4 ms·

It's even more fun in public institutions, e.g. universities, where a higher amount of perfunctory humouring of external candidates is required in order to crea

It's even more fun in public institutions, e.g. universities, where a higher amount of perfunctory humouring of external candidates is required in order to create a somewhat more convincing appearance of an equitable search.

vkou 5y ago
It's the natural consequence of a world where performance is difficult to measure, people are largely fungible, and next to nothing that you personally do will move the needle in whether your employer will be successful. In that situation, why wouldn't you hire and promote your friends? All of the incentives are aligned for doing just that.
- thinkharderdev 5y ago
  How much of it is "hiring friends" vs just hiring someone you have better information about? A lot of people interview exceptionally well but it's always something of a crapshoot how well they will do in the actual job. But for an internal candidate you should have a lot better information on how well they performed in other roles. You can have actual frank conversations with their managers/coworkers instead of getting BS references from people the candidate themselves chose for you to talk to.
  - phkahler 5y ago
    Yeah, there are a few jobs I could recommend a specific person for because I know they are very good due to past experience. When opening come along though, they are usually not looking to change. But if they were... some would say I just recommended a friend, which happens to also be true.
  - ResearchCode 5y ago
    And full-on nepotism is known to be bad. My bet is that blind recruits would perform just as well or better as the family and friends of the recruiting manager would if you'd run the experiment.
    - thinkharderdev 5y ago
      That may well be true, but I would not necessarily equate "hiring internal candidates" with "hiring family and friends".
- s1artibartfast 5y ago
  I think this is an overly cynical take. Reputation and VERIFIABLE track record are what is being selected for here. If a hiring manager views this as known for a candidate, there is basically nothing someone else can do to complete. The hiring process simply isn't sufficient to do this fact finding. In my org, managers aren't really friends, but they do have trust. A strong recommendation is impossible to overturn.
  - fortuna86 5y ago
    It's the same reason why friends set up friends for dates. If you go "public" with apps, you can be setup with literally anyone. It often doesn't go well.
  - AmericanChopper 5y ago
    Trust is really the main motivation in a lot of these situations. Imo, the value of “networking” in business is building trusting relationships with other people. I’ve gotten jobs by referrals from others, and helped other people get jobs via referrals. In those situations the referred candidate had an enormous advantage over the candidate off the street, but it’s not a system of buddies looking out for each other. It’s a system of people who’ve spent time establishing trust with each other.
- yobbo 5y ago
  > why wouldn't you hire and promote your friends? Furthermore, do you want your colleagues to be motivated by loyalty or by competition?
  - BeFlatXIII 5y ago
    Loyalty, obviously. Competition means focusing on competing with other employees and not focusing on the company's goals.
    - spfzero 5y ago
      Loyalty means hiding miss-steps, cronyism, and incentive to make your boss look good no matter what. That is orthogonal to the company's goals.
      - BeFlatXIII 5y ago
        Competition means hiding miss-steps, sandbagging your co-workers, and optimizing for looking good. These are also orthogonal to the company's goals.
908B64B197 5y ago
What's funny is when it backfires. ie, there's an alumni who now works at a top 5 lab in the field and is now looking for an opportunity to move back to his hometown (for whatever reasons). Job description was obviously written with someone within the institution in mind, but then this person shows up.
- actually_a_dog 5y ago
  I wish I remembered where I read this so I didn't have to post it unsourced and lacking so many details, but I heard about something exactly like this happening: some government agency conducted a search with a tailor-made job description, intending to hire an internal candidate. Along comes an external candidate who also happens to tick all the boxes, but also has slightly more experience with one of the skills. Since they were required by law to hire the "most qualified" applicant, this presented a problem. So, what did they do? Close the search without hiring anyone, then open a new search with the same job description, adding another skill that only the internal applicant has (I think it was fluency in Italian). The moral of the story, if there is one, is to never underestimate the ability of people to get a desired result by exploiting the system in an unforeseen way (i.e. hacking). :)
  - jhart99 5y ago
    I have been that external candidate. I saw a random job on USAjobs a few years ago that really seemed to fit all of my experience so I figured I would apply for the heck of it. Within a few hours the listing was withdrawn. Weird. Then the same thing popped up again and again over the next couple of weeks and I would apply and it was immediately withdrawn again. Good to know what was really going with that now.
grepfru_it 5y ago
I experienced this when a job req was opened specifically for me. It was odd having to interview knowing good and well I was getting the job. I used the time to talk with the professors like a real interview and then used the last 15 minutes to ask for advice for how I could interview differently in the real world.
PaulHoule 5y ago
Sometimes that ‘favored’ person has done a lot of work to create the opportunity that they are going to fill. (For instance that person might have done a lot of work to get a grant, or convince higher ups to make money available.)

