6 Key Reasons Why Hiring Your Relatives Or Friends Is A Bad Idea
There is a good reason why a majority of the most experienced and established CEO’s do not hire their family or friends.
They have seen and experienced firsthand what mixing business and family can do; the damaging and sometimes negative impact it leaves on a company.
While some CEO’s have had a good relationship working with relatives, for most it has been a costly mistake.
So why is it never a good idea to hire your relatives/friends?
Here are 6 fundamental reasons a number of CEO’s attest to:
- Emotional manipulation
In today’s society, it is becoming more and more important for professionals to exude a high degree of emotional intelligence. That refers to how self-aware they are of their emotions, how they manage them and well as their social skills.
The danger involved in hiring your relatives or friends is that whenever you bring yourself up to offer them criticism, they become emotional and irrational.
Say for instance you have to talk to your brother who is currently the company Accountant about his poor performance. This person will not be able to detach his emotions.
Unlike someone unrelated to you, they will take your criticism personally and act cold.
- Difficulty in firing
You decide to hire your cousin who is a Finance Major from the University of Nairobi only to realize that they are completely incompetent and lack self-initiative simply because they share a relationship with you.
Hiring your relatives or friends denies you the opportunity to actually work with a team that is qualified, competent and self-motivated.
On top of that, when you finally realize you made a mistake hiring your relative, trying to fire them becomes almost impossible.
The reason is because family members are definitely going to influence your decision.
- Lack of clear distinction between work and personal matters
You have pressing business matters that need to be attended to. At the same time you want to uphold a certain level of professionalism in your company.
But the problem is, your relatives or friends cannot seem to clearly demarcate what is business and what is personal.
Because of this, they have also watered down your authority where one cans assume that it’s okay to just halt your work and busy schedule to discuss matters that are neither here nor there.
You spend hours wasting time discussing personal matters when that time could have been spent attending a sales pitch, meeting a client or simply having a business meeting to discuss how you will grow your company.
- A mentality of entitlement
The minute you hire your friends or relatives, you can forget about clear working structures for your company.
The reason is because, someone will assume they do not need to adhere to company policy.
On top of this, they believe they are entitled to earn higher salaries than the rest of the staffs well as promotions.
They will either never show up to work on time, never meet the set targets, disregard the authority of their supervisors (if they have one),never treat you with formal respect or simply manipulate you into getting personal favors.
Your relatives will also assume they are entitled to certain favors and exempted form rules.
- Lack of diversity
Because of employing your relatives and family members, you will find that there is lack of diversity in ideas and recommendations.
You will not have an objective third party to chip into offering ideas that are contrary to yours and more so ideas that are beneficial to your company.
With your relatives and friends in the company, you will have one standard way of doing things whereas you could have had a variety of ideas to work around.
- False sense of loyalty
Your relatives believe that they have to keep working for you even though they may not be satisfied with the current position.
They feel obliged to remain “loyal” to you and to the company because they feel they “owe” you.
This false sense of loyalty to you and towards the company will mean that your relatives/friends will not be self-motivated. They will simply stick around because they feel compelled to “repay” you back.
Does that mean you can never hire your relatives/friends?
Certainly not. However, one of your critical roles as a CEO is decision making.
Whereas the company is yours, ensure that you are analytical in the hiring decisions you make.
Yes, you can hire your relatives/friends but the catch is to:
- Create a balance; hire a few of your relatives as well as non-related staff.
- More importantly hire family/friends who ONLY have the right skills and work-ethic; if they are not qualified but are zealous, offer an internship opportunity and mentor them.
What if you have already hired relatives or friends and you have to let them go and you still want to maintain a good relationship?
You can do so by communicating the reason for termination and offer alternatives; remain objective and SENSITIVE in showing them their non-performance is hurting the company. Offer alternative places they can apply for jobs. Sponsor them for a career development program to help them gain focus and clarity in their career.
Start making the right decisions for your company especially when it comes to hiring in order to make sure you meet your organizational bottom line.
Perminus Wainaina is a Certified HR Consultant and the Managing Partner at Corporate Staffing Services where he manages a team of 20 staff. He helps CEOs, executives, and managers solve their biggest HR pains, dysfunctions, and key challenges and turn their teams into a well-oiled machine that contributes dramatically to business success.