Your noncompete is only as good as the document it lives in.

A proposed class action against Ashley Furniture alleges the company buried a noncompete in its handbook-style "Culture Guide" and didn't disclose the terms until after workers accepted their job offers.

This case raises an important question for employers to consider: can you enforce a noncompete that lives only in your handbook?

Probably not, and your own handbook is why.

Most handbooks say they are not a contract. We put that language there to defeat implied-contract claims. But it cuts both ways. If the handbook isn't a contract, it can't be the contract that restricts someone from working after they leave.

Courts agree. In Elite Cleaning Co. v. Capel, a noncompete appeared only in an employee manual, acknowledged on a short form. The court held that a handbook for an at-will employee is not a contract, and the employer offered nothing more. In Morgan v. Raymours Furniture Co., a handbook arbitration clause failed for the same reason. The court wouldn't let the employer disclaim a contract when convenient and then insist on one when it wasn't.

The lesson is that a separate, signed agreement changes the outcome. In ASI System Integration v. Mollenkopf, the handbook provision was unenforceable because of its disclaimer, but the employer survived dismissal because the employee had signed a separate stand-alone agreement.

There's a second problem. A handbook applies to everyone, so the noncompete does too: the receptionist, the stocker, and the sales director who holds your biggest accounts. Under the law of most states (including Ohio), a covenant must be no greater than needed to protect legitimate interests like trade secrets and customer goodwill. Most employees have none. In Elite Cleaning, for example, the court found the employer's interest weak as to an unskilled worker with no trade secrets. A blanket restriction invites the inference that the goal is controlling labor, not protecting the business.

Courts can narrow an overbroad covenant rather than void it, but that's a gamble, not a plan.

The fix is to use a stand-alone agreement, signed by the employee, tied to a legitimate interest and tailored to the role. Reserve it for employees who actually have something to protect, and use confidentiality and non-solicitation terms for everyone else. And keep it out of the handbook if you have hopes of enforcement.

If your noncompete is a paragraph on page 47 of a handbook that applies to every employee, you probably don't have one to enforce at all.