> Any "fix" to the interview process has to accommodate the reality that the left half of the applicant pool distribution is of terribly low levels of ability.
I would like to see some distinction between people who apply cold, and people who have been reached out to by a company.
I'm an experienced, employed engineer, and if a company reaches out to me, I expect to not be treated in an interview like "gotta see if you are a faker! You could be coasting for 15 years! We get soooo many applicants."
That's the (in-house) recruiter's job, or hiring manager's. Don't waste my damn time like this.
I think there are three categories rather than just two. Cold application, reached out to by a recruiter, or referred by a former colleague. Seeing how internal recruiting or "sourcing" works, I don't see it as being vastly different from a cold application. Someone dredged up your profile on LinkedIn and reached out to you based on a keyword search (in all likelihood). Once you responded, they passed you off to the recruiting pipeline. There's not much more signal in you having a keyword on LinkedIn as having a keyword on your resume.
Only the third, a referral from an actual ex-colleague, would I skip any of the basic vetting steps. (Said differently, I agree "that's the (in-house) recruiter's job, or hiring manager's"; this is them doing it...)
100% agreed! That's why I specified "from an actual ex-colleague" rather than "from someone they once got a LinkedIn request from but knows nothing about and couldn't pick out of a police lineup".
I would like to see some distinction between people who apply cold, and people who have been reached out to by a company.
I'm an experienced, employed engineer, and if a company reaches out to me, I expect to not be treated in an interview like "gotta see if you are a faker! You could be coasting for 15 years! We get soooo many applicants."
That's the (in-house) recruiter's job, or hiring manager's. Don't waste my damn time like this.