Companies have used "non-compete contracts" en masse since the dot-com boom to protect their intellectual property and help retain workers in a competitive labor market.  Workers have bristled against the notion that former employers can dictate who they can work for and what they can do in subsequent jobs.

The California Supreme Court’s ruling on Thursday was in regard to the case of Edwards vs. Arthur Andersen.  Attorneys for Edwards, a tax manager, claim that the non-compete agreement that Arthur Andersen required Edwards to sign is invalid under California law.  The court agreed and stated in its final disposition:  "The noncompetition agreement that Edwards was required to sign before commencing employment with Andersen was therefore invalid because it restrained his ability to practice his profession."

California, the home of Silicon Valley and heart of U.S. technological production, is clearly on the forefront of technology law, and therefore this ruling is likely to have an impact on non-compete laws throughout the country. 

As an employee, I am against non-compete contracts that restrict workers from obtaining gainful employment from any company they choose.  However, as an employer, I recognize that companies must retain the right to prevent ex-employees from disseminating trade secrets to competitors.  Until now, non-compete contracts have been an effective means of protecting intellectual property.  Without these contracts, employers will likely resort to litigation against ex-employees that go to work for competitors.  It’s a conundrum, one that will continue to play out in the courts.

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Inspired by The Unix Guy, following are the annual salaries (as of June 10, 2008) for software developer jobs for the most popular programming languages and a few related technologies such as LAMP, Ajax and ASP.NET.  The second column lists the salary for developer jobs in that language, such that the job title for C# would be “C# developer.”  The third column lists senior developer salary, and the fourth columns lists junior developer salary.  Note that some jobs had no listings for the specified language.

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Quarantined Keyboards

Scientists in London swabbed 33 keyboards in their own offices for food poisoning bugs including e.coli, coliforms, and staphylococcus. Then they tested toilet seats and bathroom door handles. The results were shocking:

• Two keyboards had “warning levels” of staphylococcus aureus.
• Two other keyboards had “worryingly elevated” levels of coliforms and enterobacteria, “putting users at high risk of becoming ill from contact.”
• One keyboard was so dirty that it was removed, quarantined and cleaned. It had 150 times the acceptable limit for bacteria and was five times as filthy as the average toilet seat.

The experts said the findings were typical of most offices. They warned that users risk “qwerty tummy,” named after the first six letters on a keyboard.

In a Word: Gross!

“The main cause of a bug-infested keyboard is eating lunch at desks, as the food deposits encourage the growth of millions of bacteria,” said the lead scientist. “Poor personal hygiene, such as dodging hand washing after going to the lavatory, may also be to blame. Most people don’t give much thought to the grime that builds up on their PC, but if you don’t clean your computer, you might as well eat your lunch off a lavatory seat.”

A DailyMail survey found that one in ten people never clean their keyboard, and one in five never clean their computer mouse. About half clean their keyboard less than once a month. Also, the modern practice of “hotdesking,” in which employees sit at different desks every day, means that workers don’t know who has been using their keyboard before them.

This is nothing new of course. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported a norovirus outbreak at a Washington, D.C., elementary school in February 2007 that sickened more than 100 students may have spread through contaminated computer equipment.

Wash Up!

“Handwashing is the single best, cheapest, most effective way to limit your exposure you have throughout your life with potentially dangerous bacteria,” says Dr. Aaron Glatt, spokesperson for the Infectious Disease Society of America. “It’s amazing how this basic, basic advice is ignored by huge numbers of people every day.”

It’s also important to clean your keyboard and mouse on a regular basis. Unplug your computer, then wipe the keyboard, mouse and other surfaces with a damp, soft, lint-free cloth. Compressed air is useful to remove food particles that have fallen between the keys. VideoJug recommends using home vinegar as a cleaner because it is inexpensive, you likely have it already in your kitchen, and it is anti-static, so it will help prevent dirt from sticking to your computer surfaces. A more radical, last-ditch solution is to disinfect your keyboard in a dishwasher.

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Forty years ago, most office workers were jammed together in open rooms.  Propst’s idea was to increase worker productivity by separating people into their own small “rooms,” which could be easily assembled or re-configured as needed.  It’s like offering each worker their own personal bathroom stall, but without the door or any real expectation of privacy.

Corporate bosses, who typically work in offices with walls, cielings and doors, thought cubicles were a terrific idea and have purchased more than $5 billion worth of cubicles from Herman Miller alone.  Today, 70% of U.S. office workers sit in cubicles.

But as usual, a good invention was hijacked for evil.  “The Action Office wasn’t conceived to cram a lot of people into little space,” says Joe Schwartz, Herman Miller’s former marketing chief who helped launch the system in 1968. “It was driven that way by economics.”  In the late 60’s, the number of white-collar office workers exploded along with commercial real estate prices, resulting in a need to maximize office space.  Cubicles offered a much cheaper alternative than building fixed offices. 

Propst designed cubicles to be flexible, but in practice companies would seldom move or modify their cubicles.  Lined up in identical rows, cubicles came to represent the “dystopian world of bright satanic offices” as described in the 1998 book, “Workplaces of the Future.”

There is debate on whether cubicles or offices are better for software developers.  The main arguments are:

• Cubicles – encourage collaboration and can adapt to an ever-changing workforce
• Offices – provide privacy and silence for developers to get into the “zone”

The “zone” sounds silly but is real.  It’s widely accepted that software developers can take from 5-15 minutes to regain focus and concentration after an interruption.  So if a developer is interrupted every 10 minutes while working in a cubicle, he may not get much work done.

I have spent my entire career in either an office or cubicle, and I prefer an office with a door.  But cubicles can be OK if co-workers stay quiet and limit interruptions, and if there is plenty of ambient noise from air conditioning or white-noise generator.

So what does the future hold for the office cubicle?  Scott Adams, who created the Dilbert cartoon that lampoons cubicles and “pointy-haired bosses,” approached furniture maker IDEO to create Dilbert’s Ultimate Cubicle.  This is an attempt to “address the myriad issues connected with partition-based offices.  The result is a modular cubicle that allows each worker to select the components and create a space based on his or her tastes and lifestyle.”

Along with practical solutions for common work necessities like storage and counter space, Dilbert’s Ultimate Cubicle also includes amenities such as a hammock, aquarium, floor cooler, fold-down visitor’s chair, boss monitor, locker and motorized shoe polisher.

So which type of work area do you prefer: office, cubicle or open space?  Please comment below.

Interesting Cubicle Links

• 10 Cubicles that are Cooler than Yours (and 1 that isn’t)
• Cool Cubicle Gadgets
• “Dilbert’s Cubicle Chaos” computer game
• Fortune Magazine: Can business break out of the box?

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3. Court Finds Non-Compete Clauses Invalid