It’s a social networking success story, right? One of your friends, a long-time good guy and a person you trust completely, hints that he’d like to work at your company and there’s an open position he just might be able to fill. Should you hire him?
Not so fast. Even if company policy doesn’t prohibit hiring a friend, you should consider this situation from several angles. It’s best to think long and hard before attempting to transform a personal relationship into a professional one. Here’s a digest of what you should consider.
Your Friendship Will Probably Change
When your once-a-month golfing buddy becomes your everyday-in-the-halls coworker you may find you’ve got too much of a good thing. In the past, your buddy gave you a safe place to unwind without having to censor your conversation. The updated relationship may have you knowing information he can’t know or vice versa. Alternately, changes in the workplace could pit you against one another in competing for resources, promotions or sales. While workplace censorship and competition is a fact of corporate life, your friendship will be complicated by it. Before you take the plunge, decide how important the friendship is to you, because there’s a good chance the friendship will eventually be overtaken by corporate reality.
Hiring Your Friend Affects Everyone
Over time, each of your current work team members has negotiated working relationships among themselves that are working pretty well. Changing the team composition upsets that balance since roles, responsibilities and working styles have to be renegotiated each time a new team member is hired. This situation is even more complex when other team members perceive that the new hire is “special” because of his preexisting personal relationship with you. If they have good relationships with you, they may arrive more quickly at a good relationship with him, transferring goodwill to him. Or, they may perceive the new hire as someone who receives preferential treatment. If this happens, it will bond the non-friend team members with each other, but against the new hire and perhaps against you. This puts you in an untenable position.
Hiring your friend also raises the possibility of affecting the workplace should something in someone’s personal life, a nasty divorce for example, cause the friendship to disintegrate. Without the blended relationship, your friend would simply drift out of your life; since he is now a coworker his drama has the possibility to affect your career. This possibility is exacerbated if you have become co-owners of a business. Other employees will be worried by the changes in your personal friendship, even if you try to insulate them.
More on this subject in my next post.
–Jean
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Jean Houston Shore works with organizations that want their people to work together better. She can be reached at 770-643-9724, by email at jean@thinkbusiness.com or through her website at www.working-together-better.com.
Copyright © 2010, Jean Houston Shore, Business Resource Group. All Rights Reserved Internationally. No portion may be reprinted or used without prior written permission.
