Friday, September 14, 2007
Newspapers and Nepotism?
My partner is a reporter, I am a copy editor, and we are both ready to move on from our current newspaper. We both want to stick with our career paths, but beyond that we are clueless about the best way to do a two-person job search -- especially in this era of one-newspaper cities when we're pretty much stuck applying to the same companies if we want to live together.
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In the past we have done a staggered move: I got a copy editing job, and a year later he got a reporting job at the same newspaper. Everyone knew we were a couple, but it wasn't an issue -- he had previously finished an internship at the newspaper and was hired, of course, on his merits. It worked out, but the year we lived hundreds of miles apart was tough, and we'd rather not repeat it.
It's hard enough to find a job for one person. Do you any advice on how to find jobs for two? Do many newspapers have policies about hiring couples? (We're not married, but we have lived together for several years.) How and when should we address (or not address) the situation when applying for jobs?
Jen
Anti-nepotism policies apply only to people who are legally related. You are not.
I would apply separately to the same newspapers and to newspapers that are near each other, trying to find metropolitan areas that you both favor and that have multiple newspapers.
In the interest of full disclosure, I would tell a newspaper about your relationship only if both of you get offers from the same newspaper and only when it becomes a potential issue -- when the second person gets an offer. I would disclose before I accepted. I would not bring it up before an offer is made unless, for some reason, you are asked. That question itself seems so inappropriate that it probably would not get asked.
Coming Monday: He is contemplating a move from a fun job in the trade press to mainstream journalism -- but he might want to take a trip first.
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