I don't have hard numbers, but anecdotally, I know two people for whom this is simply not true at all. It took them months to find jobs, and they sincerely wanted to know why they were being rejected. If you are told "we didn't hire you, because you don't have skill X", or "you don't have any experience with Y", then you can focus on getting better at that thing. It was extremely frustrating for them to be told "We found a better candidate", or more commonly, getting no response at all.
The problem is, often, there isn't a skill or experience that is the reason. I literally just went through this.
I interviewed for a position that I am way qualified for. I check every box, in terms of skills and abilities and experience. I'm essentially doing the job right now, just with a different title.
And I was passed over for a less qualified, less experienced candidate. The reason I was given, as I dove through the organization (it's where I work now) to ask for feedback to improve myself professionally, was that there wasn't really anything I can get better at, it was just 'fit'.
I was able to ask probing questions to get to the root of that, and it turns out that, outside of the folks I work with daily, people outside of my division don't necessarily know my leadership abilities. But tell me, how would you even go about quantifying that for an external candidate, other than saying the, very safe, 'we found a better candidate'?
