Since we're all "That Idiot" to somebody anyways, might as well not worry about it. Leaves the HR firewall. You undermine that by having somebody on the inside

Since we're all "That Idiot" to somebody anyways, might as well not worry about it. Leaves the HR firewall. You undermine that by having somebody on the inside refer you. Or by having a work history that gets you in the door (which, of course, has a bootstrap problem). Or by working on OSS in that field. In other words: Anything that makes you stand out positively from all the other average programmers.