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If you’re a decent, honest, and hard-working employee, then you’re bound to be annoyed by any boss who throws fairness out the window. Say, like if they hire, promote, and reward their family and friends instead of the folks who truly deserve it. This leads to lower morale and worse productivity, not to mention how deeply unethical it is.
In an enlightening thread on the ‘Work’ subreddit, people shared the worst cases of workplace nepotism and favoritism that they’d ever seen. Keep scrolling to check out their stories, and be sure to share these with your work BFFs.
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#1
There’s this guy who was leader of a major country and he appointed family members to positions without having proper security clearances. Then a few years later he was even re-elected.
RELATED:
#2
I was a teacher at a school when I truly learned about nepotism. My boss had many of her relatives in key positions. At one point, I needed a new teacher in my department so I just looked at her and asked “ don’t you have any more relatives that need a job”.
T'Mar of Vulcan 1 month ago
My boss hired her sister, her husband and both her sons. Then when the school board stopped nepo hires she was crying about her son having to leave. PLEASE.
#3
In 1998, I got a contract job from a director of operations at a airplane-related facility who asked me to install a server and client software on all the workstations because the son of the owner was "head of IT" and did nothing but play video games all day. The DO was pretty desperate, and paying me out of his own pocket. He didn't go into much detail, except that the head of IT was less than useless, and this needed done and the son wasn't doing it because he was less than useless. So I did it, it worked, yay! Easiest ten hours of work I ever did.
Two weeks later, the DO calls me again. Apparently, the son had "tried to make improvements," messed it up, then wiped the server to cover up his tracks saying it was a hard drive error or something. So I got paid AGAIN to do the same job all over again. Even easier because I didn't have to wait for the install to work on the workstations.
It’s not just that blatant nepotism is bound to breed resentment and frustration among your staff, but you’re also likely to damage your business as a result. For one, you’re not rewarding actually talented and skilled employees who bring you profit. On top of that, the family and friends you hire might not have the right skillset for the job.
Nepotism leads to an unhealthy work environment, low morale, higher employee turnover rates, decreased productivity, and a lack of overall respect for workplace leadership.
For instance, ‘Indeed’ notes that some obvious signs of employers playing favorites with their relatives include behaviors like:
- Ignoring their chronic lateness
- Giving them less work to do than everyone else
- Ignoring their poor performance at work
- Promoting them ahead of employees who deserve to advance
#4
My boss hired his almost 30 year old son to learn plumbing when the guy had never even turned a wrench in his life. 2 weeks later he fired him after he door dashed food to a job site and sat at a customer’s table eating it instead of working lol.
#5
My boss once hired his cousin as a “consultant” who did nothing but sit in meetings and nod. Got promoted in 2 months. Nepotism at its finest.
#6
My dad hired me and to avoid any appearance of nepotism treated me worse than anyone else hired, then negotiated to not have to pay my pto owed.
Some major red flags that your boss might be treating their family or friends preferentially include things like that particular employee being under-qualified, behaving unprofessionally, and not being punished.
Workers who are under the protection of nepotistic bosses also tend to receive better assignments and earn more cash.
There’s no easy way to fix these situations. You need frameworks, guidelines, and systems in place on a company-wide level to ensure that everyone behaves ethically. As part of that, you need to have options for workers to report nepotism and favoritism without the threat of losing their jobs.
#7
My mother and I worked for the same company, just in different departments. She worked aged care, I worked in disabilities.
After years of consistent mistreatment and lack of help, I tried to move out of the disability sector and get into aged care. Not necessarily in the programs that my mother ran, just anywhere really. They wouldn't let me, said it wouldn't be fair to other staff.
So I stayed in a horrible job (that left me burnt out and with a permanent back injury yay) because at the time it was my only option. Cue to one day when all my easy shifts are cut and replaced with longer, harder ones, to make way for a new support worker. I fought this through my managers and HR but was ultimately told to suck it up and that it was all done legally. I'm not a petty person, I got along with the new support worker and we became friends pretty quickly. I didn't find out straight away, but she was my bosses daughter.
Years later I go for an admin role to get out of my painful job. I had been doing this role for 8 months as an acting scheduler. I was told that I was not suitable for the position due to my lack of experience. They hired someone externally, one of the big managers son, he had no experience, having previously being only unemployed, he lasted a week.
