Parents job hunting for their adult offspring

[Foxinthechickencoop]

Just don’t!
I work in recruitment / HR and have done in various sectors For many years.
We seem to get a constant stream of parents of young adults contacting us for jobs for their offspring who have just left university, or college or another job etc. I just want to say, the minute someone’s parent contacts me instead of the person themselves alarm bells ring. I would assume the young person in question is pretty unmotivated and the parents are worrying they are just sat in their room / drifting and want them to get a job. But essentially if you aren’t interested enough to enquire about jobs yourself, then you won’t be the right fit for the workplace.
Only exception might be if a parent was a customer somewhere and saw they were hiring and said, ooh I’ll tell my son to apply.
I say son because it’s always boys. In 15 years I think it’s been one girl.

Sorry rant over. Just been triggered by DH receiving a text from a customer of his asking if he could give any work to their 24 year old son who has been working in tourism but now out of work. Why can’t he ask himself?!!!! We don’t want to employ a 24 year old who needs his parents to do his work for him 🤷🏼‍♀️

Prepared to have by head bitten off.

I don't think you're being unreasonable at all. If I was contacted by a parent wanting to scope out work for their adult children, it would be an outright rejection!

Exactly that’s the issue. It’s ends up being a rejection based on the fact they haven’t done it themselves!
It’s a shame as the parents are clearly lovely most of the time and trying to help their unmotivated children.

There is a huge difference between parents job hunting through recruitment agencies for their children and a parent asking a business contact if they have any jobs coming up that their child could apply for.

Well I think even if it’s a business contact the most they should do is ask if it’s ok for the “child” to contact them using details not readily available.
For example a friend asked me if I could contact a business Associate about an internship for her daughter. I told her to use the usual channels but I emailed my BA to ask them to lookout for the application.
If a friend asked me about a job for their offspring I would say they needed to get in touch themselves

@Hoppinggreen exactly!

What I would be looking for is... ‘my son wondered whether it would be okay to contact you for potential job opportunities through this number?’.

Or ‘I see you are recruiting, I’ll let DC know’

When I worked in a factory we had parents constantly (and I mean daily) coming in and saying ‘have you got any jobs. My DC need and I I’ve heard you pay well’!

‘Um yes we do. Do they have a degree in engineering? I suggest they send there up to date CV in to us. ‘

‘Oh they haven’t got a CV. Can they just come in for a chat with you and see what you’ve got?!!‘

😱🤷🏼‍♀️ ‘ urgh nope, what you are talking about is an interview. There is a selection process for that. It starts with an application or CV’

‘Oh is their an application form? I’ll fill that in for them then’!!!!

I work in HR and what's also bad is when you get parents writing in to complain about their adult offspring and raise a grievance on their behalf if they think they've been treated badly (usually they only get one side of the story, and their dear darling has done something to incite the so called poor treatment, such as behaving like a dick)

I would have literally disowned my mum had she ever tried to do that.

@CloudsCanLookLikeSheep yes we get this too.
Or when you are in a sickness absence meeting for persistent short term absence, and they say ‘I was honestly ill, ask my mum’
WTF?
I even had an apprentices mum call once and ask to speak to me about her sons absence meeting. When I refused on the grounds of confidentiality, she said ‘but I’m his mum’.
You might be, but if he’s old enough to be out on the lash all weekend and post pics on fb, And then call in sick Monday, Then he’s old enough to fight his own battles. He was 21 😱

A friend of mine had an official warning when she phoned from the college where she worked to the home of an Apprentice who kept failing to turn up to placements. His Mum said he was at work and she replied that he wasn’t and hadn’t been all week.

I'm on the fence with this one. I used to work in recruitment and was regional manager for 2 companies including a major consulting house. I wouldn't call up and apply for jobs for my DC but I would use my experience to help them source, apply for jobs and interview techniques.

I think in this current climate, people are utilizing all their friends and family members to help them source employment so I wouldn't criticize someone who has their mum inquiring about job opportunities.

Doing the application for them / attending the interview with them is obviously a different matter.

I also think there’s a difference between a teenager looking for a weekend job or first job at 16 and a graduate

My dh gets this all the time. A contact will ask for a job for their ds (normally as in the building trade). Dh says the ds needs to ring him to see what’s available. About 50% of the time they ring back. He won’t chase or open doors, these need to be opened by the applicant.

Yeah ok, I can see how it looks, but do you remember what it was like to be 18? Freshly graduated without a clue what to do next?

18/21... you know what I meant

When I was a teenager doing weekend jobs I found them for myself. I didn’t have mummy do it for me. The whole point was independence for me (not that my mum would have asked anyway!).

