[PakG1]

The implication seems to be that gp has never interviewed and hired people who "had this sort of independent and outside-the-box thinking".

[nine_k]

If the implication is true, that would be a data point.

If the implication is false, it would be an exciting data point!

HN being what it is, here is quite a non-zero chance to meet a person with real hiring power who really could have made an offer to the person in question.

[StavrosK]

The GP's sentence was in the conditional perfect (would have), which means he never met someone like that (otherwise he would have said "did").