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Ask HN: Has a candidate's political views ever stopped you from hiring them?

26 points by waterside81 ↗ HN
We're hiring a bunch of people for one of my startups and I checked each of their FB profiles (for whatever reason) and I noticed one candidate has some political views that I strongly disagree with. Now I've already decided to hire them because they are very talented and I don't feel any differently towards them because of our differences in opinion, but I'm wondering if anyone out there has not hired (or not been hired themselves) because of differing political views?

58 comments

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bhousel
It's far easier reject a candidate up front than it is to fire them later.

I don't have any data, but I know of several companies that take 'culture fit' very seriously and won't hire a candidate if they feel that they won't fit in.

lzw
By definition this is a form of political correctness. I think that there are a lot of companies run by people eho think they are tolerant but who really aren't and reject candidates for the simple crime of growing up in a differnt part of the country.

For instance, someone i know at amazon will not hire people from the south. He's a liberal and as "tolerant" as he thinks is, he thinks everyone from the south is stupid and evil, and so he won't hire them.

Personally, I would take politics into account. I had to work with some leftists who were constantly sowing dissent in the company because they thought anything having to do with profit was evil. I'd want to screen those kinds out, they led several pointless sorta revolts.

jlindley
Political affiliation or activities can result in protected-class status in a few jurisdictions in the US (DC and NY at least, I believe), sometimes only under certain circumstances. Check your particular state's non-discrimination laws to be sure.

That said, if you get along with the person and they can contribute to the team and they're also OK with disagreeing with you on these issues, it shouldn't be a problem. I'm a gay atheist, and I have a close friend who's actually an evangelical pastor. We get along just fine despite our radical differences in outlook because we respect each other.

Culture is about how you communicate, what you value, and how to make difficult decisions as a company. Consider at what level those values sit.

Human interaction can't just be a checklist. A person is more than just a Facebook profile.

Agustus
I am not a lawyer. I wish you would not have looked. The question you need to ask is will their political views impede their ability to do the job requirements. If they do, you have a legitimate concern, if they do not, you would fall into the Civil Rights Act of 1964: "The Act requires the elimination of artificial, arbitrary, and unnecessary barriers to employment that operate invidiously to discriminate on the basis of race, and, if, as here, an employment practice that operates to exclude Negroes cannot be shown to be related to job performance, it is prohibited, notwithstanding the employer's lack of discriminatory intent."
waterside81
Oh no doubt, discrimination as a result of this information would be dead wrong (and likely illegal). Like I said, we will hire this person because they are very talented, enthusiastic, etc.

I think you're right; I kind of wish I hadn't looked.

fgf
you might have found at anyway, and now, at least, you can avoid the subject
c1sc0
While all of that is nice & dandy, in the real world discrimination does exist. I know I'm guilty of it & I simply consider this as something you cannot rule out, just like bias in journalism. The law in these cases is often just wishful thinking.

My favorite 2 questions: Can he/she do the job? Would you enjoy spending time with him/her outside of the office?

If it's someone I'd get in a fight with every time we go out for a few beers then that's a no-hire.

bmj
Question #1 is far more important than question #2. In fact, I'd argue question #2 shouldn't even be asked. I work with some folks who are very, very good at their jobs, and I get on with them well enough during work hours, but I have zero interest in engaging them outside of work (and it has little to do with political preferences).

Personally, I think it's sorta sad that as a culture, we've allowed political differences to splinter relationships, professional or otherwise. I'm not suggesting that we can't disagree about politics, but it needn't be as divisive as it is.

mikeryan
This isn't how discrimination works in employment law. Discrimination is for the most part only relevant to those who fall under Protected Classes (age, gender, race etc). Political affiliation is not a protected class.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_class

xiaoma
A quick google search suggests that it's a bit more complicated than that. According to an employee rights attorney here (http://www.linkedin.com/answers/law-legal/employment-labor-l...):

"I will answer based on CA law. Labor Code 1101 and 1102 prohibit employers from forbidding, directing, controlling, terminating or threatening to terminate an employee based on politics. This was further expanded on in Ali v. LA Focus Publication (2003) 112 CA4th 1477. "

robertg
Diversity is one of the ingredients that makes projects successful. You need people on your project that think differently than you. As long as they aren't interested in terrorism or a complete asshole (which, consequently, can be anyone from any political affiliation) then you shouldn't pass up on the good talent. Smart people are hard enough to find these days, as long as they keep that shit out of the work place (and you too, by the way) then you should be fine.

