[rhizome]

What you're describing is not only illegal, but also something for which Apple recently contributed to a half-billion dollar settlement:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L...

a lot of companies have non-solications in place to try and prevent this kind of behavior

If you know of other companies engaging in backroom nonsolicitation agreements with each other, the responsible thing to do for your fellow STEM workers is to call the Department of Justice Antitrust Division and let them know that the Apple/Google/etc. settlement didn't achieve its intended effect.

[nostrademons]

The type of "no-solicit" that bfstein is talking about is very different from the one you're referring to. The no-solicit contracts that are common in Silicon Valley mean that you, as an ex-employee, cannot directly approach a current employee that you know there and offer them a job at your current employer. The no-solicits that they got in trouble with in the HTEAL were where the company's HR department refused to approach employees at other tech companies. The former is a contract between you and your employer, which is legal and enforceable. The latter was a verbal contract between competitors to the detriment of their employees, which is illegal.

In practice, what most big companies do is they ask incoming employees for the names and personal contact info (and only that) of good employees that they have worked with in the past, and then pass that info on to HR, for a corporate recruiter to make the initial contact. Has the same effect, but no contracts are broken, since the corporation does all the soliciting.

[rhizome]

Those contract clauses would be void in California.

[serge2k]

Why?

[bronson]

Section 16600: http://www.tradesecretsnoncompetelaw.com/2014/05/articles/no...

(just read the 2nd paragraph. the rest of the article makes the rather obvious point that, if you solicit based on confidential company information, 16600 won't save you.)

[nostrademons]

This article (and most of the rest of the information I found on the Internet) is referring to solicitation of customers, not solicitation of employees. The few sources I found [1][2] indicate that non-solicitation agreements for employees are very much enforceable, but only if the employee directly reaches out (if the current employee contacts a former coworker about a job, that's legal, and ditto for the former employee's new employer).

[1] http://www.pashalaw.com/legally-poaching-employees-company-a...

[2] http://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/understanding-nonsoli...

[shoyer]

It's entirely standard at tech companies to have a non-solicitation clause in employment contracts that prohibits soliciting other employees up through a fixed period (e.g., one year) after you leave.

IANAL but I did some research on this and to the best of my understanding these are perfectly legal and enforceable in California.

[Hydraulix989]

That would be career suicide though.