Is this actually sketchy though? As everyone knows, hiring is difficult. It is time-expensive and the outcome of a bad hire can be catastrophic. So here we have

Is this actually sketchy though? As everyone knows, hiring is difficult. It is time-expensive and the outcome of a bad hire can be catastrophic. So here we have a recruiter who is making it his business to make your life easier by making the process less time expensive and less risky, and we brand this sketchy? In forming a good relationship between their hiring partner and interviewees - they know who is likely to be a "fit" and who will not be. This is no different to HR screening CVs based on fit, the only difference is that recruiters of take a personal vested interest in the success. Every hire nets them commission. Every good hire strengthens their network, every bad hire weakens their network. If they are truly a network-based recruiter, they want every hire to be amazing. Yes, there will be weaknesses in this system. Yes, it leads a reduced hiring pool (if you opt-in to this style of hiring) and black-box hiring. The upshot is that as an interviewer and interviewee you save yourself time and find yourself a job that makes you happy, you only need find yourself the right recruiter.