[alkonaut]

Out of curiosity, how exactly did the referrals work? When you say "attached" do you mean literally attached? Or just that someone internal had emailed and said "heads up, this guy Bob Bobson, a former colleague of mine, is going to apply for the position and I think you should pay extra attention to his resume because he's da bomb"?

[nixgeek]

Many companies have ways for employees to refer new people into the recruiting process. It’s usually as easy as entering a name and email. Then when you apply Recruiting will see it comes with a referral from one or more existing employees.

Some companies will also give employees who refer someone that then is hired a bonus - have seen this be $1500 to perhaps $5000 in U.S. places.

Referral processes may ask whether you know the person in some non-professional capacity, or whether you have direct professional working experience with the person. There’s usually more weight assigned to the latter case.

Applicants who have multiple referrals really stand out; applicants who have referrals from people in my team (versus the wider >100k person company) are also extra interesting.

[bluGill]

That very much depends. Different companies work very differently. The important part is the hiring manager believes the person who referred you thinks you are good.

The best way to use your network in all cases above though is reach out to everyone. You never know who in your network has the right connections to help - but they do know. I know of cases where all the hiring managers (4 different managers) ask one person who to hire, if you already had reached out to that one person he will give them a resume and you are hired (note that no jobs were ever advertised, it was either this one person said who to hire or it went to an external 6 months contract to hire company). In small companies everyone talks to everyone, so just reach out to them. In very large companies you need to know someone who knows the hiring manager.

In all cases your contact will know better than you what to do. So ask them.