An employment contract sets out the terms of an ongoing employment relationship — the role and duties, compensation and benefits, work schedule, whether employment is at-will or for a fixed term, termination and notice, confidentiality, IP assignment, and how the employer's policies and handbook fit in. Download the ready-to-fill template below, or read the full clause checklist first — including the at-will election and the mistakes that most often make an employment contract weak.
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This document is a general-purpose template provided for information only. It is not legal advice, it does not create a lawyer–client relationship, and nobody has reviewed it against your situation.
Laws differ by country, state and province, and they change. A clause that is standard in one place can be unenforceable — or illegal — in another. Terms that are ordinary between two businesses can be void in a consumer or employment context.
Read every clause before you use it, fill in every blank, and delete anything that does not apply. For anything high-value, unusual, or that you could not afford to lose a dispute over, have a qualified lawyer in your jurisdiction review it before it is signed.
This kind of document is regulated differently almost everywhere. Many places require specific notices, disclosures or statutory wording, and some make clauses like these unenforceable outright. Treat this template as a starting point to take to a local lawyer, not as a document to sign as-is.
Employer and employee names, start date
Full legal name and address of the employer and the employee, and the date employment actually begins.
Position, duties and reporting line
The job title, who the employee reports to, and the core duties — specific enough to set expectations, general enough to allow the employer to assign related work.
Work location and schedule
Where the employee works (office, remote, hybrid) and the normal working hours, including any overtime or scheduling rules that apply.
Compensation and benefits
Salary or wage, pay frequency, and the benefits the employee is eligible for — health coverage, retirement plans, paid time off — plus how often pay is reviewed.
At-will vs. fixed-term employment
Whether either party can end employment at any time (at-will) or the relationship runs for a stated term. This single election changes what the rest of the termination clause needs to say — and whether it is even available depends on where the employee works.
Termination and notice
Notice period each side must give, what counts as cause for immediate termination, and what gets paid out (final wages, accrued time off, any required severance) when employment ends.
Confidentiality
What counts as the employer's confidential information, and the employee's obligation not to disclose or misuse it — during employment and after it ends.
Intellectual property assignment
Assigns work the employee creates within the scope of the job to the employer, with the "own time, own equipment" carve-out most jurisdictions require for inventions unrelated to the job.
Restrictive covenants (non-solicitation)
A narrow non-solicitation of employees and clients is common in a base contract; a broader non-compete needs its own agreement and its own jurisdiction check — see below.
Policy incorporation (employee handbook)
States that the employer's policies and handbook apply, without letting a policy silently override the contract's express terms, like at-will status.
Governing law
Which jurisdiction's law governs the contract — though mandatory employment protections in the place the employee actually works can still apply regardless of what this clause says.
Signatures and date
Both parties sign and date the agreement. Until this happens, nothing in the document is binding.
Whether employment defaults to at-will, how much notice either side must give to end it, what counts as required severance, and even what must be included in a written employment statement in the first place are all set by the country, state or province where the employee actually works — not by where the employer is headquartered, and not by anything a template can decide for you.
Restrictive covenants vary even more sharply: a non-solicitation clause like the one in this template is broadly enforceable in most places, but a full non-compete is banned outright in some US states and heavily restricted in many countries outside the US. Confidentiality and IP-assignment language is generally more portable, but statutory carve-outs — like the “own time, own equipment” exception for employee inventions that several US states require by law — differ in scope from one jurisdiction to the next.
Treat this template as a starting point that covers the ground common to employment contracts everywhere. Before using it to hire someone, confirm the minimum notice period, final-pay timing, mandatory benefits and any required disclosures for the specific state or country where the employee will work — ideally with a local employment lawyer, especially before adding any restrictive covenant.
Fill in the template above and send it to the new hire for signature with a free Evenseal account — 3 documents a month, no card required. They sign online and never need an account, and the finished file comes back sealed with an audit certificate showing who signed, when, and from where.
Not legal advice — at-will status, notice requirements and restrictive-covenant enforceability vary by state and country; confirm yours with a local employment lawyer before relying on this template alone.