[4258HzG]

One thing to consider is if the client you're dealing with requiring it, or is their firm requiring it by policy? If it's the later, the kind of leeway you'll have in terms of getting appropriate terms signed off by their legal team is quite different.

For example, for early discussions a mutual disclosure agreement is another nice way to get compliance with a company's standard legal terms (ie. both parties agree to not reveal anything confidential or sensitive), and can be useful to get things started far enough to get upper management support required to make exceptions to their standard legal procedures. (I've been in the situation where my and a supplier's legal team's where far and distant enough from a project not to prioritize resolving incompatible differences in standard contract terms for months eventually requiring a loud "nudge" from upper management behind a closed door.)

[tptacek]

This will be the case at virtually any firm that (a) has a lawyer either on staff or retainer and (b) works with customer private data of any sort. There won't be any leeway whatsoever from firms like these on NDAs.

[4258HzG]

That is basically the case that the person you're talking to requiring it (small company), if the 'contract' is basically a substitute for a hire, or if programmers are viewed there as fungible goods.

For companies large enough to have a large bureaucracy of legal staff whose standard terms are a Byzantine compromise of many different departments / businesses requirements / and past initiatives. Then local legal aids will typically had a fixed set of options of types of contracts they'll entertain quickly (in order to get anything done). For example, they might have a mutual disclosure agreement on file. Later, if the questioner offers something important enough to get upper management's attention minor modifications can be made within limits. Then again you have to offer something unique and important for that to happen.