You sign the settlement. You think it’s mutual. They can’t talk about you, you can’t talk about them. Clean break. Move on.
Except there’s a list.
Not written on paper. Not sent in an email anyone would CC you on. It lives in HR systems, in reference check databases, in the quiet pause before a recruiter says “we’ve decided to go in a different direction.” It doesn’t need your name in a subject line. It just needs a flag next to your employee ID that says DNR. Do not rehire.
You don’t know it’s there. You can’t see it. Nobody tells you it exists. There’s no notification, no appeal, no expiration date. You just keep applying and keep not landing and you start to wonder if you’re imagining it.
You’re not imagining it.
The NDA you signed says you can’t talk about them. The list they maintain says they don’t have to talk about you. They don’t have to say a single word. The system says it for them — silently, permanently, to every hiring manager who runs the check.
So what was the settlement, really?
You gave up your right to tell the story. They kept every tool they needed to keep telling yours. One side got silence. The other side got a muzzle and a tracking collar.
And the most cunning part — you thanked them for it. Because at the time, the check cleared and the lawyer said it was a good deal and you just wanted it to be over.
It’s never over.
The list doesn’t expire. The NDA doesn’t expire. But the list works in the dark and the NDA works in the light and only one of you knows both exist.
That’s not a settlement. That’s an asymmetric weapon disguised as a handshake.