Cue to my ending at this company. I had finally worked my way to a managerial position, running groups for PWD in a centre. My mother ran this centre and had done so for years, but being in different sectors, she wasn't my boss and had nothing to do with me or my groups. The company decided this was 'nepotism', despite me being in the company for 12 years. So they removed my mother from this centre and put my boss in. Who proceeded to royally mess everything up.
She diverted funds from my groups to her failing ones, making it look as if we were in a huge deficit. She had no idea how to do her job, was always sick, working from home or in a 'meeting'. Committed numerous fireable offences but wasnt even warned. Ended up totally destroying not only my groups which had been running for 30+ years, but the centre as a whole and a huge portion of the aged care sector. She didn't even know the names of my staff or clients, but gave off this very wholesome, caring persona. Even after being violently assaulted by my ex partner, told me to continue coming to work as I didn't want to let him effect my income (turns out we actually had DV leave which she chose not to tell me).
So I was fired, made redundant, told that I hadn't been running the program efficiently and that it was all coming to an end. She went on holiday during my last months, didn't even see me once before I left, although I was supposedly like a daughter to her.
They fired my mother too, while she was taking care of my dying stepdad, she had been there 21 years. Apparently she was less experienced than my boss who'd been there 3 years. Gave her a week before she had to leave, put on numerous farewell parties for the other staff they fired (not me though lol) and gave her nothing, then lied to the CEO saying they had put on a huge bash and given speeches. Then when my stepdad died, they told one of my mums friends they'd be sending a representative from the company. It was going to be my ex boss, the woman who got me fired and schemed with the upper managers to get my mother's position. When we declined her offer and told her she was not welcome, she cried to mutual acquaintances that she was being ghosted and didn't know what she'd done wrong.
#8
I worked in a family owned restaurant. The owner made her creep son a manager, despite the fact that he had no experience and was universally loathed by the staff. I caught him taking an up skirt pic of me while I was on a ladder setting up a display. I reported it to the owner, who denied it. The place was full of cameras, so I told her to check the video. She refused. .
#9
At my last job only my boss’s family had the option to WFH, everyone else had to be in the office full time.
Meanwhile, you also need transparent hiring practices and clear rules when it comes to hiring family members.
“Rather than banning the hiring of family members, establish guidelines for these circumstances. For instance, it may be fine for two relatives to work within the same company as long as one doesn’t directly report to the other,” ‘Indeed’ suggests.
#10
My job was eliminated and I was let go so the HR manager’s favorite pet (her assistant) could have my housing.
#11
Our VP hired her godson to work for one of her managers. Really incompetent in his role. And there was no clear connection- the VP had only been in our state for like 1-2 years and the godson never worked or lived out of state. The godson spilled the beans when he had a little too much to drink at a company event. Someone searched FB and found photos of them hanging out.
#12
My boss brought in his wife after our HR quit. Talk about nepotism. She is still involved with the company and it has been f’ing hell since she arrived.
Be honest, Pandas, what are some of the worst, most blatant cases of nepotism that you’ve personally witnessed in the workplace? What happened?
Have you ever called out workplace toxicity before? What was the fallout like? Share your nightmare work stories in the comments.
#13
I have quite a few-
My co worker and boss would take smoke breaks together which turned into vacations together. Guess who the promotion went to? Not the ones who were covering for their vacations .
A director promoted his side piece up the ranks and then left his wife for her, claiming he wanted someone with similar career aspects
An admin was “obsessed” with one of the guys and he would act embarrassed that she would order him the fanciest equipment and bring him snacks all the time. One day he told everyone that he thought he saw her followed him home. She got laid off and the guy was treated as a hero for putting up with her. Years later it came out they had been dating but he convinced her to keep their relationship under wraps. He wanted to break up with her so he made her look crazy to the execs to get a clean break.
#14
Absentee owner hired a manager who hired her family to "work" there. They did nothing, while the rest of us struggled to get the most basic things done. Business went under. .
#15
A branch manager that the CEO really liked manoeuvred to have her mom hired as a deposit operations specialist. Over the next three years, they managed to scheme their way into getting all of the region's office supplies (toilet paper, cleaning products, paper towels, etc) delivered to the daughter's specific branch, which was small, out of the way, and not our headquarters.