Also, I would google and check the social media profiles of everyone I was about to hire. It's easier to get out of some marriages than it is to fire some people and you need to know what you are getting in to.

ryandvm
Only hiring people that think like you is one of the worst mistakes a small team can make. Nobody can drive a bus off a cliff like a bunch of "yes men".

Unless you're never wrong, you should embrace hiring smart people that have completely different ideas than yourself.

seven
I agree to what you said, but isn't it the problem that we consider people with political views that we _strongly_ disagree with, as less smart or smart but evil?

To answer the question of waterside81: Yes, I rejected somebody just because I did not want to have an 18 year old kid working with us that calls himself 'very very conservative'. I do not care much about left or right wing. I just do not want extremists. :)

And I am pretty sure I got rejected myself at least once because of my political views that collided with the business model. Which is perfectly ok and a very understandable reason.

Kadrith
> I agree to what you said, but isn't it the problem that we consider people with political views that we _strongly_ disagree with, as less smart or smart but evil?

I don't look at it that way. Smart people can disagree if they place a different weight on the various data points.

MichaelSalib
I'd be very wary of declaring someone an extremist just because they said they were very very conservative. Individual understanding of what terms like liberal and conservative mean often is completely turned around. My politics are fairly liberal but at times I think of myself as a fairly conservative person because I think some conservatives are radicals. There is too much uncertainty about what these terms mean to base hiring decisions on them.

Plus, people with experience in other countries or cultures can have very different definitions. It seems that the spectrum of allowable political opinions in the US is much narrower than in Europe. Many American liberals would be considered quite conservative in some European countries.

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exline
Unless you are a politician, it shouldn't make a difference. I don't care to much what they do/think outside of work. As many people have said, having a diversity is a good thing in the work place. Unless the person was very out spoken about his/her beliefs that was disrupting work, it shouldn't matter. But you wouldn't know this before hiring them, but if they had that type of personality, they probably show up in other ways in the interview processes.
[dead] dark_matter
First of all, you shouldn't ever ask a person for his political views during an interview. Opinions that are freely offered on Facebook or a blog are a separate matter. I don't think someone gets "protected" status for political blog posts, based on the "reasonable man" hypothesis; a reasonable man would consider it acceptable not to hire a person with announced and extreme (e.g. KKK) politics.

To answer your question: no, but that doesn't mean political views shouldn't be considered at all. They reflect on a person's ethics and sense of social justice. Not all who identify as "Republican" are stupid and mean-spirited, but the politics that the modern-day conservative movement represents is stupid, short-sighted, and mean-spirited. So if a person is politically aware and yet supports it, that should be a major red flag.

If someone puts "Conservative" for his political views in his Facebook profile, that doesn't mean anything and I wouldn't hold it against him, because "conservative" and "liberal" mean different things to different people. If he rails against the "Ground Zero Mosque", posts in support of the Arizona immigration laws, or is in favor of retaining Bush's tax cuts for the rich, then... yeah, I wouldn't hire him, because he's an asshole and his disregard for social justice reflects a lack of character.

I grew up in "Red America", so I have a lot of friends who identify as "Republican" but are actually centrists or moderate libertarians, and their political views wouldn't put me off. I'd hire them in a second. On the other hand, someone who actually supports this country's lurch toward corporate oligarchy is a person of bad character and I wouldn't want to hire him.

nhebb
Some of my favorite coworkers over the years are ones I've vehemently disagreed with politically. Politics is a funny thing. I can't think of anything else that turns otherwise intelligent people into bumbling idiots to the same degree. Whenever you get caught up in the political issue du jour, it's good to keep in mind that much of the political news is about petty bickering inside the beltway and not about governance and policy.
_b8r0
I think there's a difference between political views and activism. Our employees tend to go through Government clearance, which weeds the activists out. We do have people with differing political views, and used to have someone that would be considered borderline extreme right wing and it wasn't a problem as long as they weren't active.
MichaelSalib
What qualifies as activism? Writing a letter to the editor? Attending a protest? Signing a petition? Speaking at a public meeting?
jackfoxy
Birds (and aircraft) need a left wing and a right wing to fly.
lkrubner
Do they have a sense of humor about their political views? As a practical matter, I think having a sense of humor is important, especially on small teams. Someone might have political views that I disagree with it, but the important reality is how they handle themselves in regards to those issues, and how do they handle disagreement from others. Some people get angry when others have different views - and I think these people need to be avoided. Other people meet disagreement with a bit of humor - I think these people are easier to deal with, even if their views are somewhat extreme.
gregwebs
Not having a sense of humor about something like political beliefs is a good sign that someone is accepting dogma on the subject. This could make them more likely to accept dogma for things important to work also.

