Employment Contracts in Türkiye: What Foreign Employers Must Get Right

For a foreign company making its first hire in Türkiye, the employment contract is where the most expensive assumptions are quietly built in — and where they are cheapest to correct. Employment relationships are governed primarily by the Labour Act No. 4857 (İş Kanunu), with roles outside its scope falling under the Turkish Code of Obligations No. 6098 (TBK). Both are markedly protective of the employee, and the floor of rights they set cannot be lowered by agreement. Three ideas that travel well in other jurisdictions do not survive contact with this framework, and each one, left unexamined, turns into a claim. Getting the contract right at the start is the single most effective safeguard a foreign employer has, and it sits at the front end of the wider task of employing staff in Türkiye.

Assumption One: Employment Is At-Will

It is not — there is no at-will employment anywhere in Turkish law. Every indefinite-term hire is wrapped in notice periods graduated by seniority, and once an employee completes six months’ service in a workplace of 30 or more employees, the job-security regime (iş güvencesi, Arts. 18–21) applies. From that point the employer needs a valid reason (geçerli sebep) — connected to the employee’s conduct, capacity, or the operational needs of the business — and must follow procedure, including written notice and, for conduct dismissals, a chance to defend. A dismissal that fails this test is invalid, and the employee can pursue reinstatement. The mechanics of ending a relationship lawfully are a subject in their own right, covered in our guide to terminating an employee in Türkiye; the point for the contract stage is simpler. No clause reserving a right to dismiss “at any time, for any reason” means anything. It is void, and drafting one signals to a court exactly the mindset it is watching for.

Assumption Two: Fixed-Term Contracts Are the Default

Foreign employers often reach for a fixed-term contract as the default, on the theory that it expires cleanly and avoids the job-security regime. In Türkiye the logic runs the other way. Indefinite-term is the default, and a fixed-term contract (belirli süreli iş sözleşmesi) is valid only where an objective reason (esaslı neden) genuinely justifies a fixed duration — a defined project, seasonal work, or covering a named employee’s leave. Where that reason is real, the fixed term holds.

The trap is renewal. Chaining fixed-term contracts, or renewing one without a fresh objective reason, converts the relationship into an indefinite-term contract by operation of law — and the employee is treated as having been on an indefinite contract from the beginning, with the job-security protection that carries.

A fixed-term contract used as a device to avoid job security does not merely fail on renewal; a court looks at the substance of the work from day one. If the role was always ongoing, the “fixed” term was never valid, and the employee acquires full termination protection regardless of the label on the page.

The practical consequence is that the contract type is a legal characterisation, not a drafting preference. Choosing it wrongly does not reduce exposure — it manufactures a dispute about severance and notice, subjects treated in detail in our guide to severance and notice pay in Türkiye.

Assumption Three: Non-Competes Can Be Broad

The third imported instinct is the sweeping non-compete — global, multi-year, covering the whole industry. Under Turkish law that clause is largely unenforceable as written. The non-compete (rekabet yasağı) is governed by Articles 444–447 of the TBK, and it is valid only where several conditions all hold:

Requirement under TBK 444–447	What it means in practice
Access to protected interests	The employee must have had access to the customer base or to trade secrets; a junior role with neither cannot be bound.
Limited in time	The restraint must be reasonable in duration, generally no more than two years.
Limited in place	It must be confined to the geography where the employer actually competes, not the world.
Limited in subject matter	It must cover only the line of business where competition would genuinely harm the employer.
Written form	The clause must be in writing and the employee must have capacity when signing.

Where a clause overreaches on any axis, a court does not simply ignore it — it narrows it to what is reasonable, or strikes it out. There is a further limit foreign employers miss: a non-compete does not bind the employee at all where the employer terminates without a justified reason, or where the employee resigns for a reason attributable to the employer. In other words, the restraint protects a business that parts with staff fairly, not one that dismisses at will.

Confidentiality is the better-built companion. A confidentiality (gizlilik) obligation protecting trade secrets and know-how is far more durable than a non-compete and is not subject to the same two-year ceiling, so the two should be drafted as separate clauses rather than folded together. Where the employee will handle customer or personnel data, the contract should also align with data-protection obligations under Law No. 6698 — a live compliance surface for which we advise clients through our personal-data-protection practice.

Getting the Written Form Right

Turkish law does not require every contract to be written, but it requires enough of them that “we shook hands” is never a safe position. Written form is mandatory for fixed-term contracts of one year or more, and for specific clauses — probation and non-compete among them — which are simply ineffective unless recorded in writing. For indefinite-term contracts below one year the writing requirement is softer, but the employer must still furnish the employee a written document setting out the essential terms within two months of the start.

Even where writing is not compelled, it is indispensable in practice, because in a dispute the burden of proving the agreed terms falls on the employer. A sound contract fixes the identities and addresses of both parties, the job title, duties and place of work, the wage and any allowances, working hours and rest periods, the duration where fixed, and the notice and termination conditions.

Probation, Part-Time, On-Call and Remote

Four further points routinely go wrong at the drafting stage.

Probation (deneme süresi) is capped at two months, extendable to four months only by a collective bargaining agreement. It must be stated expressly in the contract to take effect. During the trial period either side may terminate without notice and without severance — a genuine flexibility, but a narrow window that cannot be stretched by contract.

Part-time and on-call arrangements are permitted, but part-time employees cannot be treated less favourably, on a pro-rata basis, than a comparable full-time worker. An on-call (çağrı üzerine çalışma) contract must fix the weekly hours and the notice the employer gives before calling the employee in; silence on those points is read against the employer.

Remote work has been formally regulated since the 2021 Remote Working Regulation (Uzaktan Çalışma Yönetmeliği), issued under Labour Act No. 4857. It requires the arrangement to be made in writing and addresses equipment, the reimbursement of work-related expenses, data protection, and the boundaries of working time — points that a contract written for an office role will not cover.

One further matter is not an assumption but a factual precondition: employing a foreign national requires a work permit from the Ministry of Labour and Social Security, issued together with the right of residence. It is a distinct, specialist process that sits outside the ordinary contract, and it must be secured before the employee’s first day.

The Cost of Getting It Right Early

None of these are exotic rules — they are the ordinary architecture of a Turkish hire, and they reward employers who draft to them rather than around them. A contract that starts from indefinite-term, uses fixed terms only where an objective reason supports them, keeps probation within bounds, and pairs a proportionate non-compete with a durable confidentiality clause is not merely compliant; it is the cheapest insurance a foreign employer will buy. The alternative — importing an at-will template and discovering its clauses are void when the relationship ends — is far more expensive, and it always arrives at the worst possible moment. Our employment-contracts practice exists to close that gap before the first hire, not after the first claim.