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Comment by laichzeit0 | Hacker News Reader

Don't people get job offers anymore from someone they used to know that moved to another company and then like "hey I know this really great guy who works at XYZ, we should definitely get him here"? That is literally how every job I've moved to happened, except for the very first one right after being a student. That's the only job I ever remember having to "interview" for. The rest were just through established social connections by working in the tech industry. Surely if you have skills and work hard and other people know about this, they would be knocking at your door?

It's just weird to me that people go job hunting by "cold-calling" some random job advertisement where they don't know the company or anyone that works there. If I were hiring people, I'd go for people I personally have worked with, or been recommended by someone that I work with, waaaaay before hiring some random person that showed up at an interview.

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You're way ahead of the game, OP. We talk a big talk in our industry about hackers and meritocracy, but this is still a relationships business -- like every other business. At most companies if you're cold-applying to a position on a job board, you're already behind your competition.

I'd like to propose an alternative job hunt:

(1) Start thinking about your next move before you need a job.

(2) Send an email or DM to someone at a company you like, ask to buy them coffee/beer, and make it clear you don't want anything from them. Ask them questions -- or even better try to do them a favor... promote a side project, make a connection, etc.

(3) When you're ready to make a move, reach out again to all the people you've met and ask if they're hiring. Most people are happy to forward a resume -- especially because so many companies now offer referral bonuses. It's a win-win.

(4) KEEP MAINTAINING THESE CONNECTIONS EVEN AFTER YOU GET THE JOB!

sounds great except now that person forwarded the resume, and you still have to do the exact rounds that you would have done when cold calling unless you're applying to a small shop

But HR will come to the referrer when that candidate bombs their homework and the referrer, if they can vouch for you, gets a chance to defend your honor. "Oh, that makes sense. Joan was terrible at that kind of thing but she built this amazing thing that did this and that and that…"

you can usually skip a round or 2, and also get a bit of leniency

Not all of my friends work for places I want to work, and any reasonably sized company is going to throw you through the ringer anyway in the name of "consistency."

Sure, I'd guess the majority of engineering roles above junior are through networking of some sort. "Surely if you have skills"... well, what % of programmers out there fit this description? It's even weirder to think that every software developer has enough skills to have people knocking at their door.

In my situation I moved to a new city for family reasons with zero connections. I had a stable job working remote but put some feelers out and found a better job in my city by randomly applying.

It's actually weird you find it weird.

Any time I've heard of people I knew getting referred by old coworkers they still had to go through the complete interview process. Are you getting jobs through word of mouth alone with no technical interview?

I haven't heard of that happening too much, at least in the Bay Area.

If the place is large enough, your friends have to go through the standardized interview process too unless they are famous enough already to be some sort of tech celebrity or have a rare and special skill.

Even the tech celebrities have to go through the process half the time too. You will get a referral bonus although if your friends pass the process although.

This is mostly done to prevent cliques who let in bad performers.

I've gotten all my jobs that way since 1999. Based on the current trends of tech hiring, I would never bother with a company that does what's mentioned in this article.

Question 1: What's the interview process look like?

Anything other than 1 hour phone / in person interview would get rejected.

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