Are Non-Competes Enforceable for Therapists and Behavioral Health Staff in California?

"Every contract by which anyone is restrained from engaging in a lawful profession, trade, or business of any kind is to that extent void," except as the chapter allows — that is Business and Professions Code § 16600(a), and it covers clinical and non-clinical staff alike.

Since January 1, 2024, it has also been unlawful under § 16600.1 to include a non-compete clause in an employment contract or to require an employee to enter one that does not satisfy a statutory exception.

Writing the clause into an offer packet is itself the violation — you do not have to try to enforce it.

How other states treat non-competes is covered in our guide to non-competes nationally.

Section 16600(b)(1) directs courts to read § 16600 broadly, per Edwards, to void any employment non-compete no matter how narrowly tailored, unless a statutory exception applies.

In Edwards v. Arthur Andersen LLP (2008), the California Supreme Court voided a clause barring a departing professional for a year from "soliciting" clients of his former office.

Section 16600.1 (AB 1076, effective January 1, 2024) makes it unlawful to include a non-compete in an employment contract or require an employee to sign one that does not satisfy a statutory exception.

Section 16600.5 adds that a contract void under the chapter is unenforceable regardless of where and when it was signed — even if it was signed and the employment maintained outside California — and that an employee, former employee or prospective employee may sue for an injunction and actual damages, with a prevailing worker recovering reasonable attorney's fees and costs.

Labor Code § 925 also bars requiring an employee who primarily resides and works in California, as a condition of employment, to litigate outside California or give up California law (contracts entered, modified or extended on or after January 1, 2017, unless individually represented by counsel).

There is no carve-out: § 16600 applies to "anyone," so it covers therapists, psychologists, social workers, BCBAs, RBTs, psychiatrists and nurse practitioners alike, aside from the chapter's own statutory exceptions.

One statute does approach the topic from the healthcare side: Health and Safety Code § 1191(d) bars a contract for the management of a physician or dental practice by, or the sale of its assets to, a private equity group or hedge fund from including a clause barring any provider in that practice from competing after leaving.

It reaches physician or dental practices — a PE-backed psychiatry group, not a therapy or ABA practice.

Nothing — that is what makes California different.

If a court were free to judge a non-compete on its merits, the questions would be the ones in this heading: how long the restraint lasts, how wide a geographic area it covers, and what legitimate business interest it protects.

California does not run that test on employment non-competes: § 16600(b)(1) voids them no matter how narrowly tailored, and Edwards holds them invalid even when narrowly drawn unless they fit a statutory exception — a one-month clause covering one service line is as void as a five-year, statewide one.

The only openings are the chapter's statutory exceptions: Edwards named sections 16601, 16602 and 16602.5 — the chapter's sale-of-business and partnership exceptions.

That matters at the deal table, not the offer table: a seller's non-compete sits in exception territory a W-2 therapist's does not.

Client non-solicits generally fail on the same authority.

Edwards itself invalidated a non-solicitation clause — it barred the departing professional for a year from "soliciting" clients of his former office, defined as providing services to them.

So a clause that stops a former therapist from treating clients who choose to follow is generally a void restraint, and no narrower draft saves it: § 16600(b)(1) rejects tailoring as a defense.

What Edwards left standing is information protection: the court distinguished the solicitation cases that protect trade secrets or confidential proprietary information.

Under the federal Defend Trade Secrets Act, a client list is a trade secret only if the owner took reasonable measures to keep it secret and it has independent economic value from not being generally known.

Employee non-solicits are their own question.

In AMN Healthcare, Inc. v. Aya Healthcare Services, Inc. (2018), a California appellate court held a one-year clause barring former recruiters from soliciting the employer's employees void under § 16600, because it restrained the recruiters from practicing their profession of recruiting travel nurses.

It is one fact-specific appellate decision, not a blanket rule — ask employment counsel how such clauses fare for clinical roles.

Transition conduct is already governed by ethics codes — the APA Ethics Code, for example, directs psychologists entering employment to make reasonable efforts to provide for orderly resolution of responsibility for client care if the relationship ends.

Those duties are covered in our guide to non-solicitation clauses.

Start by taking the clause out: including one in a California employment contract has been unlawful since January 1, 2024, and clauses your past hires signed are void regardless of where and when they were signed.

Protect the same assets with tools the statute leaves alone:

• Confidentiality and trade-secret terms. Edwards kept trade-secret protection standing as a separate route; the practical work is access controls and limited exports on client lists, schedules and EHR data, not just a contract paragraph.
• A client-transition clause. Agree in the contract who continues care and how a departing clinician's caseload is handed over — the orderly-resolution planning the APA standard expects.
• A records-custody clause. BACB Ethics Code standard 2.05 keeps responsibility for storing, retaining and destroying documentation with the organization when a behavior analyst leaves; write the equivalent custody terms into every clinical agreement.

Then check the adjacent clause type: California's stay-or-pay ban — Business and Professions Code § 16608, from AB 692 — applies to contracts entered into on or after January 1, 2027; AB 1697, an urgency statute chaptered September 30, 2026, moved the start date from January 1, 2026 and added exceptions including bonuses under specified recruitment and retention programs and repayment of advanced paid time off on voluntary separation.

Under Labor Code § 926, a stay-or-pay term that violates § 16608 is void only if entered into on or after that date, and a liable employer owes the greater of actual damages or $5,000 per worker, plus injunctive relief and attorney's fees.

Our guide to training repayment agreements covers where those clauses stand.