My own anecdote - I work for an F50 (not in tech). An adjacent team was having a lot of difficulty hiring, since it was a relatively niche area with few people

My own anecdote - I work for an F50 (not in tech). An adjacent team was having a lot of difficulty hiring, since it was a relatively niche area with few people with relevant experience. I've done research in this area, and wanted to refer my grad school colleague who was a pretty good match for the role in skills and experience. Spoke to the hiring manager who seemed interested. When I spoke to my friend about this role and sent a referral link, turns out they already applied for a role like this before and was automatically rejected so couldn't apply again. So yeah, it's gonna continue being difficult to hire, because outside tech, I've noticed recruiting isn't taken seriously (comparitively) and just stops with putting up a job posting. You hardly get any relevant applicants once it goes through the automated and misc HR filters like "doesn't match keywords" "needs a visa transfer, I can't deal with the paperwork" etc. even though a hiring manager is ok with all that. Even otherwise, most of the time you aren't even sure if this is an actual job posting or some kind of compliance posting (the one where you're required to post for internal candidates or PERM regulations). So I don't even bother applying anymore unless a recruiter approaches me. There have been times I've been approached by company recruiters for roles I've applied to and been auto rejected before, long after I've taken up another job. There is this huge impedance mismatch between hiring managers and the job applicant at non-tech big companies with their large HR departments. Can't speak much about tech because I don't have experience. The best experience I've had so far was applying on indeed through my phone browser for a small company where the hiring manager directly called me up after seeing my application. Eventually took the job. Not sure why bigger companies think this approach doesn't scale.