“Qualified” isn’t a magic word here. Saying that someone is qualified doesn’t automatically get someone a job. What I’m interested in is the mental concept people have about the word, whether it’s more of a skills/abilities issue or more of a credentials issue. In other words, it’s a linguistic question, not a management questin.
Sorry, but the poll did not allow me to pick both formal qualification and skills/experience, and to me that’s what “Qualified” means. “Qualified” means that you have the specific requirements to be in a job, and that includes skills, education, certifications, and training. To my way of thinking it’s not a choice between two things. It’s all of it.
Even by that definition it is still both. Being qualified is the sum total of many qualities that include both skills and credentials. The weight given to credentials vs skills depends on the specific job. For some, the credential is key, I’ll teach you the skills. For others, formal credentialing is irrelevant, but you better have skills. For yet others its a different balance.
But what interests me is for those for whom it is not both. My Indian relatives, for example, consider “qualified” to mean “properly credentialed,” period. To them, skills and abilities constitute a separate factor to be considered, a necessary factor, yet discrete and separate from the “qualification” factor.
Ok, you asked in a general way, so I answered for my perspective, as it seems many people share. Maybe the better question is “Do you consider credentials alone enough to be qualified for a job?”, but the answer will probably still be complex.
This is my take as well.
You need both, the degree/license/ etc, AND the work experience.
Again, that’s not the question. The question is a linguistic one, about the meaning of the word “qualified.” I’m not asking what you “need” to get a job. I’m asking what makes you “qualified” for a job. That’s two separate questions.
I think people are answering the question. To be qualified (ie capable of being hired or dong the job), at times, both credentials and skills may be needed.
When I hear that someone is ‘qualified’, I think that they have the skills needed to do the job, regardless of the degrees and certifications they hold; for example, a Kreplachistani immigrant who was a neurosurgeon back in Kreplachistan but who is driving a bus here because their credentials didn’t transfer is still a qualified neurosurgeon assuming they’re competent at that work. They just have a paperwork problem, that’s all.
It depends on the job description. Sometimes all you need is “5 or more years’ experience in food service”. Sometimes “any bachelor’s degree in a STEM* field” is the sole requirement. However, if a hiring manager decides to only consider people who’ve been arrested for public urination, owned a Maserati, AND obtained an honorary doctorate from the University of Phoenix, then anyone who doesn’t go three-for-three in those regards is not qualified to fill that particular opening.
If I have to give an either/or answer, however, I’ll say ability is more important than documentation. My brother has a college degree, but no teaching certificate. Nevertheless, he has more knowledge, along with ability to impart it, than do many people who graduated from colleges of education.
- shorthand for “Science/Technology/Engineering/Mathematics”, an acronym commonly bandied about at Purdue University and like-minded institutions
Either or both, particularly if you considering that the paperwork needed is often not an engraved diploma or license, but just documentation that you have been doing something for X years, written down by someone else. The second is the more annoying one. Knowledge and skills-wise, I am perfectly capable of doing a lot of jobs whose hiring committee would trash my application without reading, because I don’t have an official witness to the fact that I can do something. I understand their position – they don’t know me from Adam and want independent verification – but I’ve run into it repeatedly, and it never ceases to frustrate me.