Employee Ordered To Work Out Notice Period

In negotiating senior executive employment agreements employers often seek lengthy notice periods from employees who wish to resign. The reasons for this usually revolve around the difficulty recruiting a replacement with specialized skills and the need to ensure a smooth transition without competition from the executive. Whether the employee fulfills this obligation, however, has often been considered more of a moral, than a legal, obligation on the basis that it was unlikely an employer could force an employee to continue to provide services against his or her wishes. A recent decision from the Ontario Superior Court of Justice challenges all that. In Blackberry Limited v. Marineau-Mes, 2014 ONSC 1790 (CanLII), Justice T. McEwen has issued a declaration that an executive is obliged to fulfill his contractual obligation to work out a six month notice period.