Obviously, they were taking a significant portion of the supplies home, despite the fact that they were both extremely well off, with the mother living in an over a million dollar valued house in a moderate cost of living area. The daughter would buy really nice Brawny paper towels for "her branch", but they ran out constantly and everyone else got the cheap stuff. Eventually someone, somewhere caught on and the supplies were delivered to each branch instead of the one, but they never got in trouble or anything. I think it would have been too embarrassing for the CEO to admit what had been happening.
The branch manager was eventually fired for some bs reason. I have no doubt her and her mom's little stunt contributed, as she was fired pretty quickly after the supplies stopped going only to her.
#16
Not a small mom and pop but an outpost of a very large foreign company. Big bosses brother in law. Fired at least twice for gross incompetence and chiseling. Kept hiring him back. Got the dude promoted to management with a HS diploma. Could barely spell an email.
#17
We hired a woman as a product owner of a product that her husband was a developer of. She was easily the worst PO I'd ever seen. Would start and end a sprint review in 2 minutes flat to avoid questions, and if it went any length of time, she completely ignored any questions like she didn't hear them.
#18
Worked in a luxury retirement home as the only pastry chef for 300 residents. The girl who was in charge of the waitresses did nothing but her makeup, wore no shoes in a professional establishment/nursing home. Hired nearly all her family members for nearly every position. She was not my boss. But would pull desserts saying they were unsuitable ( my boss tested and signed off on them earlier) take whole pies and cakes home then said we had none for service. It was a fight I did not want to continue due to mental health. No one deserves to be tormented at work.
#20
The current UNC Football coach hired his two sons to work with him on the team, despite strict university no nepotism rules. Wonder how that happened?
#21
The CFO's husband worked for me. He was two years from retirement . He could not do his job. Literally. I sent him to training and he couldn't do the bare minimum. I documented the lack of work, worked with HR, and his union rep. He eventually retired early. He said I caused him to have a heart problem by setting deadlines for his work.
#22
Where I went to high school the Sheriff’s wife was secretary and main dispatcher and his son was the main deputy for the area.
#23
The person hired to do the common area cleaning for the apartment buildings I worked for was the owners adult daughter. Part of my job was to report the cleanliness of the buildings to her so she knew what to prioritize. I’d reach out multiple days in a row before she actually ever did anything about the issues, meanwhile her mom would be getting angry with me about the state of the buildings. It was ridiculous. She was being paid way more than me too and barely showed up to work. Company was also paying the child support for her new husband’s kids since he was so behind.
#24
Chairman at nonprofit hired his daughter and we were all forced to listen to hear talk about anything and everything, never allowed to disagree when it came to work, and even the c-suite people had to make sure she was boosted and well liked. I doubt the daughter was even aware, but god it was exhausting. She did this as a thing just to to and was actually trying to be an actress. So she would come and go when she pleased (still did the work on her own time to her credit). But it would get tiresome listening to her problems, lies (how she complained about rent but literally owns her apt), and would just get up and travel when she pleased and needed a break. It was too hard to be around someone like this constantly especially when her literal income was just fun money.
#25
Current hierarchy: Owner, Me, His Daughter.
Hours last week: Owner - 40
Me - 8
His Daughter - 40
I have a mortgage and a car payment, she lives at home and has no bills.
#26
Used to work for a small computer firm that got bought out. The new company consolidated into one new building basically the day after the merger. Second day in this office my department manager, his first day on the job, comes in to introduce himself. His actual first words, "Hi I'm the worthless brother-in-law every company has".
Took about an hour to find out he was the owner's brother-in-law who needed a job. He was the software development manager. Previous experience, retail shift supervisor.
#27
I have a couple of good ones.
First story - Worked with a guy (director level) who got his brother-in-law hired and the two of them pretended to not know each other. The new hire went from a help desk job, to help desk team lead, to Windows admin, to managing the Windows team (and being a direct report to the director) in the course of maybe a year. No one could figure out why MrDirector kept promoting this guy because his work sucked on every level. Through dumb luck, someone met someone at a conference who knew MrDirector at a previous gig and the secret was out. No one did squat. MrDirector eventually got canned for completely unrelated reasons, went to another company, and sure enough it wasn't six months before brother-in-law followed.
