I’m nearing the end of a successful career and I frequently get asked for help in starting out by young people I don’t know. If they went to state school, I try to help by approaching my contacts, but not if they went to a public school. My profession is far more diverse than it was when I was young, but I know it’s not as diverse as it should be. I like to feel I’m doing my (small) bit to improve matters – but not at the expense of my friends’ children (although, just to avoid giving the wrong impression, the great majority of my friends, like me, sent their children to state schools). My reason for helping young adults starting out is wholly selfish. It makes me feel better. My success has involved a lot of luck (as well, I hope, as some talent); helping others helps me to suppress the occasional twinge of guilt. I feel some conflict, however, when the more privileged of my friends approach for help. I tend to bend the rules for public-school educated children of friends because I prefer to maintain my social network. I have had requests for everything from introductions to internships. The only times I get cross are when I am clearly one of a number of people to have been asked to give help – such as when someone misspells my name, or writes what is plainly a pro-forma email which shows no attempt to explain specifically why they are contacting me. I don’t bother to reply to those. I haven’t yet regretted a decision to help anyone; I neither seek credit nor accept blame for what the person I help does once they go through the door. Sometimes I can’t tell whether I am being sensibly egalitarian or indefensibly rigid and tokenistic. What do you think?
So you’ve made it to the top and people are asking you to send the elevator back down. Don’t be so hard on yourself for having a heart. Some professions are a middle-class racket for a reason: social influence is a powerful tool, so it’s no wonder that you feel compromised when privileged friends pressure you. The fact that these levers can be pressed is the reason structural inequalities exist; not because of your individual actions. But don’t let that be a free pass. You are doing some important work to level the playing field, and rightly diagnose that every time you help a pushy friend you are undoing your attempts to help those who do not have such contacts.
Everyone has to start somewhere, but starting at a friend’s firm with no experience is a priceless opportunity not open to many. With opportunities like that, I would make your excuses where you can. Sometimes having a blanket policy can help – could you say you are happy to offer advice, but not introductions?
Going to a state school is no guarantee against privilege: many students with family connections or bags of money for tuition send their kids to state schools for the very reason that they know it will make them look less well-off. But I understand that you need some easy measure with which to differentiate. Instead of making these calls yourself, perhaps it would be easier to use your power and influence to take aim at structural loopholes rather than making decisions about individuals.
Could you pressure high-up friends to ban unpaid internships or to ignore work experience secured through family friends or relatives? Or could you volunteer for a programme trying to deal with the short-term, immediate effects borne out of inequality? A good example is Presspad, which provides a free room for young people trying to secure a job in journalism without contacts in London or wads of cash to move there for an internship. Hopefully there are industry equivalents.
You note that your own lot in life is not merely down to hard work. That alone is important: a pervasive belief that all success is self-earned is harmful to people without privilege and connections. Although you call your motivations selfish, it would be easier not to help or ask questions of yourself at all. But don’t let it be a back-patting exercise: you have seen how this racket works and fortunately, you have the power to change things.
• What do you think? Or have you got a question for Poppy and readers to consider? Post your responses below or email them to in.it.together@guardian.co.uk
• Submissions are subject to our terms and conditions: see http://gu.com/letters-terms