I also wonder if people think it is hacker-like to have strong political beliefs. Maybe I am way of base, but I always thought of hackers as being more apolitical, or at least not enjoying (pointless) political arguments. It is one thing to be adamantly against software patents, or to focus on a few issues that you can do something about, but another to spend a lot of time on something as unproductive as politics.

MichaelSalib
but another to spend a lot of time on something as unproductive as politics

I disagree strongly. Some hackers like politics, others don't. Neither choice is more hacker-like. I find politics interesting because I like seeing how institutional structure leads to outcomes; as a corollary, I find 95% of political reporting to be garbage, so my perspective on politics might be unusual. But that seems like a very hacker-like perspective: political outcomes are emergent properties of institutional structures that resulted from random compromise and contingent events. Tweak the structure here and look what changes....

In terms of unproductivity, I feel the same way about C++. I mean, the language is so obviously fundamentally broken that I weep when considering how much time has been wasted fixing problems that only arise because of C++'s brokenness. That doesn't mean that I think it is always the wrong choice, but I am astounded when I encounter people who C++ is a well designed language. It feels like talking to someone who claims the government is controlling their thoughts with an implant in their tooth.

gyardley
If I only hired people who agreed with my political views I'd have a hard time hiring anybody. It's important to realize and accept that two equally intelligent people can come to very different political viewpoints, and that these political viewpoints generally don't impact a person's ability to do their job.

That said, I strongly believe that political conversations don't belong in the office. I've been in both workplaces and graduate programs where one's political views were simply assumed. Sitting around in the middle of a one-sided political 'conversation' isn't fun - you have to decide whether you want to just politely keep quiet or speak up and potentially ruin your relationship with your co-workers. (While most people can handle differing political views, some hold grudges or assume you're stupid, and it's not easy to tell who's going to do this at first.) Neither option is particularly enjoyable when you just want to get your job done and get along with everybody.

aspiringsensei
>I've been in both workplaces and graduate programs where one's political views were simply assumed.

Ditto with religion. I'm not devout, but I don't believe it's anyone's right to sit around and mock religious people on pure "durr hurr god isn't real" grounds.

jawngee
1st amendment guarantees that right to sit around and mock people for whatever you feel like.
JustinSeriously
True, but the 1st amendment isn't a right to harass people, and harassment is a fireable offense.
gyardley
In America, there is no constitutional 'freedom of speech' protection in the private sector. If you mock another employee at work, you most certainly can be fired.
tofumatt
There is a world of difference between liberty and license. I'm hardly the first guy in the room to be labelled politically correct but just because you can doesn't mean you should.

And also, you can't mock (specific) people because of things like their gender or religion anyway. For better or worse, that's usually considered discrimination.

doki_pen
Why do people think that the 1st amendment gives you the right to say anything you want without consequence. It only gives you the right to say whatever you want without LEGAL consequence. It is a very important distinction. You have the right to say what you want, and I have the right to think or act based on what you say.

Maybe I'm having a bad day but I am sooooo sick of hearing this argument that people can say whatever stupid thing they want and then just shout "1st Amendment!"

carbocation
Not even that. It gives you the right to say most anything you want without retribution from the government. It doesn't compel your employer, a private entity, to do anything.
InclinedPlane
The 1st amendment also gives you the right, without fear of legal prosecution, to use racial slurs against others.

It doesn't mean you should. And it also doesn't mean that you can't be fired for not playing well with others.

HeyLaughingBoy
I keep hearing about practices like this and I wonder how prevalent they are outside of HR.

I've interviewed my share of people. In fact, we just finished hiring for all our open positions and I interviewed most of the candidates. But not once did it even occur to me to check out someone on Facebook or LinkedIn or even google them. What people are doing on their own time simply isn't relevant to the job and I think they're smart enough that if they have something useful and relevant online (like OSS contributions/projects), they would mention it since it can only benefit them.

