The next time you’re interviewing for a job, there are five words your interviewer might say that should send you running in the opposite direction: “We’re like a family here.”
While a family-like company might sound pleasant on the surface, that framework tends to be a flag for a strikingly dysfunctional work environment—one that will make unreasonable demands on you while expecting you to comply because, after all, “we’re a family.”
To be clear, it’s not that workplaces shouldn’t strive for warm, supportive cultures. They should! It’s healthy to genuinely care about your colleagues and form real human connections with them, and spending 40+ hours a week at work is much more pleasant when you feel a sense of camaraderie with the people around you.
The problem with “family” workplaces is that they nearly always disadvantage workers, who end up feeling pressed to prioritize the company above their own interests. They might accept lower pay, work longer hours, avoid pushing back against bad management or unfair policies, and feel guilty if they contemplate leaving. (You don’t leave your family, after all!) This account from a reader is typical of the struggle people in these companies often encounter when they try to act in their own interests:
I work for a small, close-knit organization that prides itself on being “like a family.” I have considered leaving several times over the past few years, mostly due to work-life balance issues and being underpaid. When I’ve asked for a salary increase to get me in line with the market, my managers have told me that it’s a hard time for the company and we all need to do our part (which in my case seems to mean not being paid what I could earn somewhere else). In the past I’ve accepted that, but this time I’m ready to leave and I have another offer that I want to take. But I’m terrified to tell my managers because I’ve seen them take other long-time employees’ resignations as a personal betrayal. I’m also worried about leaving my co-workers in a bind after I’m gone, because I do truly care about them.
Here’s another:
My first (and highly toxic) job used the “family” dynamic to compensate for the fact that the owners of the company were stingy and unethical (and in some cases illegal). The managers had to find some way of getting us all to band together in the face of adversity in order to prevent staff turnover. It worked, and we all pushed ourselves to ridiculous ends, not for the business or the money but because we didn’t want to let our work family down!
But the consequences were that people were reluctant to take time off, stayed in jobs that made them miserable, and nobody ever just moved on in a healthy and sensible way—either they vanished without notice following an explosive row or gross misconduct, or they suffered horrendous medical issues as a result of the job and went on sick leave, never to be seen again. I was one of the latter.
This person, fortunately, was able to recognize the red flags at the interview stage before getting sucked in:
I heard “we’re like a family” in one interview and it made me a little reluctant to continue but I did. The next day they offered me the job with a nonnegotiable salary of about 70 percent of the average starting salary for that position in my local market. I guess “family” was supposed to make up for the low pay?
There’s also the little problem that family isn’t always a selling point, as anyone who comes from a less-than-functional family knows all too well:
My last job used to say “we’re like a big dysfunctional family here” and it was true to the bone. Case in point: The owner would get into yelling matches with an employee that included some cursing (about once a week) and one time you could hear them at the front of the shop where I was with a customer. It was a little too familiar, as someone who grew up around a lot of yelling. That’s not what I want in a job.
And of course, work isn’t a family. It can be a place where you feel genuine affection for colleagues, but it’s also a place that might fire you or lay you off if they decide it’s in their interests—and where you need to act in your own interests.
Almost invariably when workplaces claim to be “like a family,” they’re using the phrase to mean that they expect employees to show the same sort of patience, commitment, and loyalty (and sometimes guilt!) that we generally associate with families. But they’re certainly not offering the benefits people normally expect from their families in return, like love, emotional support, and a financial safety net (nor should they, in most business arrangements).
A much better model for employment is that it’s a team—a group of people working together toward a common goal, with the understanding that either party can leave the arrangement if they determine it’s no longer in their best interests. Dysfunctional employers don’t like that framing, because it underscores that employees are independent agents who can and should prioritize their own needs, but it’s a far more accurate one. It’s also healthier, since workers should advocate for themselves, expect to be paid fairly, and feel free to move on without guilt.
Work, at its core, is an economic transaction: We’re trading our labor for money. That doesn’t mean that workers don’t owe their employers hard work and conscientiousness—they do. And it doesn’t mean that employers don’t owe employees fair and respectful treatment—they do, too. But we’d all be better off if we assumed that each side will act in its own interests, and that employees aren’t obligated to sacrifice their earning potential, professional growth, job satisfaction, leisure hours, or health for a misplaced idea of “family” at work. We’ve got enough family to deal with at home.
