AI is changing how work gets done, but many companies are still hiring against yesterday’s definition of a qualified employee.

Hiring in a service business has a way of challenging what you think you know about talent. Over the years, I’ve seen candidates who looked nearly perfect on paper struggle once the job became unpredictable. I’ve also watched people without the obvious résumé rise quickly because they could learn, communicate and make good decisions when nobody was standing beside them telling them what to do.

Experience matters, particularly in positions that require specialized knowledge. The mistake is assuming experience automatically predicts future performance, especially as technology changes what many jobs require. It can show that someone understands the fundamentals, but it cannot reveal how that person will respond when familiar tools, expectations or customer needs shift.

That makes an old hiring question increasingly less useful: Has this person already done this exact job? A better question may be: Can this person succeed in the job this is becoming?

Employers have good reason to be frustrated with the labor market. The National Federation of Independent Business reported in September that 45% of small-business owners trying to hire had few or no qualified applicants. 26% identified labor quality or availability as their single most important business problem, more than twice the historical average.

Many industries clearly face a talent shortage. Some businesses may be worsening the shortage by defining “qualified” too narrowly. A job description built around five years of experience performing a specific set of tasks assumes those tasks will remain relatively unchanged.

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