Eight years ago, as a new inexperienced entrepreneur, I was excited when a BigCo sent us our first NDA to sign. Another company actually thought we were important enough to get their legal team involved. Haha!
I was also nervous. What if they were trying to pull one over on us?! I’d better get our expensive lawyers to read it over carefully, right?
So I spent money on lawyers. They read it. They marked it up in red highlights. We spent time going back and forth with the other party. We finally signed it two weeks later.
It took time and money. And in the end, we probably didn’t even do anything meaningful with that other company. Most partnerships have no teeth anyway.
So my mode of operation now is different. My team and I read the NDAs ourselves. In general, if the terms are all mutual and not out of the ordinary, we do not need an expensive lawyer to read over them. We sign them as-is and move on. There are a few exceptions. Especially if there are terms that are not mutual.
This saves us time, money, and headache. It gets the legal done and out of the way and allows the focus to be more on actually doing productive business together.
What are your thoughts on signing NDAs?
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