In my experience, very high-performing teams are not rare outside of prestige employers, but the distribution is longer-tailed.
Employees at prestige employers don’t want to consider that they might not be the best, or might not have to put up with all the corporate bureaucracy, so they erect barriers.
For recruiters, recommending prestige resumes is just the equivalent of “nobody ever got fired for buying IBM”.
Nobody on tech teams is putting in 20 hour weeks and watercoolering to get by in those small teams at small companies. Everything they do counts.
Cue a random example: 2-people company bought for millions by Atlassian or 18-people company bought for billions by Facebook (Wasn’t Whatsapp 18 people?).
Employees at prestige employers don’t want to consider that they might not be the best, or might not have to put up with all the corporate bureaucracy, so they erect barriers.
For recruiters, recommending prestige resumes is just the equivalent of “nobody ever got fired for buying IBM”.
Nobody on tech teams is putting in 20 hour weeks and watercoolering to get by in those small teams at small companies. Everything they do counts.