[misterbowfinger]

I want to say this again: a technical recruiter should not define hiring policy or hiring process. Their value is in their relatively low cost per candidate.

I look at this a little differently. OP seems to treat Engineering as a totally independent organization within a company. In bigger companies, I understand. But I don't think it makes as much sense in a smaller company, where, often, the tight-knit culture is what's keeping the ship afloat.

Engineering is one piece of the pie. The success of the company is everyone's success. Consequently, the team's hiring process can and should be influenced by people outside of Engineering, to some extent. One has to take the comapany's culture in account.

[ramblinjan]

You've got me looking back at what I've written, because I actually agree with you on company culture (if the company's culture is a positive force). My point about technical recruiters is because they're very often totally separated from the engineering culture. Oddly enough, I'm speaking about smaller companies more so than bigger ones because a large company is less likely to give their engineering teams enough autonomy to really do anything with what I've written.

The main thing I wanted to get at here is that a hiring process can not be thought of as separate from your engineering process. I'm not trying to argue that hiring should be insulated from reality. I'm arguing that there are a lot of companies who are ignoring the fact that it isn't.