Putting a word in for someone.

Another thread got me thinking about this.

My Husband grew up in the Uk and came here in his forties, being in the construction industry he was off work for a while in the recession. I come from a large family and we have as is often the way in large family's:.. We have the family Mafia we help each other out in all sort of way's. I offered to put work in with my family and extended family. Well he said absolute not!, and was very shocked at that sort of carry one here.

I genuinely could not see the harm in it. I think its an Irish cultural thing to help each other out? possibly because that is the way poor and post colonial societies traditionally behave.

myshirt

There is nothing wrong with nepotism as long as you keep it in the family

qo2cj1dsne8y4k

No a few years ago my friend was getting messed around in work. She's returned to work after her maternity leave was up, but they'd hired her cover and the cover was getting all the days and my friend was going for weeks without having even a couple of hours work.

I was working in a very busy place at the time and my friend asked if I could say it to my manager, which I did and my manager was bringing her in on the very busy days. But i was the middle man.

My manager would ask me to ask my friend.
My friend would say yes.
Then I'd tell my manager yes.
Then my friend would text and be like "I dont really want to go in tomorrow"
Which was leaving me to tell my manager and let her down on a busy day with no notice.

Feck that people can paddle their own canoes now

Mesrine65

Bitter experience has taught me never to work with family/friends.

Auldloon

It's not just an Irish thing. I work abroad with people of several different nationalities but mainly British and no one is hired without personal recommendations from team members.

DEFTLEFTHAND

I can see where he's coming from, nepotism no matter what way you square it is dishonourable but I think sometimes you have to swallow your pride and accept help from family.

Auldloon

Auldloon wrote: »

It's not just an Irish thing. I work abroad with people of several different nationalities but mainly British and no one is hired without personal recommendations from team members.

That sounds like a nightmare to be honest, I am not sure I would be happy to personal recommend someone based on my opinion alone, there is a difference in asking around about what work is available and asking for the person to be interviewed verses what you are talking about.

BattleCorp

I've had about 10 different jobs and I only got one of those jobs without anybody putting in a word for me.

People like to know who they are hiring.

Lisacatlover

Sorry Maria, are you saying you asked your family to hire him to do work for them?

stoplooklisten

Maybe it's his pride...my wife has to ask people she knows will they give me a job, not on merit but because she knows them, kind of thing

Ben Gadot

I would have been anti-nepotism big time, but 3 years ago I was on the scratch for almost a year and was giving up, until a friend let me know that he got a promotion and his old role was vacant.

The bloke always said I got the job myself but it's no overstatement to say that he saved me in a lot of ways. Him vouching for me made all the difference as I was always shakey at interviews, and I firmly believe I'd still be on the dole if not for him.

I made sure to earn my place and so I did. That's the key thing, if you're vouching for someone you have to know that the person will work their bollox off and won't let you down. So yeah, nepotism is fine in the right circumstances.

Lisacatlover

Lisacatlover wrote: »

Sorry Maria, are you saying you asked your family to hire him to do work for them?

No but I would have family and wider family in the same industry its more subtle that that it not exactly about asking for a job it more about the modern word for it, which is being connected.

His objection to it is more politicia.

sheesh

Its most jobs are gotten through word of mouth/recommendations you the 3 questions that HR are looking for when they hire are: Can they do the job? ,will they do the job? will they fit in?

If one person can recommend you kindof have the last 2 and can find out the first question in the interview.

stoplooklisten

mariaalice wrote: »

No but I would have family and wider family in the same industry its more subtle that that it not exactly about asking for a job it more about the modern word for it, which is being connected.

His objection to it is more politicia.

Could you have a little party at your house, invite the relations that work in his industry and casually force him to do a bit of networking?


No need to tell the relations or himself that's the aim of the party

He went back to the Uk to work for a while and now its grand its all taking off again.

eeguy

DEFTLEFTHAND wrote: »

nepotism no matter what way you square it is dishonourable.

