t understand the above comment: It is a rare non-compete that can be enforced in California in any meaningful way.

AWS is on my list of places I would never apply or work at. This post just reinforces my opinion on that.

Tell HN: anyone with good knowledge about something like this will not tell you on Hacker News. Probably not even in private.

Think about it: if you had issues with AWS related to your non-compete, you probably reached some form of agreement or settlement. I'd assume in a large number of these cases, part of the agreement is to not disclose anything about it in public.

Take my two cents: talk to a good, really good, lawyer.

A note to anyone involved in such litigation: settlement agreements are negotiable! Consider what effect a gag clause will have on your life and ability to communicate freely with others, and consider negotiating it out of the agreement, or putting an expiration date on it. If the other party is contemplating a settlement, you are likely coming from a position of negotiating power: you can always walk and insist on a judgment, which will be more of a hassle for everyone but will not include a gag clause.

Amazon are struggling for engineers lately. There's a good chance if you just don't sign it they won't bat an eyelid.

I've been getting a few emails from Amazon recruiters weekly to both my personal and work emails.

I complained to jeff@ about the spam from recruiters, after emailing them several times to stop contacting me - and even calling the recruiters on the phone once asking them to stop.

The final reply in my email thread with them: "I will take a look at these messages and will inform our recruiting team of your concern if these messages are found to be legitimate. Thank you again for sharing your concerns. I wish you well in your future endeavors!"

I had one message me on linked in, escalate to email, and then escalate to texting within 3 minutes. I didn't know about the priors but the cold text is unacceptable. The guy even tried to justify it by claiming "it's just text mate" and tried to dismiss my request not to be contacted by text if I don't know you.. An email to jeff@ had him apologizing in an hour.

That's hilarious, I had no idea his email was public. I have to wonder whether the response was written by an assistant, though.

It used to be his semi-personal email many many years ago, part of his "open door policy" for employees, partners and customers. It was transformed into an escalated support inbox many years ago because it go too busy. Even though he isn't at Amazon anymore, the inbox remained open because people keep contacting it for issues that aren't being resolved through the proper channels.

I'll clarify: The "I" pronoun in the reply I got isn't referring to Mr. Bezos. The email is signed by an Amazon employee who I won't name for his privacy.

I did this once. Could never tell if HR was inept and didn't see it or if they just didn't care. Anyways that was a long time ago and no regrets from me.

Amazon will enforce them at the exec level, but courts have ruled they aren't a total blanket ban on employment elsewhere, just a restriction on what you can do for that new employer.

"This past October, a federal judge placed major limitations on his Moyer’s role while also criticizing Amazon’s non-compete policies. Moyer was not allowed to work on any financial services projects, his area of expertise at AWS, for Google Cloud. He was also barred from contacting any AWS customers and any potential financial services customers. The conditions were to stay in place until the lawsuit was fully resolved, or until his non-compete expired in November 2020."

https://www.geekwire.com/2020/amazon-settles-non-compete-law...

What would be the downside of banning all non-competes (no exceptions) at the Federal level?

Companies have to increase wages as people job hop to seek better opportunities. Look at the Apple hiring/salary fixing fiasco that got Steve Jobs in hot water about a decade ago--Apple was actively colluding with all the tech companies to agree not to hire or poach employees so their salaries wouldn't rise: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...

Big companies love the free market, except when it means they have to pay more money to employees...

You’re saying that just asking will cause them to pull the offer. That would be bizarre behavior. If that’s accurate, do you want to work for them? You don’t. And you don’t have to.

My first proper job after being a freelancer I felt it had an overly broad clause about ownership of work done in my private time. When I asked, they clarified, and I told them directly, that makes sense, but that’s not what’s written. They just changed it for me! No problem! It was no Amazon but a large company in my book.

If (with the help of a lawyer) it isn’t clarified to your liking, do not work for them.

No is good.

I'm curious:

1. Do you live+work in a state where non-competes are enforceable?

2. Does the contract say they need to compensate you (e.g. some % of salary) for the period during which they want to enforce the non-compete?

You should get a consult with an employment attorney before agreeing to this to understand the specifics. In WA, very likely enforceable if you make over $100k. Also they are unlikely to negotiate for a non executive position.

If you are in CA(or ND or a few others) this would not be an issue at all. Non competes are illegal with few exceptions.

