This guy must be a really good hire if the higher-ups at his company are willing to go to this length to keep him. 

One of the most stressful parts of finding a new job is trying to keep your current workplace from finding out you’re looking. It’s not always easy to do that, especially if you’re dressing up nicely for a day when you’re supposed to be going to a «doctor’s appointment» in the middle of the workday. It can also be difficult when you’re working in a niche industry where everybody knows everybody. If you apply to your company’s sister company, or a company with several former employees of your current company, there’s a nonzero chance that people at the company you’re applying to are going to snitch to your current employer that you’re looking for a new job. Why would they do such a thing? Because they want to maintain a relationship with their previous employer, and what better way to do that than to throw someone under the bus for trying to seek an opportunity as they did! 

The manager in this story was shocked to discover that a young, promising employee who was referred to work at their company was rejected because his employer did not want to poach an employee from a competitor, which is just ridiculous.