To think this isn’t nepotism?

[Abergatwenty]

I work for the IT department of a solicitors firm in a large town. We are currently switching from one IT system to another - this means that we’re having to manually transfer a lot of data from the old system to the new.

To help us do this, we have eight 18-21 year olds (including my daughter) working for us for 2 weeks to do the transferring. They are all the children of various people who work for the firm - I just sent out an email asking if anyone had any uni student children home for the holidays who wanted a bit of summer work. We’re paying them minimum wage.

This afternoon in town I bumped into the mother of a girl who my daughter was at school with. She asked what my daughter was up to and I told her she was working at the solicitors with me for a couple of weeks. This mother got very angry about this and thought it wasn’t outrageous that we hadn’t “properly advertised” the jobs so that anyone could apply and had just asked our own kids.

AIBU? The work is time consuming but completely unskilled - we didn’t need to waste time shifting through CVs and A level results to find the most academic people. The only quality required is that we can trust them - we all trust our kids, and we don’t have time to conduct interviews.

Plus, given the number of applications that would come flooding in for anything that even resembles ‘legal work experience’, assessing each applicant and selecting 8 people would have probably taken longer than the actual data transfer job!

And it’s not like the work is going to lead to full time positions - it’s just a 2 weeks, unskilled, minimum wage summer job.

Superb selective quoting there Screaming

Why do you think it's not nepotism?

Of course it's nepotism. This is how the civil service - specifically DHSS/DWP used to work in the 1980s/1990s - memos being sent round asking if staff had any relatives who could come in at short notice to cover staffing gaps. Many of them started on temporary contracts - planning to do something else - but got made permanent and are now stll there. That's why there are so many families in Newcastle, Blackpool and Leeds who all work for the civil service.

All that has changed now, there are proper recruitment procedures in place that take no account of whether you are related to someone but that's certainly how it used to work.

It doesn't matter whether the job they are doing will benefit them. They got the temporary job because of who they know/are related to. That's the very definition of nepotism.

katniss

Am I missing something here? How does “works in an IT department” automatically equal the OP being privileged?

And yet Screaming, those of us who've interviewed graduate trainees know exactly how much you're going to learn in two weeks of work experience doing data inputting. I managed to spin my termtime job working at Sainsburys on the till to demonstrate the rest of those attributes.

Which would be more than you would learn during two weeks of not working at all; and more than someone who'd never had a data entry job.

Is that better? My comment followed on from your first sentence, not your last sentence, because we're talking about the interview experience potentially provided by a data entry job, not a job on the till at Sainsburys.

Yes it's nepotism. But also makes complete sense.

I've done plenty of jobs in my time, and at many of them, the call has gone out - 'does anyone know anyone who wants some hours doing X' - because sometimes, you just need someone quickly, and a recommendation is a lot easier than going through the official process.

If it was a permanent job, then sure, it would be a bit off - but for 2 weeks of data entry, that's just the luck of the draw. Even my 16 year old self trying to find summer work when half my school mates got work through their parents (on a market stall, or at the local shop, or the garden centre cafe etc.) understands that for short-term, casual work, you ask around before you advertise.

Of course it's not nepotism, that's utterly ridiculous that she would say that!

Who cares if it's nepotism, it's completely understandable given the circumstances you described why this was the best choice. Especially this bit:

"The only quality required is that we can trust them - we all trust our kids, and we don’t have time to conduct interviews."

With strangers there would be the advert, the CV's, the interviews, and background checks. I work with legal documents my background check alone took 2 weeks.

Dorset...

It smacks of privilege to dismiss this as 'not nepotism, it's just a rubbish office job', which is essentially what the OP has said. It's completely naive to think that all young people have access to someone who can get them a foot in the door to work experience of any kind and to dismiss in such a blaise manner that other people might see that as a good opportunity. There is nepotism all around us, all the time. It won't go away, but to pretend it's not there is ridiculous. When I was kid at state school the pupils with parents who did office or professional jobs did experience in those industries, I on the other hand got to spend a week helping clean the nursing home my mum worked at

I should have been clearer Dorset...it's certainly not the job that implies privilege, but the attitude.

And actually, I agree with PP saying it makes practical sense for the business, and is probably a decision I would struggle to argue against. However, that doesn't mean it's not nepotism.

I can't get past the fact that the data transfer has to be done manually!

now wondering which DMS/PMS you're moving from and to

Disclaimer: I worked in legal IT a long time

Apologies: for missing point of post

Katniss. Ah, ok. Albeit I didn’t read the OPs post in the same way. I don’t think they were being dismissive and saying it’s a rubbish job. I read it that the OP didn’t see it as nepotism as such due to the fact that it’s two weeks of data entry work and is a ‘one off’ task due to the change of IT system as opposed to formal ‘work experience’ or a legal placement.

It's definitely nepotism. Now, it isn't necessarily illegal if you're a private company and if your reasons were not something discriminatory like "let's all use our family members who are all of X race or religion, so no person of Y race or religion is hired". It probably made sense for your company. But it is still nepotism. And that might make you feel a bit uncomfortable to acknowledge but that's the price you pay for the convenience you got.

You say the main factor was trust. Don't you think that's a pretty important advantage for these young people - "I was hired on a short-term project which entailed a high degree of trust placed in me by the firm". I am willing to bet if your daughter's friend asked you for a reference for her time in the role, you'd be downplaying it a lot less than people are on here "Anne was a diligent punctual worker, good team member, good attention to detail, completed tasks to a high standard and was entrusted with handling confidential material". That is exactly the benefit of nepotism - the difference between Anne and the next candidate for the next job who has no such equivalent CV entry or reference.

They are all the children of various people who work for the firm

I just sent out an email asking

100% nepotism. There was absolutely no way for anyone who didn't already have a relative there to know about the job or to get it. It's not illegal, but it is nepotism.

Why would you not think it was nepotism?

Well it is nepotism but as you have outlined nepotism isn't always a bad thing and can often save time/reduce losses due to bad luck in the hiring process. There is a reason why people start family businesses.

It was a sound business and managing decision. The nepotism aspect, well.... this is the private sector, for a very unqualified job. Frankly, this is none of her business and is not really relevant.

*I can't get past the fact that the data transfer has to be done manually! confusedconfused

now wondering which DMS/PMS you're moving from and to

Disclaimer: I worked in legal IT a long time

Apologies: for missing point of post*

The vast majority of our records were transferred in bulk, but we weren’t ready to start using the new system until 5 weeks after the transfer (this wasn’t planned - unforeseen circumstances that I can’t really explain on here). So after the transfer, all new data was still being recorded on the old system.

Therefore, all the records from the past 5 weeks have to be transferred manually

I'm shocked by the whole "manual transfer of data" bit.
Not very 21st century is it?

@Ethylred

^^ explained above. It’s not all the data, just 5 weeks of it.

Good luck with the last stages of the project!!

I feel your pain on that front

I mean, this is the very definition of nepotism - people getting jobs because of the influence of their parents rather than on merit.

I totally get where you're coming from - the stakes are low, it's short term and has no career prospects, it was a quick and convenient solution. But to suggest it's not nepotism is laughable really!

Absolute textbook nepotism.

I can't imagine how on earth you don't think it is.

Smacks of privilege to dismiss 2 weeks data entry as nothing.

Do you have any idea how hard it is to get work experience? No experience, no job, no experience. It's a trap.