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Comment by irrational | Hacker News Reader

I’ve sat on interview boards at a Fortune 100 company for at least 100 positions. We’ve never hired anyone based on their network. To the best of my knowledge, we’ve never even interviewed anyone that knew anybody at the company. Maybe the positions we were filling were unique.

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Never? That’s interesting. I don’t know the hiring percentages but I would say at least 30% of the interview loops I’ve been on at a FAANG have been with someone who was referred in from a person on my team or who had another connection in. I haven’t done 100 interviews (maybe lifetime total I have, but not in tech), but it’s a solid 40 or 50. Again, the person who gets the job isn’t always someone who has a connection to the team — I would say except in rare circumstances, their chances are no better than anyone else’s — but there are usually at least two people per loop who were referred in through their network.

Even in my own experience, I’ve had only one job as an adult that I didn’t have some sort of connection at or where my network wasn’t part of why I was recruited (so even if I didn’t know people hiring me personally, they knew of me). Now, my career has largely been in roles where I’m publicly visible (and that visibility is part of the job), so I won’t try to attach that to anyone else — but even for a non-public facing role, I would still leverage my network first and foremost I think.

I don’t think it’s so much that knowing someone guarantees you’ll get the job, but I do think it makes it much more likely you’ll get to the first or second stage of an interview.

In general, the big advantage of going in network is the much higher chance of passing interviews vs the random person off the street that hands you their resume. I've seen this done all the time in fortune 100 companies, but it only really works if you aren't hiring so much your network is depleted. Even when the interviewing team is not aware of the reference, there's just a higher success rate, as the worst candidates just don't get recommended.

Still, positions change. I've had to do full interview rounds after strong recommendations, and I've been hired by SMS in 10 minutes, salary negotiation included. One size doesn't it all.

I would speculate that roles which are filled through networking never get to the posting / interview stage. If that were the case it would make sense that being involved with interview boards would lead to seeing very few candidates getting a position through their network.

Oh, this is 100% true. Or if they do have a posting, it’ll be for legal reasons only but the person they are hiring has always been planned from the beginning.

You never had anyone at the company refer a friend or former coworker for a position there? That seems... unusual.

I think you'd use referrals to decide if someone should pass the first stage, as HR and resume review are a broad filter. Once you're at the interview panel, you vote based on how the interviews went. If you tell the interviewers that "this is so-and-so's friend" then you could get nepotism instead of an informed hire. I think it's possible that there were many referrals, but that information wasn't shared outside an initial screening because it was no longer helpful.

Huge red flag

Isn't there some filtering that happens before a person is even visible to your interview board? Maybe networking was involved there?

I can guarantee you right now I could send a few emails out and tell former coworkers who are now managers or former managers who have moved on that I’m looking for a job and someone would find a position for me or worse case hire me as a consultant.

I am no special snowflake but I keep my network strong.

It might not have been a direct hire because there was a connection in the company but I bet that most of the interviewees found out about the position because they had someone in their network tell them about it and gave them tips on how to get the job.

Maybe the positions were a bit junior? There are some big companies that hire a lot from school, and then are up and out. It's not necessarily bad, its just a particular thing.

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