My Wife's Sister's Cousin

I guess I need to back track a little and explain about the nepotism. I was lucky enough recently to add a new position at our small company for someone to help me with my growing workload. Not to get too into this right now, but I am usually juggling about 11 different projects at a time. We had been kicking the idea around for this position since early last fall. At Thanksgiving Dinner I made a casual inquiry to my wife’s cousin, “So what are you doing these days?” He proceeded to describe to me the position that I was going to be creating in the coming year. I told him straight out that I was looking for someone to do the same thing at my company and I would let him know if the position ever became real. It did so I did.

I wanted everything to be above board so I interviewed him in February and had my boss interview him and we made an offer. I did interview some other folks too because I wanted it to be fair. He has been there for a little over a month now and I think it is working out very well. I am already noticing that I can get more done. I think I may be pushing him a little, but that could be a good thing. One thing I hadn’t counted on was having someone there to bounce an idea off of that actually understands. We worked on a project the other day and it was the first time in a long while where I felt I was working on a team effort and not just a Mike-will-do-all-of-the-work-while-everyone-else-watches effort.

There is quite a bit of my wife's family out here so there is a little concern that things could end badly, but not a big one. I was asked if it would be awkward at family gatherings if things didn't work out. I told them it would just be a good excuse for me not to go to them any longer. Don't get me wrong I her family is pretty amusing and I get along with most of them, but I am not really a large gathering type of person. I'm more of a one-on-one with a couple of beers kind of guy.