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Is it OK to Hire People from Your Friend’s Company? (2011)

bhorowitz.com

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Re: Is it OK to Hire People from Your Friend’s Company? (2011)

#51

Post by MimiZ »

rayiner wrote: post #33
mayop100 wrote: post #8

The similarities between this post and the actions that Google and Apple took and are now being investigated for are striking. At a small scale, it's just "good business" not to poach. At a large scale it's "evil" and illegal. Seems rather arbitrary to me.

It's not arbitrary at all. At a small scale, the activity has little impact on the market for labor. At the large scale, it has a very substantial impact.

True.

But you can't really hold it against companies that are poaching. Whether or not they are friends with you because everyone in tech basically knows each other (through networks).

There seems to be a limited talent pool in specific skill sets for certain geographies. In this case, the market is in the favor of the employee, not necessarily the employer.

Re: Is it OK to Hire People from Your Friend’s Company? (2011)

#52

Post by tbrownaw »

mathattack wrote: post #37

This seems to be a little bit of golden rule, right? How would you feel if someone hired away one of your best employers? What if it was a close friend that was doing the hiring? Or an important business partner? Would it suffice to say, "They were looking anyway?" Would it make a difference if it was a customer? Does it matter to the morality if the other party will feel aggrieved? My 2 cents is this isn't that blac…

This seems to be a little bit of golden rule, right? How would you feel if someone hired away one of your best employers?

How would you feel if someone refused to hire you as a favor to your old boss's boss?

Re: Is it OK to Hire People from Your Friend’s Company? (2011)

#53

Post by ericd »

stephencanon wrote: post #22
ericd wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not about colluding, it's just that the new CEO is bound to not hire you out of loyalty to his/her friend. Social laws and laws on the books don't always line up well.

She’s not much of a CEO if loyalty to her friend trumps the best interests of the company in (what should be) a purely professional decision. Her friend isn’t much of a friend if he lets a purely professional decision interfere with their non-professional relationship.

Almost nothing in business is purely professional, that's like ignoring friction in physics problems. And when it approaches that state, the results can be pretty amoral and scary. Part of being a good CEO is being a good human. Companies aren't perfect abstractions from the underlying humanity, nor should they be.

Re: Is it OK to Hire People from Your Friend’s Company? (2011)

#54

Post by mindslight »

greenyoda wrote: post #48
mindslight wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not this post that's terribly wrong, but the widespread fallacy of equivalence between tiny companies and large corporations. It's not inconsistent to think it reasonable for small startups to avoid hiring each other's employees, yet that scaling this up to a significant part of the labor market is problematic.

Owning a small company doesn't magically exempt you from obeying the law.

Sure, but when discussing morality, the current legality is irrelevant.

Re: Is it OK to Hire People from Your Friend’s Company? (2011)

#55

Post by mcv »

eshvk wrote: post #26
mcv wrote: post #17

What a bizarre kind of possessiveness. Companies don't own their employees. Slavery is supposed to have ended quite some time ago (yes, I know it still exists). If you want to hire someone, hire them. If an employee leaves, let them leave. No hard feelings. If you really don't want them to leave, offer them more. Preferably do that before they think about leaving. This sort of unfair limitations on employee's employa…

I feel like that is not the point though. The analogy he made was fairly reasonable: people have fairly demanding (sometimes irrational) restrictions on who they decide to keep in their lives as friends. This is about that. Not about slavery. Not about mismanagement of a company.

Well, I don't need "friends" who make demanding and irrational restrictions on our friendship.

Re: Is it OK to Hire People from Your Friend’s Company? (2011)

#56

Post by mathattack »

tbrownaw wrote: post #52
mathattack wrote: post #37

This seems to be a little bit of golden rule, right? How would you feel if someone hired away one of your best employers? What if it was a close friend that was doing the hiring? Or an important business partner? Would it suffice to say, "They were looking anyway?" Would it make a difference if it was a customer? Does it matter to the morality if the other party will feel aggrieved? My 2 cents is this isn't that blac…

This seems to be a little bit of golden rule, right? How would you feel if someone hired away one of your best employers? How would you feel if someone refused to hire you as a favor to your old boss's boss?

If I knew in advance that they were friends, I would go to my current boss first. The future boss should suggest the same.
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