Nobody is going over a contract with legsl just because they removed the ‘we own everything you make’ clause. That’s an irrelevant part of the contract.
At big companies they will not change the contract for a single candidate. No way. Not unless it's a "big deal" sort of job where the executives are involved. They'll just tell you to go pound sand.
The correct course of action is to cross out the clause, put your initials next to it, then sign the document. It is the responsibility of the company to have someone review contracts for such things but they never do; they just collect all the documents, check they're signed, and file them away to be forgotten about forever (or until a lawsuit requires they be retrieved).
I've done this at several employers! I even tell the HR people what I'm doing so they can't claim they're being misled. Not once have they ever understood what I was even talking about or even cared. It's because they're HR people; not lawyers. They just "follow the script" as it were.
One woman at HR said that what I did--crossing out the "we own everything you make while you work here plus a year afterwards" clause--was a "very good idea" and just took my documents and filed them away like anyone else's. I even offered alternative language that would be fair along the lines of, "we own everything you make using company resources in your official line of work" but she wasn't interested.
A lot of HN folks make stuff and these invention clauses are completely ridiculous. If you invent a new kind of apple peeler in your garage on a weekend using your own tools it is absolutely unconscionable that your employer who pays you to do programming or management work could claim ownership of that thing. Even if the contract says as such I seriously doubt any court would enforce that unless you worked at a manufacturer of apple peelers.
This. You always have the power to change the proposed contract to suit your needs, and let them balk if they don't like it. This assumes it's a contract you can actually edit (whether on the computer or mark up with pen); for non-editable things (e.g. DocuSign contracts), I'm not sure what you'd do if you can't print it out pre-signing.
For the latter, I've sent them a "diff" over email containing the changes I required before signing. They didn't accept any changes to the document itself, but they did let me create a separate document with clarifying language.
My experience in the USA is that they will flatly refuse to change anything in the contract, and will tell you to take it as-is or walk away, in part because they feel like they can't make changes without getting it re-approved by legal first.
I've had the opposite experience. There was always a bit of hand-wringing about "oh, but this is the contract approved by our legal consultants...", but pointing out the fact that A) this clause is flatly impossible to enforce in my jurisdiction and B) it would be immensely silly to blow up this entire hiring process over a contract clause that, best case scenario, would involve them having to sue me and lose to enforce has always made the hiring manager sign off on the reasonable modifications.
Of course, if the clauses are enforceable in your state, it might be a different matter, but that's also an opportunity to make demands. "Sure we agreed to $XXX,XXX , but there was no mention of a noncompete. That's going to need $XXX,XXX+$YY,YYY or $Z weeks of vacation". Make the numbers bigger than you think is reasonable, and they'll probably cave on the contract clause. Or they'll compensate you for it. Win/Win.
