Hiring a family member without thinking about how he or she will mesh with your team can turn into a major setback for your business, says Joanne Ferguson, president, coach and consultant with Advisor Pathways Inc. in Toronto.
Here are four questions to ask yourself before approaching a family member to join your business:
1. Why are you hiring the family member?
Think carefully about why you want to bring a family member into the business.
Be as honest and candid with yourself as possible, says Ferguson. Do you want to hire a family member for income splitting purposes? Do you want to bring someone on as part of a succession plan?
Knowing why you want to hire someone, Ferguson says, will help you make an objective decision about their skill sets and whether those skills are right for a particular role in your company.
2. Precisely what role will the family member fill?
Before hiring a family member for your business, carefully assess the nature of their contribution.
“What role would [the family member] fill?,” says Ferguson. “Define the skills, experience or talent that [he or she] would bring to the business that would help increase revenue or generate new clients.”
3. Would the family member get along with the existing team?
Look at your current team and ask yourself how the family member would fit in.
Talk to your team about your plans to hire a family member, says Ferguson, and ask for feedback.
“The [final] decision might be yours,” she says, “but giving team members the choice makes them feel like they’re a part of the process.”
As well, if you are hiring a family member as part of a succession plan, says Ferguson, think first about whether you have an associate who may be assuming that he or she would be your successor. If a team member had expected to be your successor you should consult with them about your decision to keep the business in the family. In the alternative, you may want to reconsider your plans.
“You want to be sensitive,” says Ferguson, “as to what you’ve said in the past or what you promised.”
4. How will you keep work and family life separate?
Before hiring a family member, give some thought to keeping both your and their professional and personal lives separate.
Other team members can be made to feel uncomfortable if you and a family member are bringing personal problems to the office, says Ferguson. Be honest about how you will set up boundaries so that you are not letting personal issues follow you to the office.
The first of a two-part series on hiring family. Tomorrow: How to bring family members into your business.