If You Have A Home-Based Business Should You Hire Your Spouse?
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Hiring your spouse for your new home-based business has its good and bad points. Below are six things you should consider before taking that step. Read them before you decide if hiring your spouse will benefit, or sabotage you.
You Can Probably Pay Them Less And Hire Them Without The Formalities
You can hire your spouse without the formalities, and pay them less. This would save you time and money by not having to go through stacks of Resumes, phoning references and endless interviews. More than likely they would come on board with less pay, after all your spouse will also benefit from your home-based business.
You also don't ever have to wonder whether they lied about any of their qualifications. This is another stress you can stay away from.
Trusting That They Will Get The Job Done Is Easier
You know your spouse better than anyone, hopefully. This makes it easier for you to judge whether they will be able to get the job done. There is also the trust factor. You can safely assume they will not scam or take advantage of you.
You also know your spouse's stress levels, and schedule. You know how much time they have to designate to your home business and what they can or cannot handle.
You Can Avoid Red Tape Issues Of Having An “Employee”
You can avoid the officialism of having to hire an "employee." You don't have to adhere to any government formal standards, so there is not as much red tape to deal with. You can just hire your spouse and put them to work. This saves a lot of time and stress.
There are also some tax benefits like child-care expenses, social security benefits and travel expenses.
Family Is Harder To Fire
It is almost impossible to fire your spouse. Firing any employee is difficult enough, but with your spouse, you still have to see them every day. If they don't agree with the dismissal, your life will become adversarial.
If your spouse makes a mistake, it is also harder to reprimand them. You may find yourself in a position where you have to secretly problem-solve, which will take up your time so your productivity will suffer.
It's Difficult Putting Them In A Position They're Qualified For
The position you feel your spouse will thrive in, might be a totally different position than your spouse feels qualified for. You may want them to take care of client phone calls and emails, but they feel confident managing your books.
It Can Create Anger And Resentment Within Your Family
If your "work relationship" with your spouse isn't harmonious, it will flow into your home life guaranteed. Any of the above cons can negatively affect your personal relationship. The last thing you want to have to do is deal with the stresses of a new home business, and an unhappy home life.
Decision Making Time
Will your spouse, help or hinder your home business? You know what some of the benefits and risks are, so now you have to make the big decision.
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Great hub! The pictures are really wonderful and cute. It's really something for anyone to think about if they are going to hire their spouse. It might work out to hire your spouse.
Hi Business Time - Good point, thank you. That would be quite stressful. Good Luck with everything, I hope it all works out.
Hi gail641, thank you for stopping by and sharing your comments. I am glad you enjoyed the pictures, I do too.
interesting subject. Thank you for this information.
Your welcome mathair, and thanks for visiting :)
Your Welcome KoraleeP
All excellent points to ponder before making a decision. I worked with my husband for a year . . no way does it work for us. Voted up, marked useful and interesting.
Good hub. These are important things to keep in mind when hiring, not only your spouse, but any family member. I have done this and it just didn't work out. My daughter was just too creative, smart, and aggressive to stay in a subordinate position and I didn't have time one the job to sit down and talk things through with her. Our personal issues got all mixed up with business issues. It was disastrous.
Thank you very much pmccray, sorry to hear it didn't work out, but at least you found out, moved on and stayed married (I assume?).
Oh no alekhouse, sorry to hear it worked out that way. This made me think of working with my daughter,hmmm... I could imagine a similar outcome.
This is a big decision and like you said, it could turn out good and bad.
Tammy: I agree there is a 50/50 chance.
BusinessTime Level 4 Commenter 5 months ago
One other con to hiring your spouse (one my fiance and I are struggling with) is that if your business doesn't do as well as you might have hoped, having your spouse gainfully employed somewhere else that offers benefits, like health insurance, is an extremely valuable safety net to have.