New bulletin on corporate compliance

The Competition Bureau has released its final bulletin on corporate compliance. The bulletin is an effort to encourage all companies to develop programs ensuring that they are compliant with Canada’s various competition statutes. Although some might think that the legislation falling under the Competition Bureau’s mandate (Competition Act, Consumer Packaging and Labelling Act, Textile Labelling Act, and Precious Metals Marking Act) only applies to public companies, the bureau investigates illegal practices in all businesses. Deceptive marketing, tied selling, legalities of “loyalty” programs, pricing below cost, selling or marketing through telemarketing, full disclosure in advertising- these are issues in businesses of all sizes.    

The compliance program detailed in the bulletin seems complicated, especially for smaller companies. But you may find the due diligence checklist at the end of the bulletin useful.

There’s an incentive to developing a compliance program for your company: if you have a compliance program and you still contravene the legislation, your penalties may be reduced.

Breach of duty of good faith when manager lured staff to another firm

Generally, unless an employee signs a non-competition agreement with their employer, they are free to leave their job and begin competing directly against this employer. However, every employee owes some “duty of good faith” to their current employer. The scope of this duty depends upon the role of the employee within the organisation. For employees with critical responsibilities within a company, this duty can even be elevated to a fiduciary duty.

A recent Supreme Court case discusses the duty of good faith in the context of an employee who left his employment for a competitor. This case involved a branch manager at RBC securities.  He left his job at RBC taking, not only his clients, but also most of RBC’s investment advisors at the branch to a competing investment firm, Merrill Lynch. Interestingly, the manager had never signed a non-competition agreement with RBC and neither had any of the other advisors.

One would have thought the lack of a non-competition agreement would have settled the issue in favour of the manager. However, the court felt that the manager still owed RBC a duty of good faith which included making sure that his fellow investment advisors stayed with RBC. He was found liable for 1.5 million dollars in damages for lost profits to RBC over a 5 year period.

Even without a non-competition agreement, there are limits to what an employee can do in the name of free competition and career opportunity.

Women’s networking breakfast

This morning, I went to Lisa MacLeod’s latest Nepean-Carleton Women in Business breakfast held in Barrhaven. Anyone who reads my blog knows I have a particular fondness for women’s-only business events and this one is always great. Angela Sutcliffe was the speaker today. She talked about some of the challenges women face in networking. It doesn’t matter how many talks on ‘networking’ that I hear, I always realize that I am doing it the wrong way- Did you know, for example, that you should bring your daytimer to all the events you attend?  

If you schedule your events this far ahead of time, the next women’s breakfast with Lisa is being held on April 3rd. 

Top female entrepreneurs

Profit magazine has released its list of the 100 most profitable companies owned by women entrepreneurs in Canada.  If you read the article that accompanies the list, it cites some important differences between male-owned businesses and those owned by women. 85% of women-owned businesses have less than 5 employees, and revenues generated by these firms falls below half of the revenue generated by male-owned businesses.  Some things to think about…

A couple of entries on the list that caught my eye- a woman who owns a car dealership in Waterloo, a restauranteur in Moncton, and a coffee importer/roaster. 

Nepean Chamber awards 2008

Shari Westman won the Businesswoman of the Year at the Nepean Chamber of Commerce Business Awards, held on October 16th. Shari’s business, Comfort Keepers, provides home care services to seniors. Congratulations, Shari!