No, most employers don’t want people who do that. They want someone who will do as he is told, and not go making up his own rules.
At my company all resumes have to go through HR. So if you want to do a hire and get a resume direct, its a LOT harder to hire that person than if the resume came through them first - because you have to get HR to go back and process your candidate outside of their normal process. Unless you are recruiting the person in yourself, it isn’t worth the work.
Your best bet, even if you knew someone would be to get a resume to HR. Then to make sure that the hiring manager knew your name in such a fashion where they’d drop an email to the HR department saying “Make sure Frank Martin’s resume is sent to me.” You could do that by getting the hiring manager your resume, or you could have the contact you know in house drop a note to the hiring manager saying “Frank Martin is applying for your open position. I’ve worked with him before and think he would be an excellent fit” or whatever. But HR HAS to forward the resume to the hiring manager or their process got broken.
Which is what I did. I applied for the job through the normal channel and then sent a note to my contact inside the company. That earned a response from the HR person to the effect that if I was so damned good I could apply through the regular process like everyone else (which I took care to point out I had already done.)
Nope, never heard from them. And so ended another desperately clung-to belief about job-hunting.
Although this issue wouldn’t happen to me since my team recruits from within, an applicant like that would start out with a very big strike against them, if they were even hired. The nature of our work is very detail-oriented and almost always on a tight deadline. I need people who can quickly and precisely follow instructions and alert me of any protocol discrepancies. I could not trust a person who ignored protocol and explicitly-stated instructions, especially in the name of self-advancement. This is not the kind of initiative we want to see.
Its doubtful that that is common, even if your company did it that way.:dubious: If so,all of the hundreds and thousands of Job Hunting books and outsourcing experts might have mentioned it. For example Lee Hecht Harrison.,
Next, if the CEO came by and brought a resume down saying “Hey, this guy was a classmate of mine, treat him right, OK?” and the HR drone torn up said resume in the face of the CEO saying “That’s against the rules, sir” he’d be fired on the spot. :dubious:
Anyway, that’s actually a example of why you do NOT want to “follow the rules” (of HR)- becuase HR is filled with mindless petty spiteful drone, who delight in making up weird and invisible rules to stop the dudes who actually produce stuff from getting a job. I have an example from on job board- one HR person claimed she always shit-canned any resume sent in on fancy paper, saying “It’s the content, not the paper”, whereas another HR expert claimed he shredded any resume that did NOT come in on good paper- as it “Showed they didn’t care enough”. Some toss resumes with Cover letters- some toss resume withOUT cover letters. So me say that “thinking outside the box, and sending the resume in by networking” shows intelligence and initiative, and some say… well, this thread.
Common or not, it’s a definite illustration of why you should research the company you are applying to. Among other things, determine if stepping outside the normal procedures for hiring will work for or against you.
I guess you blasted past the part where I said there was an established procedure for an employee to recommend someone for hire. IF the CEO - or even a lowly mail clerk - knew someone looking for a job that person was free to follow company procedure and recommend said person for a job. In fact, if the new hire stayed more than 90 days with satisfactory performance there was a cash bonus, so such recommendations were common.
If, however, you blindly faxed your resume or a job app to anywhere BUT HR… yes, it was shit-canned. I saw that happen, too. It was particularly sad when a “headhunter” started blind-faxing dozens of resumes to various departments other than HR because absolutely ALL of those people whose names appeared on those resumes were put on a list of people who would NOT be considered for open positions. They absolutely took the matter that seriously. So all those people, who probably paid that “headhunter” to help them get jobs, actually had their chances of being employed by the company smashed through no fault of their own.
Well, you do need to be careful about headhunters, too.
It wasn’t a “weird and invisible rule” - it was quite plainly stated in the company rules and policies. Also quite plainly stated on the company website when you inquired about jobs. This really wasn’t a secret.
I suspect it was prompted because at one point the senior management were receiving so many faxes from job-seekers that it was starting to disrupt normal business. The company culture is quite conservative, in an industry were procedures MUST be followed (particularly on government contracts), and if you couldn’t follow simple and plainly stated instructions how to apply for the job they didn’t want you.
Obviously, with some other companies going around the HR department can be beneficial. Just be sure you know what sort of company you’re dealing with before you take such action.
So basically you don’t want a good candidate for the job, you want someone who will follow orders. Yep Hitler did real well with that 
I do share your opinion that HR departments are often troughs of waste. I remember one interview I had that soured after the HR woman present refused to believe that I like arid, hot climates. It was during the small talk banter after the main questions and answers were given. Anyway, she practically accused me of lying about my preference for hot weather - it was comical. She was British, I am Australian. I think I know what I was talking about.
But in this situation we are just a medium sized law firm. I think the rules are different. I wrote the job ad, I put my name to it, with a link to my profile. That he tried to bypass me speaks badly of him, in my opinion. It makes me think he thinks I’m some muppet. I may or not be. But I’m the muppet who will shitcan his chances at this job the minute I sense any attitude from him.
I want both. Call me greedy. 
It’s networking only if you have a pre-existing personal relationship with somebody else at the company. If you’re just looking for fancy title on the company’s web site, it’s called spam.
Or business, or social. But yes, you must have at least a second level relationship, as I said.
In my company, currently, that CV would be circular filed. That’s because so many people are trying to use social networks to get their CV in, people were getting disrupted in their real work by 50% of their mail being CVs. Too much work was not being done. My boss said upper management said production rose 2% two months after the can the CVs went into effect.
We are rifing people, so all jobs that we’re hiring for are very serious. If you can’t follow directions you won’t fit this culture - we don’t want to waste our time with someone who can’t fit in here. If you want to do things differently go to another company that welcomes non-conformists. Any job we have, that is being externally advertised, will need someone who can follow orders. Our corporate culture is very much too many cooks spoil the broth.
Since “following orders” was vital to getting the job done and retaining contracts, it is arguable that being able to follow orders was a vital trait for being considered a good candidate.
Hey, I don’t even work for the bastards anymore. I’m not defending them, just stating that that was the way it worked. Trying to go around the established procedure wouldn’t work at that particular company.