# The Illegal Questions Nora Was Asked (and Why They're Dangerous)

- **Episode:** [161](https://agents.truthliesandwork.com/episodes/161.md) (2025-01-09)
- **Type:** interview
- **Tags:** illegal-questions, discrimination, hiring-bias
- **Time:** 16:01–21:08 (start 961s)
- **Listen:** [https://truthliesandwork.com/161?t=961](https://truthliesandwork.com/161?t=961)

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[16:01] Nora Burns: Um, I was asked an inordinate amount of times if I had kids. And what's interesting, and again, I show up as I am, right? I did this research as a 40 and 50-year-old woman. And so part of that is some of the bias that goes in there. I've asked men my age, nobody's been asked. I've asked it in the middle of a keynote where the room is filled with men and say, who here has been asked during a job interview if they have kids? The only people who will raise their hand are women. It is sometimes asked as a, I'm just trying to make you feel comfortable. I'm trying to, you know, break the ice. Hey, you know, I'm trying to get to know you kind of a thing. It doesn't mean that it's any less dangerous to ask because it's a— here in the United States, we've got protection on family status. And there's a huge discriminatory and biased effect because women are being asked the question and men aren't. And really what some of these organizations are asking is, how many sick days are you going to take? How, you know, how many soccer games do we need to schedule around and those types of things? So I was really surprised that in today's day and age, people are still inquiring as to if I have kids. And again, sometimes completely innocent. They're trying to find some commonality to talk about. It's still dangerous and still not appropriate
[17:42] Al Elliott: We actually have a lot in common. We both use behavioral science to help people do better at work
[18:45] Nora Burns: It can
[18:52] Leanne Elliott: But come back
[18:53] Al Elliott: Yeah, come back. Definitely come back because Nudge isn't as good as this, so come back. I'll cut that out. Keep that in
[18:59] Leanne Elliott: I mean, playing devil's avocado that we like to do on the podcast, if I'm a business owner, I have— I own my own business, it's pretty small, I have a team less than 20, I don't think I can afford to hire somebody that's going to go on maternity leave for the next 12 months. Do I not have the right to assess that risk as a business owner?
[19:20] Nora Burns: No. The short answer is no. The other thing is, um, it is— we have, we have protections here in the United States. There's protections about that. There's legal protections having to do with, with that and asking about pregnancy and if you plan to have kids. Those are all things you make a decision about that, um, on your hiring process that you can get sued for and find yourself in front of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission about. And more importantly, it sends a message to the employer, to the employee that you don't care about their whole selves, right? Like in terms of if we want to make sure that you can give your full life to us 24/7, 365, that's not what the workplace is willing to do anymore. And so, it goes into that kind of cultural element as well. And the thing is, you have no idea if I'm going to have kids or not. If I'm, if I'm in my 30s as a woman, I decided not to have kids by that time. But I'm not going to mention that because it's not relevant to the job. And you might have a guy who's going to have 7 kids. And he wants to spend an inordinate amount of time with his kids. And he doesn't want to work even full time. So there's nothing that, that you can really make based on our gender because those, those norms are shifting. Um, but yeah, it doesn't, it's really none of your business. What matters is the fact that I can do the job, that I have the skills and abilities to do the job, and that I am presenting myself as a person who will continue to do the job
[21:00] Leanne Elliott: It must have been such an interesting time going on, on those interviews, but you've also done The Undercover Employee. Tell us about that