A colleague (who currently works at the company) told me that he is creating a new business that would be a direct competition of our current company.

He also asked me to help him with a job for his new business due to my skills, but I rejected that proposition.

I just want to forget that matter and never discuss it, but what should I do?

You should forget that matter and never discuss it. You are not responsible for the decisions of your friend. It is not your solemn duty to report this to anyone. Just go about your day.

When you have a sought after skillset people will often try and factor that into their own agenda if they can. Don't let that happen without clear gain to yourself. In this case you should just ignore your colleague since you're not interested and have no need to take any risks.

There is no need to take it further in any direction including reporting it unless there is a clear personal benefit in doing so and it can be done without negative repercussions. Lastly, if it's not documented, it didn't happen.

In some circumstances if it is provable or you have good rapport with management it might be worth giving them a quiet heads up, if it's a niche service or market where competition will not generate it's own clients but must take others clients, then it is a direct threat to your job security. However these often have non competing clauses written into contracts.

It is common practice in the industry that when ever a new industry is established they hire skilled human resource from the already existing successful companies. It not only provides expertise in that field but also divert other experienced employees towards new setup and creates salary competition among owners which ultimately benefit skilled employees . It is common and effective strategy to start new business which your friend has used.

It is entirely your choice that you can decide to accept his offer by evaluating future career appourtunities and salary setup.

Welcome new user.

1. You have a special skillset




2. Your "friend", F, wants to use that for his gain and pay you nothing.

Here is how often this happens, every day, on this planet:

10,000,000 times per day.

Your solution is remarkably simple. The miracle of "up front payment" will solve everything.

The miracle of up-front payment.

Here is the precise language to use to your friend, word for word.

"Good one, F. I'll require $45,000 for the first 10 weeks to be involved with this. Obviously I'll be leaving my current role to join your enterprise. The split second you can give me cleared funds (cashier's cheque, or cleared wire transfer), I'll immediately leave my job and work for you. Once again, and don't make me repeat myself, I'll talk to you further after the funds are cleared. I'll take the risk that after two months, you'll flop and I'll be totally fucked. That will introduce a large moral obligation from you to me, but that;'s your choice in life. Let me know the instant you have the cleared funds available. Please, and let me be clear, there is very little point in you wasting talky talky talky talky words words words words until the cleared funds are in my account. Let me know when you want the bank details. Be aware that I don't do "secret" 12-year-old conversations. Anything you say to me after this is public knowledge with our boss. Every word."

In 19/20 instances, your friends business!! idea!! will amount to nothing and it will just be a (hopefully, forgotten) embarassment to him in retrospect.

It is true that in 1:20 cases, you will end up rich - like ,really really rich - and F will end up even richer.

Do note that any idea of "sneaking around" is utterly, totally, ridiculous. You're not 12 years old. If it works out, simply say to your boss and colleagues, "F has come up with a great business idea, and I'm off to join him." No bizarre mysteries or secrets. They couldn't give a toss that you're leaving, as you and F can be replaced with a $500 add on stackoverflow.

Takeaways

1. If you do anything without huge amounts of money upfront. you will be: f####d senseless. To be clear: utterly, totally, completely, f####d senseless with a rusty iron rod.




2. Totally set aside any absurd "secrecy!" etc etc. Just simply openly tell everyone what is happening.

(If the astounding! company F is starting starts to run, then your various bosses, and even the owners, and so on will all come over to work with F on the new enterprise.)