It's not clear that hiring people you know directly into your team is even a good idea. I liked the Google interview system, and since leaving I have only seen worse ones.
You like the possibility of someone being placed onto your team without anyone who is part of that team having interviewed them? Maybe that does happen at some point, I forget. Long time.
If it doesn't.. I think I would absolutely hate that.
I don't interview people I know personally or refer or know from projects but I absolutely want 2-3 from my team to be speak to them and us do the technical tests.
But I'm an SRE and not a SWE and there are a lot fewer operation/platform people compared to the 6-10 dev teams of 6-12 people doing various languages one sre team supports so there are usually plenty of SWE specific people to bring on committees. My team is 6 who support 80 SWEs so there are just a lot fewer proficient IAC writers on staff.
Yes, I do prefer choosing new team members from among people who got hired into level by a team-neutral process, because I have seen too many instances of a hiring manager throwing out all the standards to hire a person they want into a particular role, which can be detrimental to companies because hiring people who don't really meet your standards is one of the worst things you can do as a company.
