I agree with you. But the "question" of the parent post was "I have no idea why this doesn't happen more often, it's not difficult to do in any reasonably sized

I agree with you. But the "question" of the parent post was "I have no idea why this doesn't happen more often, it's not difficult to do in any reasonably sized company", and I was just trying to give a possible answer. While it's really not a good indicator, there'll eventually be some correlation. Bottom line is: I'd totally understand a manager not accepting a guy that failed elsewhere in the same company; he would possibly be wrong in doing so, but - really - what would you do? I'd eventually try to interview the guy but, in the end, if I got two "final" candidates and one of them already failed in the company, I'd go for the other.