When I worked at the BBC I had to sometimes hire runners to work on location shoots for a day. We would contact local universities and colleges and send them a job ad to distribute. The students who found the ad for themselves and applied were always far, far better at the job than the ones who had been told to apply by their media studies lecturers (they always sent lazy CVs and covering letters - sometimes not even bothering to change the company name in the letter from the last application they’d done).

Also, the students who had (or had in the past) weekend jobs in customer facing roles like waiting on or bar work were far better than the ones who’d never done anything except study.

I used to despair - TV is an incredibly competitive industry and so many of these kids either couldn’t be fagged or had no idea how to self start.

@liaun

Yeah ok, I can see how it looks, but do you remember what it was like to be 18? Freshly graduated without a clue what to do next?

Yep, I remember.

I remember getting myself a job at 14 at a local pub as a waitress.

I remember going all over town with my printed CVs that I'd done myself at 16 for a part time job.

I remember doing the same at 18 for a part time job in my Uni town.

I remember all the graduate applications I put together with no input from anyone else and the assessment centres.

Seriously...unless there is some kind of SEN no DC should need this level of babying.

I would give my own DC advice, help them prep for interviews if they wanted to, review their CV for them and help them understand how they can figure out what a good CV looks like (I.e. teach them how to be resourceful). By doing it for them you're not teaching them anything except entitlement and laziness.

@liaun

Yeah ok, I can see how it looks, but do you remember what it was like to be 18? Freshly graduated without a clue what to do next?

Yes! I found myself jobs.

There is a huge difference between parents job hunting through recruitment agencies for their children and a parent asking a business contact if they have any jobs coming up that their child could apply for

This is really interesting because it seems so innocuous, but I've just been reading some articles about white privilege and they suggested that this is how it works - people help people they know, and mostly that's white people helping other white people and so privilege goes on.

It's not really equal opportunities hiring, is it?

I totally agree, OP

The whole process of looking at job ads, sifting out what to apply for, even handling the rejection of not being selected, or being selected and not hearing back after the interview (so that'll be a no then.... one says to oneself, after 4 weeks ...) is all part of the journey. As is getting that dream job, and realising that you did it all, start to finish, you achieved it 100% yourself (maybe with some back up behind the scenes).

Thinking you're doing a DC a favour by doing half the process for them is misguided.

I attended a workshop about young people organised by our local council where they told us most people get their first job through family connections. Be it a dishwasher like me or a internship at PWC.

There is a big difference between helping/supporting and applying for your kids.

I found my DH every one of his jobs (been together since school). Helped him write his applications and CV. Coached him on interview skills. Helped him practice his presentation skills and timed him etc. Found him some practice numeracy and literacy tests for his current job.

But he himself has done so well in his current job that he's been told he's up for promotion. A £10-12000 salary increase.

Some people can do the actual job but just don't have application skills or know where to look for the job.

Some people can do the actual job but just don't have application skills or know where to look for the job.

There is such a thing as "give them a fish and they can eat that day, give them a fishing rod and they can feed themselves for life".

Saying someone "doesn't have the skills to look for a job" is a cop-out. None of us were born with skills, it's by doing stuff for ourselves, of which looking for a job is a fundamental life skill, that's what embeds the knowledge. Especially with offspring, which is what the OP is about.

@liaun

Yeah ok, I can see how it looks, but do you remember what it was like to be 18? Freshly graduated without a clue what to do next?

Another one laughing a little at this. By the time I'd graduated I'd had several jobs - retail assistant, bar work, temping work. I'd had plenty of practice already in terms of applying for jobs, I certainly didn't need help by 21. Most of my friends also had part time jobs whilst college and/or Uni. And those that didn't go on to further education were in full time work much earlier.

And this was all before the internet, or the internet as it is now anyway. As a PP mentioned, this was literally walking into places with printed CVs and asking if they had vacancies. Nowadays you can ask via email/social media/check on websites. No need for your parents to do it for you at all.

I used to interview Big 4 interns and I assure you that most of them did not get jobs via family connections - they applied to online job adverts like everyone else.

I looked for jobs myself, I am not sure my parents helped me in any way at all. They may have read through a letter of application. I handwrote a letter and CV and handed it into shops!

Got to admit though, that now DH and I are working together at home, I do sometimes have the urge to call his boss and say will you please sort out the problem he's had for about three years and mithers about in my earhole every day! (His boss can't do anything about it either, it needs to be a firm-wide decision. But. Three. Years.)

I am a helicopter wife, or would be!

This is really interesting because it seems so innocuous, but I've just been reading some articles about white privilege and they suggested that this is how it works - people help people they know, and mostly that's white people helping other white people and so privilege goes on

Yes 100%. The firm I work for won't do it, and neither will the one my husband works for. The days of doing the boss's or client's daughter or nephew a favour are gone. Except that they are not, because my son was telling me today that a friend of his from 6th form college has a job via her stepdad's company for the summer.