During my childhood, which took place in the French-speaking part of Switzerland, I often heard of sons replacing their fathers in their professional roles at work; of friends being hired to complete an engineering team; of daughters-in-law getting trained to do the accounting within the company.
Having worked all over the world, I can attest that hiring qualified friends and family members is the way to go in most cultures. In Europe, Asia, Latin America, Africa, and Australia, recommending a friend or family member for a position implicitly means the person has already been vetted to demonstrate the same type of values as the person who is recommending him. A family member has similar interests regarding success as the person recommending her, as in most cultures, people care more about the well-being of the group (the family) than the individual (the self). And because friends and family members are under the scrutiny of the group at all times, hiring within one’s network guarantees the person will perform and do his best to make the group successful.
I was never made aware, until I came to the United States, that hiring friends and family had a name: a bad name, moreover. Here, and especially within large companies, that bad name is “nepotism.” A friend of mine used the term apologetically a few years ago when explaining to me that the fact that we were friends would not make me a good candidate for a consulting mandate her company posted. Her company has a strong “nepotism policy” in place; and even though I was the most qualified professional for the job, our relationship — which she felt had to be disclosed — would disqualify me. Friendship had for the first time become my competitor instead of my ally.
In North America, where the culture is strongly centered around the individual (with the exception of Québec) there is an aversion to nepotism, to the point where strong policies have been put in place at many corporations. That uniquely negative view towards friends and family in professional settings made me curious. I decided to learn more about the reasons behind this cautious stance.
The fact that Québec is the exception in North America was my first clue. It had to do with religion. English-speaking Canada is Protestant; Québec is Catholic. Sub-groups of Protestantism form the religious majority in the United States. Nepotism must have its roots in the Catholic Church and, as my research confirmed, in the Vatican and the Popes.
The etymology of the word “nepotism” pointed me in the direction of the “nephew” in Italian: il nipote. My research into papal matters and the role the nephews of the Popes played in the equation led me to a delightful book called Mistress of the Vatican by Eleanor Herman. According to Herman, Popes worked their way up through the clergy often coming from very humble backgrounds (Adrian VI’s father was a carpenter, while Pius V tended sheep before joining the clergy).
Because Rome in the Middle Age was such a dangerous place to live, the newly elected Pope would appoint his nephew (suo nipote) as his right arm and protector. Also, because most elected Popes were old, the Prince of the Church had only a few years to elevate his entire family to a level of recognized nobility. While sharing wealth was considered a Christian gesture, the way Popes did it — pillaging the Vatican’s coffers and increasing taxes on the poor to support their family’s ascension — was strongly condemned by the people.
It is no surprise that Martin Luther could convince his followers that the Body of Tradition (the different doctrines the Vatican created to justify its presence and power) was wrong. That is also where the concept of nepotism could be traced as officially getting a bad rep because it was associated with the abuse of power of the Catholic Church Luther trumpeted right and left.
North America, a continent inhabited early on by a vast number of people who had been religiously persecuted by the Catholic Church, saw these immigrants bring with them some resentment and strong dislike toward anything the Vatican did. Nepotism is one of them; and it is the reason, in my estimation, that the stigma around hiring friends and family still resonates so deeply within certain U.S. organizations.
This being said, I’ve heard that “hip” companies like Zappos and Google encourage their employees to date one another and seem to favor hiring within a tight network of people who get along with one another — people who respect each other as much outside of work as at work.
Globalization and the fact that talents may be sourced the world over, to not mention high youth unemployment, seems to have made U.S. nationals more aware of the need for inner professional support for friends and family.
All of this makes me wonder if the uncertain economical times we experience at home might be telling signs that there might be a place for il nipote in our culture after all.
Valérie Antoinette's Blog 
I love your instinct that is evident in the direction of your research into language and history. Your global perspective is a great gift too. I grew up amongst American expatriots in the Middle East and Europe, and I can tell you that I have often reflected on not just the absence of any preferential treatment towards me from my family but the very opposite, making it a point to offer all advantages to strangers. My Dad took several young people under his wing and prides himself on his legacy of people development. However, I moved to the United States in my twenties with nothing, no home, no training, and no business savy. I was completely lost. It has taken me another twenty plus years to catch up by trial and error, reinventing the wheel, reading every business book I could get my hands on, and diving into the Internet in a mad dash for scraps. So, like a gay friend of mine lamented when he said of his sexually repressed family of origin, “where was my abuse?”, I say without hesitation, “Where was my nepotism?” I have no doubt whatsoever that America will be hamstrung in a global economy unless it gets real and begins to respect the natural connections of family and ethnicity and use them to pass on and cultivate learning and excellence. A positive expression of the essence behind nepotism could be responsibly raising your kids. Let’s do it!
Thank you, Karma, for your comment. That is a moving story and a sad one to read for someone who comes from a different culture. I agree that your story has the taste of tough love and borderline neglect on fatherly duties when in fact it might have been culturally sound to your father to act the way he did. I think that this strict adherence to “no tolerance for nepotism” is on its way out.
This too was my experience, growing up in England and later living in Israel. My 5 uncles all worked in the insurance underwriting business their father started (unfortunately, the 4 sisters, which included my mother, were not invited to join the business).
So-called Millennials (aka Gen Y) view the world differently. They eschew command-and-control, top-down rigid rules, and it’s conceivable that they’ll see friends and family in business as not only de rigueur, but even actively pursue it. It’s an interesting trend to watch for.
Thank you, Roberta, for this insight into the way Gen Y act with regard to expectations in the work force. Perhaps they are the catalyst we need to let go of this ancestral dislike for nepotism. After all, even the Office of the Pope in Rome had to change: nepotism is not what it used to be there either…