[Spooky23]

You needn’t be ham handed and stupid about it, just use meaningful internal controls.

Not just for this issue. If everyone hires friends and family, people from the hometown, place of worship, etc you run into other conflicts of interest. It’s always good to have disinterested parties involved in the hiring process.

[icelancer]

On the basis of race, either documented or not, is asking to eat a massive civil lawsuit and get canceled in the media for doing so.

[Spooky23]

That’s why I said to not be ham handed about it.

Make a policy with respect to nepotism and discrimination, include a representative from other organizational groups in the interview process and be attentive to following policy.

You also have to be aware of culture issues and manage them without being a jerk. If you hire managers with background/experience whose norms are not inline with your culture you need to manage that. A McKinsey alum, a former outsourcing manager, and a web agency manager are going to have different positive and negative biases.