Am I out to lunch here? Are you guys really googling people you're going to hire as a matter of course? If so, what useful information are you getting from it?

biggitybones
I think it depends a lot on the role and company size. If it's someone who's joining as a first employee and you're going to be spending 10+ hours a day in the same small office, I think it's very prudent to learn as much as possible about them and determine if you'll be able to work well with them.

If it's a larger company (read: not an earlier stage startup) then I don't think it's as necessary, but I'd still probably do it to vet them a bit.

sedachv
LinkedIn is designed (or at least used) with that in mind - I think it's safe and helpful to check out potential candidates' profiles there. I think checking Facebook is inappropriate, but a lot of people seem to disagree.
HeyLaughingBoy
I think of LinkedIn as useful for maintaining networks, but yeah, I can see it being useful for checking out a candidate. I just wouldn't bother since people will only put positive things there and that should already be on the resume or they should bring it up in the interview.
spokey
I happen know a lot of HR people from different organizations and have discussed this very question with them. As a class, they seem discourage this sort of background research, and to strongly discourage hiring managers from doing it directly. Rightly or wrongly, HR people seem to feel it is very easy to cross an ethical or legal line by researching someone online and especially on social networks. They are also probably overly cautious as a class. My guess is that hiring managers are more likely to do this sort of research than an HR person (except in very large organizations where there's a formal "background check" sort of step in the hiring process).
jawngee
Not political views, but I have passed on overtly religious people as I view religion as a sign of mental illness.

Mod me down if you like, but having "faith" in invisible people is oddly creepy to me.

InclinedPlane
Here's the thing. You gain nothing by treating the religious as idiots. Many of them are very much not idiots. Do you think Einstein and Planck were "mentally ill"?

Here's the other thing, we all have our mistaken beliefs. Whether they are part of an organized religion or not. The best way to bring people around to a more robust and more evidence based understanding of the universe is not to revile, insult, and discriminate against them. Rather, it's to engage in open, honest, humble, and compassionate debate. You know, the same variety of debate that advances science itself.

jawngee
Einstein was an atheist who only identified with Judaism from a cultural perspective:

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2009/10/word-god-is-product-of-...

What is there to debate? There is nothing to debate and we waste time even entertaining the thought of doing so, which is why you rarely see Dawkins, Hitchens, et. al. doing so.

InclinedPlane
Einstein stated quite bluntly that he was not an atheist, specifically using the phrase "I'm not an atheist."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein%27s_religious_v...

The notion that there is nothing to debate is insulting. Proof is required, always. And everyone is bettered by an open an honest debate that patiently brings people around by convincing them with a sound argument backed by evidence. At some point it's important to recognize when an intellectual opponent is no longer worth debating, but that doesn't justify shutting down debate entirely, or of refusing to reach out and attempt to convince others who might be more open minded.

Indeed, this is quite critical, especially today. Because guess what? Atheists, and believers in, say, evolution, we are in the minority. Even in the liberal and intellectual modern western world. Far more so in the world at large. The world believes in gods, it doesn't believe in science. If you shut off that debate you aren't helping yourself or your beliefs in the slightest.

joshuacc
1. Religious discrimination in hiring is illegal in most places. (Unless you are hiring for a religious organization or equivalent.)

2. It seems a bit extreme to regard the vast majority of the human race as "mentally ill". Misinformed or uneducated I could understand more easily, even though I happen to be religious myself.

vaksel
if they reveal their political or any other affiliation during an interview without being asked then it's probably a good idea since it's obvious that they don't know when to keep their mouth shut...and that should apply no matter what political affiliation the person holds(i.e. even if you agree with them)
roboneal
A very insightful comment - if your political views are evident during the interview process = you are "doing it wrong".
narag
I once refused to work for a company for ideological reasons. Not a right-left question, but more of a "would you work for the RIAA" kind. I finally accepted an offer that was a 5% worse and not so technically interesting.

I've also systematically rejected a good number of offers in certain kind of companies (that was also time ago, when the job market was hotter) for fear to be discriminated in the workplace. This is a problem that's specific of my country, so I won't bother you with it, but I consider it political, to a point.

