> good referrals are really the only way to definitely get the job Yeah, no. They're one factor in many. I've managed just fine throughout almost 4 decades of

> good referrals are really the only way to definitely get the job Yeah, no. They're one factor in many. I've managed just fine throughout almost 4 decades of career without referrals. I'm fairly OK with how that career turned out. It has drawbacks. Some of my jobs were odd kinks in the career curve - though I did enjoy them. (Roughly, ESA -> Industrial Automation -> Consulting -> Startup -> Video Games -> FAANG. It is not the straightest path :) Referrals are definitely a large plus (IIRC, the industry stats say about 1/3rd of job offers are internal referrals, even though they are far from 1/3 of the candidates). They aren't the only way, though.