I don't think so.

I've gotten plenty of jobs through friends. Plenty of unskilled work in college, and now plenty of professional work through contacts and colleagues.

If you know of a job and a guy who would suit the job, why go to the effort and expense of advertising and interviewing?

eeguy

eeguy wrote: »

I don't think so.

I've gotten plenty of jobs through friends. Plenty of unskilled work in college, and now plenty of professional work through contacts and colleagues.

If you know of a job and a guy who would suit the job, why go to the effort and expense of advertising and interviewing?

True but is it the rout of the politics of clientelism and cronyism we often have.

PARlance

DEFTLEFTHAND wrote: »

nepotism no matter what way you square it is dishonourable

I would class it as human nature myself. It would only fall into the dishonourable category if the subject wasn't qualified to do the job.

PARlance

mariaalice wrote: »

Another thread got me thinking about this.

My Husband grew up in the Uk and came here in his forties, being in the construction industry he was off work for a while in the recession. I come from a large family and we have as is often the way in large family's:.. We have the family Mafia we help each other out in all sort of way's. I offered to put work in with my family and extended family. Well he said absolute not!, and was very shocked at that sort of carry one here.

I genuinely could not see the harm in it. I think its an Irish cultural thing to help each other out? possibly because that is the way poor and post colonial societies traditionally behave.

Not an Irish thing but I think we do it better than anyone else. Look at how well we have integrated, networked and gained power in societies around the world. We were barely off the boats before we had an Irish US president.

The British do it too. I'm obviously guessing here, but I think the issue may have lay with the fact that you were going to do the asking on his behalf. If I was in his shoes, I would be embarrassed by that scenario... male pride and all that foolishness. Put him in a room with some of the family and I'm sure he would do a bit of his own networking and as long as he didn't feel he was the subject of charity, something would probably come out of it.

darkpagandeath

Hate to break it to people, Just like begrudgery, Nepotism is not an Irish thing. Begrudgery and nepotism happen the world over. Sick of hearing how both are apparently some kind of unique Irish activity.

darkpagandeath

darkpagandeath wrote: »

Hate to break it to people, Just like begrudgery, Nepotism is not an Irish thing. Begrudgery and nepotism happen the world over. Sick of hearing how both are apparently some kind of unique Irish activity.

They are not uniquely Irish, however how they are applied in Ireland is different for want of a better word, it might well be to do with the fact we have a small population and and are thus more connected.

seamus

There's a big, huge, ginormous difference between referring someone you know into a job, and nepotism.

Nepotism is giving someone a job because you know them. But checking with friends and family to see if anyone knows of any work going, or employee referrals, are perfectly fine.

The latter is something done in every single country the world over and some insane percentage, like 50% or something, of people obtain their jobs because they hear about it from family or friends. I get the feeling the OP's husband thought he would be given a job in an underhanded way rather than just kept in mind if anyone heard of anything going.

Can also just be a pride thing - who wants their extended family all talking about how they're unemployed and desperate?

When I had just left college and was hunting for my first real job, I did an interview in a place that had 3 open roles, went pretty well. Beforehand my Dad had remarked that he knew so-and-so in that company. Whatever.

The day after the interview I got an excited call from him saying that he'd called up the guy to find out how the interview went and they were almost definitely going to offer me a job. I hit the roof with him. I was 21, he shouldn't be interfering, and either way it was no longer like it was in his day, doing things like that are more likely to lose you a job.

I ended up not being offered the job in the end. He felt bad after I chewed him out, but then he felt doubly-bad because he'd gotten my hopes up. He never interfered again
I don't actually think him ringing up had affected it at al, they had interviewed like 15 people for these 3 jobs.

valoren

It's not what you know, it's who you know.

boobar

Many many years ago, just out of college struggling to get my first real job.

A friend of mine offered to drop my cv in to his boss.

Got an interview, got the job.

Very grateful too for my first break, it could have taken me a lot longer without his help.