I'm happy to work with any kind of people, but I can't stand people that constantly try to bully you into something. I really prefer not to be chosen than to end in a place that I'm uncomfortable in.

lukejduncan
What's the name of this startup? Is the startup involved in any way with the politics that bother you? If yes, then you may have some ground to stand on...

It not, its it would be a signal to me that the organization doesn't value people as people, but property. Personally, I would turn down work at a place if I knew they hired and fired for based on political bias.

lee
I had a friend who didn't hire someone because he was very religious. During the interview he refused to shake her hand, and stated that in no manner should a female touch him (such as tap him on the shoulder...etc...).

He was the most qualified person from those interviewed, but she just couldn't hire him because of his extremist views.

I think she made the right choice.

loumf
I know that seems extreme, but even in some liberal orthodox Jewish denominations, men and women don't touch (except for husband/wife of course). I'm pretty sure that not hiring on this basis is illegal, and in some places, like NYC, it's extremely common. I'm not Jewish, but have worked with, and known, and have many friends who hold these beliefs. I have never thought of them as being extremists.

I think this specific person might have explained it inartfully.

jacquesm
Liberal and orthodox in one description feel kind of funny.
loumf
yeah -- there are gradations -- I'm just saying that even the most liberal of the orthodox Jews I have known still follow this. Which is why I don't think of it as extreme -- it's a fairly common practice.

Also, think of it from this guy's case. He has a religious belief -- he knows that you might think it's odd (based on past reactions, no doubt). He's not very good at explaining it -- perhaps he's nervous because it's an interview.

three14
This comment was interesting to me because I know several people like that guy - and their religious views would be better described as "extremely different culturally" than extremist with the common connotations of extremism. I'm having trouble translating the cultural norm, here, but I guess you could say that for them, the not touching women thing is simply a set of rules you don't break that serve as a safety barrier against real trouble like adultery. If no man ever touches a woman other than his wife, and is never in a private space alone with a woman other than his wife, then it's hard to get a relationship off the ground. I think cultural norms in the U.S. might take sufficiently little issue with adultery these days that even with explanation, the behavior is alien, but it's not the sort of extremism like "let's blow people up because we imagine God likes that."

Then again, she might very well have made the right choice. People don't easily ignore culture.

billjings
One's political views are not as much of an issue as how one expresses them. Two people having a political argument will tactically try to find a place in their disagreement that they're comfortable with - maybe they will need to win the argument, withdraw and concede the point, or try to work out some compromise position. They will probably use the same tactics when they are disagreeing over something material to the workplace.
yock
I'd suggest that their political views are largely irrelevant until someone makes them relevant, which you have done. Since this now apparently presents a bit of a dilemma for you, it would seem that it is self-inflicted.

Political views can be--though they aren't always-- indicators of intelligence. Don't stop reading here though. I don't mean to say that one end of the spectrum is smart and the other stupid, rather a political opinion is like any other self-representation in that how it is presented can be a good indicator of many traits important in evaluating a candidate-for-hire.

Sadly, I suspect that the Facebook political information is merely their political affiliation, a one word response to heading on a profile form. Which causes me to question whether or not someone could put any stock in it. Like most things on Facebook, it's designed as a conversation starter, nothing more. That leads me to conclude that perhaps Facebook is not, allowing exception for egregious examples of anti-social behavior posted to someone's wall, is not a good place to find professional information about an individual.

InclinedPlane
s/political/religious/

Does this change your opinion? Should it?

Ask yourself why you feel that not hiring this person based on their political views is justified. Force yourself to back up that justification with hard, concrete facts, not just speculation. Then recast their political views as, say, their religion, or their cultural norms. Does this change your thinking? Why? Maybe you'll come to a better appreciation for your own viewpoint and degree of tolerance / intolerance.

lzw
People who are irrational make poor employees. I wouldn't say all people with particular views are irrational, but this is one way of discovering some who are.
jacquesm
You're going to have a hard time trying to not let your views of this person be coloured by things that you probably shouldn't have known about them until they volunteered.

What someones political views are should have nothing to do with the hiring process. I'm pretty sure that you're not alone in doing this, in fact I think it happens all the time but I don't think you should go around and check up on the private stuff you can dig up on your hires. If it's work related that's different, but facebook profiles are for the most part family and friends. If someone lists their FB profile on their CV that probably changes matters a bit, that's more like volunteering but even then if they list any political affiliation there it should never be used against them.