vkou 5y ago

It's the natural consequence of a world where performance is difficult to measure, people are largely fungible, and next to nothing that you personally do will move the needle in whether your employer will be successful. In that situation, why wouldn't you hire and promote your friends? All of the incentives are aligned for doing just that.

thinkharderdev 5y ago
How much of it is "hiring friends" vs just hiring someone you have better information about? A lot of people interview exceptionally well but it's always something of a crapshoot how well they will do in the actual job. But for an internal candidate you should have a lot better information on how well they performed in other roles. You can have actual frank conversations with their managers/coworkers instead of getting BS references from people the candidate themselves chose for you to talk to.
- phkahler 5y ago
  Yeah, there are a few jobs I could recommend a specific person for because I know they are very good due to past experience. When opening come along though, they are usually not looking to change. But if they were... some would say I just recommended a friend, which happens to also be true.
- ResearchCode 5y ago
  And full-on nepotism is known to be bad. My bet is that blind recruits would perform just as well or better as the family and friends of the recruiting manager would if you'd run the experiment.
  - thinkharderdev 5y ago
    That may well be true, but I would not necessarily equate "hiring internal candidates" with "hiring family and friends".
s1artibartfast 5y ago
I think this is an overly cynical take. Reputation and VERIFIABLE track record are what is being selected for here. If a hiring manager views this as known for a candidate, there is basically nothing someone else can do to complete. The hiring process simply isn't sufficient to do this fact finding. In my org, managers aren't really friends, but they do have trust. A strong recommendation is impossible to overturn.
- fortuna86 5y ago
  It's the same reason why friends set up friends for dates. If you go "public" with apps, you can be setup with literally anyone. It often doesn't go well.
- AmericanChopper 5y ago
  Trust is really the main motivation in a lot of these situations. Imo, the value of “networking” in business is building trusting relationships with other people. I’ve gotten jobs by referrals from others, and helped other people get jobs via referrals. In those situations the referred candidate had an enormous advantage over the candidate off the street, but it’s not a system of buddies looking out for each other. It’s a system of people who’ve spent time establishing trust with each other.
yobbo 5y ago
> why wouldn't you hire and promote your friends? Furthermore, do you want your colleagues to be motivated by loyalty or by competition?
- BeFlatXIII 5y ago
  Loyalty, obviously. Competition means focusing on competing with other employees and not focusing on the company's goals.
  - spfzero 5y ago
    Loyalty means hiding miss-steps, cronyism, and incentive to make your boss look good no matter what. That is orthogonal to the company's goals.
    - BeFlatXIII 5y ago
      Competition means hiding miss-steps, sandbagging your co-workers, and optimizing for looking good. These are also orthogonal to the company's goals.

908B64B197 5y ago

What's funny is when it backfires. ie, there's an alumni who now works at a top 5 lab in the field and is now looking for an opportunity to move back to his hometown (for whatever reasons). Job description was obviously written with someone within the institution in mind, but then this person shows up.

actually_a_dog 5y ago
I wish I remembered where I read this so I didn't have to post it unsourced and lacking so many details, but I heard about something exactly like this happening: some government agency conducted a search with a tailor-made job description, intending to hire an internal candidate. Along comes an external candidate who also happens to tick all the boxes, but also has slightly more experience with one of the skills. Since they were required by law to hire the "most qualified" applicant, this presented a problem. So, what did they do? Close the search without hiring anyone, then open a new search with the same job description, adding another skill that only the internal applicant has (I think it was fluency in Italian). The moral of the story, if there is one, is to never underestimate the ability of people to get a desired result by exploiting the system in an unforeseen way (i.e. hacking). :)
- jhart99 5y ago
  I have been that external candidate. I saw a random job on USAjobs a few years ago that really seemed to fit all of my experience so I figured I would apply for the heck of it. Within a few hours the listing was withdrawn. Weird. Then the same thing popped up again and again over the next couple of weeks and I would apply and it was immediately withdrawn again. Good to know what was really going with that now.

grepfru_it 5y ago

I experienced this when a job req was opened specifically for me. It was odd having to interview knowing good and well I was getting the job. I used the time to talk with the professors like a real interview and then used the last 15 minutes to ask for advice for how I could interview differently in the real world.

PaulHoule 5y ago

Sometimes that ‘favored’ person has done a lot of work to create the opportunity that they are going to fill. (For instance that person might have done a lot of work to get a grant, or convince higher ups to make money available.)