Russell Beck and Sarah Tishler’s Article on Restrictive Covenant Law Published

Russell Beck and Sarah Tishler’s article about the Uniform Restrictive Employment Agreement Act (UREAA) was recently published by the University of Florida Journal of Law and Public Policy.

The article is titled “The Uniform Restrictive Employment Agreement Act: How UREAA Offered an Alternative To Recent State and Federal Regulation of Restrictive Covenants, and Where To Go From Here.”

The article analyzes the Uniform Restrictive Employment Agreement Act (UREAA), which is a proposed state law that was drafted and approved by a committee representing the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws.

he UREAA seeks to cover all employer-employee restrictive employment agreements. This includes noncompete agreements, confidentiality and nondisclosure agreements, nonsolicitation agreements, no-business agreements, no-recruit agreements, payment-for-competition agreements, and training-repayment agreements.

The National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws adopted UREAA at its annual conference in July 2021.  In the two-and-a-half years since its adoption, UREAA has been introduced as legislation in five states: Colorado, Oklahoma, North Carolina, Vermont, and West Virginia.

In the article, Russell and Sarah explore UREAA’s reach and its overlap with the FTC’s recent efforts to prohibit the use of noncompetes, a Massachusetts state law that is closer to getting it right, and recommendations for moving forward.

The article explains that “UREAA is an important uniform law that joins much of the state and federal action on noncompetes and other restrictive covenants,” but Russell and Sarah note that “the primary obstacle in this area is the lack of empirical research on the impacts of noncompetes and other restrictive covenants.” Russell and Sarah conclude that additional research in this area would help advance the polarizing debate about restrictive covenants past “the usual political camps.”

The article can be accessed online here and is available in its entirety below.

The University of Florida Journal of Law and Public Policy is published four times a year by the University of Florida Levin College of Law. The Journal is designed to serve the needs of professionals, researchers, instructors, and students in the academic fields of law and public policy, journalism and mass communications, business and social science, and other related disciplines, as well as law libraries, policy analysts, and public officials.

Russell Beck is a business litigator known for his expertise in trade secrets, noncompetes, and employee mobility. He was invited to the Obama White House to develop guidelines for the proper use of noncompetes, drafted much of the language for Massachusetts’ 2018 noncompete and trade secrets laws, and developed the widely-used 50 State Noncompete Survey. His insights have been cited by major outlets, including The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. He authors the Fair Competition Law blog, has published multiple books on restrictive covenants, and teaches at Boston University School of Law. He also served as President of the Boston Bar Foundation.

Sarah Tishler is a senior counsel at Beck Reed Riden LLP. Sarah’s practice is concentrated on trade secret and restrictive covenant advising and litigation, employee mobility, and commercial litigation. Sarah has won successful outcomes for clients on both sides of these disputes in all stages of litigation, including the preliminary injunction stage, jury trials, and mediation. Sarah has also counseled clients on the identification and protection of trade secrets, and the enforceability of noncompetes and other restrictive covenants. Sarah was named by the Legal 500 as a Rising Star for 2023 in the area of Trade Secrets