On: Lessons from a year’s worth of hiring data (2013)

[matheweis]

This seems pretty reasonable; "having worked at a top company matters" could speak more to the hiring practices of "top company" than to anything else.

A candidate who worked at a "top company" was (probably) already prefiltered by "top company"'s hiring practices.

[mathattack → matheweis]

The same is true from name brand schools. They filter for good test scores and other things.