Second - VP of IT brought in a "special consultant" to fix some long-standing problems with a couple of accounting systems. The "special consultant" was certainly special. That dude couldn't find his a*s with both hands. He would nap at his desk after lunch virtually every day. Turns out that the VP's wife and the consultant's wife had been college roommates and the two couples still vacationed together every year. After people figured it out, months after the guy started, one day the "special consultant" magically disappeared never to be heard from again. And, of course, none of the problems that he was supposedly hired to fix had actually gotten fixed. The rumor was that the consultant was pulling down $200/hr to basically do squat but I could never confirm that.
#28
Previous company I worked for; the owner hired all 3 of his kids, and they just sit around and get paid for it.
#29
My company is in an industry where credentials are everything - you can't legally practice without them. I have a bachelor's degree plus several other creds and years of experience and I'm basically on the bottom of the barrel.
I was told my boss had a community college diploma (what they call an associate degree in the US). I overheard him in conversation last week where it slipped that he didn't actually complete the diploma - in other words, his highest credential is high school.
His wife is also a manager in a different department of the company. As far as I know, she is just as equally qualified.
But hey, his mom is a vice president.
#30
How many stories do you want! A new investor/owner hired his wife as HR: she already had a full time job elsewhere so wasn’t available when needed and didn’t help anyway. Hired his teenager at uni to do marketing: they did 3 social media posts…ever…and picked some colours...we never saw or spoke to them because they were either at uni or travelling. He hired one kid straight out of uni, they were clever and took the role seriously but were given huge amounts of responsibility that they were wildly unequipped to handle and ended up with huge anxiety issues.
This guy also put his friends on pay roll to do goodness only knows what.
After I left the company closed within the year… shocker!
#31
My entire dept was eliminated except 2 people. And they created a brand new role for the lady who babysat their kids rather than having her look for a new job with the rest of us plebes.
#32
Founder’s son (hired by Dad without interview or input from others, but genuinely believed they deserved the job on merit) thought it was inappropriate that I signed off on our 3 interns time cards, because one of the interns was a relative of mine.
My relative knew about the job because of me, but applied, interviewed, and was hired by my boss without my input. Same process as the other 2 interns.
Jeremy James 1 month ago
"I worked hard to get where I am. I never had anything handed to me. Poor people just need to pull themselves up by their bootstraps." --Founder's Son, probably
#33
I’m a nurse on a hospital ward. HCA was hired as her Mum is a manager in the hospital. She’s an alright carer, not great but she would disappear for hours at a time. She’d literally leave the ward and go outside without telling anyone, sit in the (only) staff toilet for over 20 minutes on her phone, hide in the linen cupboard or empty patient bathrooms, anything to avoid answering the patient call bells or have anyone ask her to do some work. One day she straight up didn’t show up for a 12 hour shift, wouldn’t answer her phone or anything. They had to phone her mum for her to say she wasn’t coming in, no reason given. She’s been on “mental health leave” for months since getting full pay.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not one to judge someone’s mental health struggles, I’ve had to take mental health leave myself for multiple mental health conditions I’ve had all my life but this girl is happy as Larry, she just doesn’t care about patients and doesn’t want to do anything.
#34
Son of the Governor’s airplane pilot was hired as a mid-level executive, got bumped up a step at a time, wound up as director of a state transportation department.
#35
After her divorce, this business owner met a younger man who she hired, she had previously hired all her adult children as well, who of course only did the bare minimum but who let everyone else take the brunt of the burden.
He did absolutely nothing, he just stood there and wanted to look remarkable while talking on his cell phone as if he was the most popular person in the world.
The business went bankrupt and he dumped her because he wasn't getting any more money from her.
I think, the latest I heard, the former business woman, she was working in a small flower shop for minimum wage.
#37
I worked in a school district rife with nepotism. They hired a principal's son as a teacher only to find out 6 weeks into school that he had never gotten his teaching certification. In fact, he hadn't even graduated college.
#38
Firing someone saying their role has been eliminated. A week later, a good friend of the boss is sitting at the same desk doing the same job.
#39
I had three managers sleeping with their employees. Two managers hired their own kids. Most of the managers hired their old friends from high school and college.
All of them very incredibly lazy. I was a supervisor and it made my work life so much harder than it should have been.
#40
Our office hired the assistant’s husband as an IT specialist. the assistant has been in the office for decades. Her husband has no background in IT, we’ve been funding an entire separate position for the last year just to train him on how to do his job.
#41
My old job
The COO gave his daughter who just graduated college an admin position at the company working in the IT department. She was able to use the title and experience to springboard into a better job elsewhere a year later.
