Job Issue- How would you handle this?

cptofthehouse
Fri, 09 Jul 2010 17:40:20 +0000

Oh dear, I am sorry this happened. A very awkward situation. I wouldn’t worry about the reference letter. It can go to your neighbor who, yes, should nicely be informed about what happened with an emphasis on the gratitude on your D’s getting this job. He may not know.

This is often a problem, by the way, when you get jobs through an “in”. You may bypass the usual gatekeepers and requirements in getting the job, even leap frogging over others who have been waiting for an opening, but it’s not like everyone is going to know how you got the job, and if it come to light as it did for your daughter, that she is not in the group entitled to be there, she could be let go. It’s really only fair.

When I worked at my first job which I got by going through a number of grueling nterviews, taking a math aptitude test, and having to go through the employment ringer, I resented those summer students who waltzed in there by virtue of nepotism. Many of them had absolutely no interest or aptitude in the field of work. They just wanted the job and had a parent with an “in”. Because each department could hire at will and was really the final say on who was hired, these kids never had to go through the employment gauntlet. It was usually handeled directly, like OP’s daughter wast treated, often hired even more automatically. I remember one inept college kid who worked as little as possible, was nasty and spoiled as could be who was hired because his father was a big wig at another office and his kid wanted to stay in the college town and wanted a job. I swore I would never hoist my kids on anyone like that, and I have kept that promise.