[logic]

I suspect the 37signals employment contracts still say "at will" somewhere in them. In fact, Jason Fried talked about exactly that at one point: http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2239-employment-contracts-wha...

If you want me to treat a position like it's the last one I'll take, then show me the same: treat me like a member of the team that you'll fight to keep around. Offer equity, take that at-will clause out of the contract, treat me like a partner in your success.

Anything else is just blowing smoke, I'm afraid. At the end of the day, you can be let go without notice (and, to be fair, you can also walk away at any time); that's the agreement you sign during your first professional interaction with most US-based companies. And it sets the tone for the rest of the relationship: this is a transient arrangement, and can be discarded as situations change on either side.

[jackowayed]

What are you actually asking for? Employment in the US is at will by default, unless the employer and employee sign a contract explicitly agreeing to change something about that relationship. What do you actually want in that contract to give you? A guaranteed huge severance package that incentivizes them to keep you? Something that fully makes them unable to fire you without demonstrated cause? Do you also want to lose some of the freedom you have to walk away if they sell and massively change company culture, start hiring worse people, change what they work on or what technologies they use in a way that moves away from your interests, etc?

Also, remember that if you want a company's default employment contract to be different, it will also be different for all of your coworkers. Eventually, the company will make a hiring mistake; no process is perfect. In that event, you want the company to fire the person as quickly as it becomes clear that a mistake was made, not hang onto them until they have unquestionably demonstrated incompetence. Do you want to work at a company that will dilly dally about firing bad people?

Talk to anyone who has worked at various government agencies, which basically can't fire anyone after two years, and you will gain respect for at-will employment.

[lmm]

Where I live you'd expect at a minimum a month's notice from either party (in the contract); 3 months is reasonably common. That's not a long time to wait to leave (and you can reduce it by mutual agreement; most companies will be happy to let you leave earlier once you've handed everything over), but it gives you at least a little time to hit the ground running. As someone who's currently going through the legally-required consultation process prior to redundancies immediately after getting a mortgage, had the company been able to simply say "nope, you no longer have a job, don't come in tomorrow" it would've massively screwed me over. (Of course, in a world where that was a possibility my actions would have been different).

As for hiring mistakes, thee months' salary (you're allowed to simply pay an employee for their notice period if you don't want them coming in) is not a huge expense compared to the cost of hiring them in the first place.

So yeah; I would never work for a company that wanted to be able to fire me without cause at zero notice, and I'm willing to put up with having to give notice myself as a cost.

[nathan_long]

You make a good point, but having to give 3 months notice before quitting or firing is not the same as being unable to quit or fire.

[lmm]

Indeed, but an environment where you have to give 3 months notice before quitting or firing is not "at-will employment".

[nathan_long]

>> it sets the tone for the rest of the relationship: this is a transient arrangement, and can be discarded

I don't think this has to be the case. If the company treats you well and most of your team has been happily working there for a decade, you're not going to be dwelling on that clause. But if an irresponsible coworker starts dragging down the whole team, you'll be glad that clause is there.