The same COO also tried to shoehorn his lazy, wayward son into our marketing department. He stuck around until lunchtime, in which he disappeared and never came back. The COO escorted his son like a toddler to our department the next day. Within two hours he said he had to use the bathroom and he never came back. Heard from the team that the COO was feverishly trying to get his son to do any job there but he just kept leaving.
#42
Two.
1. A partner at the big finance firm wanted his daughter to have a job while she waited for the start date of her "real" job in a more profitable area of the firm in 6 months. So a kind of a general HR admin assistant position suddenly existed and was given to her. Straight out of a degree in something unrelated. Earning more than most admin roles, rumor had it. In the midst of a round of layoffs of real admin roles. Very galling to watch good people get handed their leavers papers while she sat about "taking notes" in meetings and "shadowing calls".
2. A new interim manager got brought into the funding department I worked for because she was pals with another department head. I was the database manager and team admin for about 9 nurses and case managers. She did _not_ like it that I knew more about anything - the department, the funding, the staff, the database - than she did. Despite never having worked in the field before. I do badly wanted to help her and keep the department working nicely. There was lots of gaslighting and micromanagement before she staged a faux disciplinary meeting and I gave up and quit.
A pal in the same office told me that she deleted all my handover and database documentation and hired her 19 year old daughter's best friend. Who showed up late, left early, and sat on her phone chewing gum loudly much of the day. Apparently the plan had been to hold the position open for her daughter... who didn't want it. And moved to another city when she graduated. In the meantime the database got mauled to death and the department had to go back to juggling janky spreadsheets. She deserved every bit of it, but I felt bad for the team.
#43
The marketing director at a software company I worked in welcomed me aboard when I started. She said that hard work was rewarded at the company, and that anyone could succeed if they worked really hard. Just look at her. Marketing director. Started as receptionist.
She was exquisitely beautiful.
And had married the company owner.
#44
Where do I begin? LOL! I have ~~hired~~ processed many job applicants from the: mother, brother, sister, sweetheart network. I even got my own mother a job because I was in a position to do so. My mother hadn't worked a real job in over 20 years. Happens all the time.
What do you think ?
Vinnie 1 month ago (edited)
Our team has been lucky with a colleague's lovely talented daughter. When she was in school, her mother gave her advice because of her experience. The daughter gave her advice back because she learned the latest techniques. It's not a family-owned business. Probation period is longer than in most places, so a new hire can't slack off after a few months. At a previous job, the VP's teenage girlfriend was a bossy interfering PITA (head of sales: "I'd fire her if I could"). My present bosses would have told her off, then fired her if she didn't shape up.
Littlemiss 1 month ago
The manager at one job hired her daughter and niece and my 10 years of work vanished overnight. Had a team leader who used to call the manager 'mum' but was no relation, got to drink nonstop coffees in the office whilst I got to do all her work. The director of the company who hired her equally dodgy sil to be my mentor at work, only to discover how awful she was. She is a psychopath who enjoys destroying people around her for fun. Just discovered recently my current manager got the role when her aunt left the position. This woman has no managerial skills whatsoever, defrauds the company, lies nonstop and has been known to beat her family members up if they stand against her - but she's fantastic...Just ask her gf who happens to be the chair of our committee.
Vinnie 1 month ago (edited)
Our team has been lucky with a colleague's lovely talented daughter. When she was in school, her mother gave her advice because of her experience. The daughter gave her advice back because she learned the latest techniques. It's not a family-owned business. Probation period is longer than in most places, so a new hire can't slack off after a few months. At a previous job, the VP's teenage girlfriend was a bossy interfering PITA (head of sales: "I'd fire her if I could"). My present bosses would have told her off, then fired her if she didn't shape up.
Littlemiss 1 month ago
The manager at one job hired her daughter and niece and my 10 years of work vanished overnight. Had a team leader who used to call the manager 'mum' but was no relation, got to drink nonstop coffees in the office whilst I got to do all her work. The director of the company who hired her equally dodgy sil to be my mentor at work, only to discover how awful she was. She is a psychopath who enjoys destroying people around her for fun. Just discovered recently my current manager got the role when her aunt left the position. This woman has no managerial skills whatsoever, defrauds the company, lies nonstop and has been known to beat her family members up if they stand against her - but she's fantastic...Just ask her gf who happens to be the chair of our committee.
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