Hiring Relatives
sphere99
5 Posts
I was wondering if there are any laws against a policy to NOT hire relatives. The owners of our company have asked me not to hire relatives of anyone, even if they are not in a subordinate position, just anywhere in the company.
What are the legalaties of this?
What are the legalaties of this?
Comments
There is no federal requirement that an employer adopt or not adopt a "nepotism" policy of any kind. It is strictly up to the employer's "philososphy." I don't believe that there is anything in Texas law that addresses nepotism policies but you probably need to make a thorough check to be sure. I'm sure Ms. Gegen, of the Texas Employment Law Letter, will provide the exact information regarding Texas law on this. Also, as a side issue, like many employment/hiring policies, make sure that any nepotism policy the company adopts doesn't have an adverse impact on protected classes.
One company has gotten in trouble when it told an employee that they were "exempt" from the policy, then later fired the employee. The court said that the employee could sue based on the promise of the exemption.
You may want to consider the demographics of your labor pool before you implement this type of policy. If you are a fairly good sized employer in a small community, it may be hard to find the best employees if you refuse to hire relatives. Also, you will need to define who the policy applies to -- will it apply to all inlaws and cousins or only more immediate family members.
A couple of issue you should think through is what happens if two employees get married - does one automatically get the ax (as so often happens, it is usually the best employees who get married, and the employer will then want to make an exception that will set them up for a discrimination claim when another employee is fired).
I believe atleast one large company (Wal-Mart) got sued over such a policy (firing married couples) and lost. The couple was interracial and the issue was whether the policy was a pretext for race discrimination.
In my opinion, the best policies to have are business related policies -- not hiring relatives in the same department or not having one relative supervise another are probably good policies. But when the policy goes further than that to a refusal to hire any relatives, I wonder whether the business reason is a good justification for the policy -- considering the loss of qualified people that the company will not consider for employment.
Good Luck!
My experience is that organizations either love to hire relatives or they hate them, all based upon experiences that they have had. The decision is based upon emotion rather than good business reasons. Of course, the majority of organizations that ban the hiring of relatives, hire them anyway. They just don't know about it because Jack is not about to say that he is John's nephew.