I've dealt with many companies large and small (retained recruitment, tech) that have admitted early on to flaws in their hiring process. Typically, I find it's

I've dealt with many companies large and small (retained recruitment, tech) that have admitted early on to flaws in their hiring process. Typically, I find it's someone in engineering all the way up to the CTO that admits the process is broken, and they generally want to circumvent internal HR processes to get the candidate to their potential boss and co-workers as efficiently as possible. HR typically wants to control as much of the process as possible, which often means an HR screening first. This tends to turn off engineers considerably, as it's deemed a waste of time, so the first step in the process is perceived negatively and that negative first impression is hard to overcome. The clients I've represented that have the smoothest process are those that use HR to facilitate and provide answers to questions, but to try and limit involvement beyond that.