Amazon does have a history of enforcing this against competing employers/former employees, against working at google or microsoft specifically

I always clarify scope on non-competes. Even if you can get an email back from an HR person clarifying scope, that should be sufficient. They will take it to legal and legal will come back with what they can do. For example, in the last non-compete I signed, it was phrased as something like "Company's business". I clarified that "company's business is X", giving X in my own words.

If you are worried about asking you will be worried about just breaking it in the future. Keep that in mind when signing because employment/reference checks will become worrisome.

There are plenty of areas where Amazon doesn't compete and plenty of areas they do compete. If you stay away from bigger firms you should be okay.

Should you accept the offer is laying low a strategy you can live with for 18 months?

On an AWS team currently, some of our best left to similar'ish google cloud products. No issues there.

The turnover rate is extremely high at Amazon. I don't even consider my non-compete clause when looking at other roles. If you're really worried then don't update your linkedin right away when you leave. After a few months no one will notice.

What's your offer monetarily?

I've read the following things:

- Amazon caps salary, and uses stock options for comp

- vesting is 3-5 years, and Amazon loves forcing people out before you vest, either by natural attrition from their toxic HR practices/stack ranking/ridiculous workloads, or by just forcing you out

On top of that, they will then noncompete you after you leave?

AVOID.

Just FYI, this also applies while you work there. This makes it almost impossible to do any open source work, or have personal projects that you'd like to retain ownership of.

It's one of the reasons I left Amazon after nearly a decade. There was stuff I wanted to do and the non compete made it impossible.

What state are you in? What Amazon can enforce will vary widely from state to state. Ask a lawyer. I had all my non-compete questions about a particular situation covered in one phone call of 45 billable minutes. This does not have to be expensive if you get a specialist in this area of the law.

If you have to ask you can’t negotiate it. And if you try to you’ll be labeled as <…> and rejected.

Talk to a lawyer or just say no. Whatever the lawyer costs you, it won't be as bad as getting yourself in a sticky situation because of the non compete. Or if you turn it down, you can definitely get a job elsewhere if you got an offer from amazon

Ask them for a list of all businesses this covers so you can make an informed decision?

Work in California as it is mostly not enforceable

You should ask for a list of known competitors. Examples.

Or you provide a list and ask them if they agree you cannot work at those.

Ask an attorney. I don't think non-compete agreements are valid in some states like California.

In SC an overly broad noncompete can’t prevent you from earning a living using the skills you have.

Who's to say where you work after you leave one employer and go to another?

Everyone who works for a FAANG or big tech company. Non-competes are unfortunately standard everywhere and I don't know of anyone who isn't like a distinguished engineer/luminary in the field (i.e. someone who can set the terms of their hiring) that was able to successfully negotiate one away.

But for more regular Joe's, maybe senior engineers or whatever, the previous employer isn't too likely to incur any costs trying to find out who the next employer was? And I'm not too sure if there's a way for a private company to find out who somebody's employer is.

I left a really crappy employer about two months into a three month notice period as it was just pointless drudgery. I just kept a low profile on LinkedIn for a year or so afterwards. Didn't think they would have any way of finding out I joined another company straight away.

Move to California - then this will be unenforceable :)

Here's some info on the relevant law as it pertains to California (where AWS is based). TLDR: "non-compete agreements are not enforceable in California"

https://www.callahan-law.com/are-non-competes-enforceable-in...

If you live somewhere else, I don't know if California law would apply or your local laws, so like other said you should consult an attorney who specializes in this area.

AWS is based in Seattle, Washington, not California.

AWS definitely has offices and employees in California. The enforcement is not about where you're headquartered but where the employee is determined to be working. An employee living full time in California would be protected.

Disclaimer: Not a lawyer.

Not necessarily. Many such contracts also contain a choice of law clause that specifies which state's laws will apply.

The same "not necessarily" would presumably apply to the choice of law clause as well, for example if California decided they didn't want a company attempting to evade their laws with such a clause, which presumably would be at the discretion of a judge who probably isn't too fond of that behavior.

Right. See my other comment.

For agreements entered into after January 1, 2017, California Labor Code Section 925 clarifies that employers may not require employees––who primarily work and reside in California––to agree to forum-selection and choice-of-law clauses that select non-California forums and/or laws, unless such employee is “individually represented by legal counsel in negotiating the terms of an agreement.”

Correct. California is its own beast when it comes to employment law and franchise law and a host of related issues.

Edit: and I glossed over the part about "employees living full time in California." My bad.

Don’t bother if below L8.

Google is notorious for treating their new hires an employees badly. It's not only a customer hostile company, it's also very hostile to its employees.

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