Hiring for Potential vs. Experience: Which Matters More in Today’s Market?
The talent shortages across industries are prompting employers to reassess their traditional hiring criteria. Because candidates with the required experience can be difficult to source, hiring for potential is becoming common.
Focusing on a candidate’s soft skills, such as initiative and a willingness to learn, indicates their ability to succeed in a role. A candidate who fits the culture can be trained to develop relevant hard skills to provide organizational value.
Prioritizing potential over experience when hiring helps build an agile, loyal, and diverse workforce. These factors help future-proof the company.
The following are reasons to hire for potential rather than experience.
Experience Does Not Imply Future Success
A candidate’s performance in previous roles doesn’t predict their future performance. Hiring a person because they fulfilled specific responsibilities doesn’t equip them for what comes next.
For instance, many candidates hired today have jobs that didn’t exist in 2000. Due to the increasing use of AI, most skills relevant to these jobs are expected to change by 2030. Therefore, candidates without experience must be hired because the experience doesn’t exist.
Importance of Hiring for Potential
Hiring for potential focuses on core capabilities like adaptability, communication, problem-solving, and learning. These factors are more important for success in a role than experience.
Focusing on potential might include hiring a candidate who’s starting their career, transitioning from another industry, or not following a traditional professional path. The person could adapt to the role, grow into more senior positions, and provide long-term value.
Benefits of Hiring for Potential
The benefits of hiring for potential rather than experience include:
- Expanding the candidate pool. Candidates with transferable skills can be taught the hard skills required for a role. Opening up the candidate pool is especially important in a tight labor market.
- Building a diverse workforce. Non-traditional candidates provide diverse ideas, experiences, and viewpoints. These factors strengthen team performance and innovation.
- Increasing employee engagement. Engaged employees work hard and perform well, encouraging others to follow their example.
- Enhancing workforce agility. High-potential candidates prioritize engagement, learning, and improvement. They quickly develop and apply new skills to stay adaptable while navigating change.
- Elevating employee attraction and retention. Employees who are invested in their work feel a sense of ownership and loyalty. They often provide referrals who remain long-term.
- Strengthening the company’s competitive edge. Hiring for potential builds the processes, assessments, and mindsets needed to attract the right candidates, quickly adapt, and scale for sustainable growth.
Advice on Hiring for Potential
These steps support hiring for potential:
- Clarify what matters in the role, including the core skills and traits that predict success.
- Rewrite the job description, focusing on skills rather than credentials.
- Use candidate assessments or simulations to evaluate aptitude.
- Explore adjacent industries and untapped markets for high-potential candidates.
- Train the hiring team to look for each candidate’s career trajectory and organizational fit.
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