At smaller places the HR mystery machine is one or two people with names and faces. If they're not passing resumes down to the tech teams then there is some pro

At smaller places the HR mystery machine is one or two people with names and faces. If they're not passing resumes down to the tech teams then there is some problem that should be sorted out. The dynamic would have to be pretty broken for me to help some random stranger bypass the system everyone in the company has agreed to use. Plus, accepting back channel applicants could mess up relationships with external recruiters, or DEI hiring initiatives. Also the teams in smaller places are not anything spectacular, just backend, frontend, data, whatever, with a lot of overlap, so the idea that someone would be aiming for a particular team, meaning whoever is working on that part of the stack this month, is also strange. What you're saying makes sense with big, complex companies with huge HR processes and teams of varying levels of prestige and expertise. Probably a good idea if you're aiming particularly for a team at Google that works on a particular thing you like.