It's pretty normal in IT, and I've heard of people in other industries getting these outreaches, but not sure how common it is in general. This guy's been hitting me up for weeks, wanting a phone call. I kept deleting figuring it was a scam, as I receive several a day. Then he started putting dollar amounts in the subject. Started at $100/hr. This morning it was $800/hr. So I went through the guy's company to contact him and verify it's real. Some quick research indicates they desperately want to talk to me specifically to get intel on my former cloud employer. Will want something in writing regarding compensation, but apparently it's a known company with a positive track record of actually paying what they say.