Is Experience Always Necessary to Getting a Job?

There are times when employers demand that a new employee must have a certain type of experience in the field that they are advertising for hire. Sometimes it is because of the company's personality or the hiring manager's personality. They believe they got where they are at through experience therefore they see it as high on the value list. Other times it is less to do with personal reasons and more to do with regulations, sometimes regulations are set by the company or even can be governmental mandated. It usually has to do with the idea that more experience means less training and supervising time on the company budget, although this may or may not always be the case when a new employee comes on with new ideas. The other problem with this theory is that while I may have even the most current experience with a certain task or action, there are still differences in interpretation of company styles and personal styles, so some confusion will still need to be addressed and training, etc. will be implemented.

It can be so frustrating when you first get out of college only to find every interview ending with, "as soon as you have some experience under your belt, give us a call". The old double edge sword, of how to get the experience when you can't get hired until you have experience has been around for a long time. But, I think we all finally figure out a way to start as a junior employee, or volunteer, or intern, or somehow get our foot in the door where we will get a chance to get our feet wet in our chosen field.

Depending upon what career you are in there will come a time when your experience will indeed help you to move up ranks and probably get better salaries, benefits and other perks. Even though jobs evolve and change with time; employers are looking for more experienced employees because this experience leads you to knowledge and wisdom you can't get from a seminar, the internet, or a study source, etc. True experience is a gold mine to most companies because it can save them a lot of money in training and fielding out someone else who won't have the understanding and wisdom that is needed to complete a task or project with some mastery.

There are some positions that do not require mastery experience in your field and if the employer is dogged in their pursuit of people who only have xyz experience that a few of their "best of the best" employees have had, you really need to steer clear of these companies because they are in pompous denial of the give and take in business. I have seen this in the "office" environment, when one company has a little known software that they bought (cheap) and then cannot find anyone who has ever worked on it previously, even though most competent people could figure it out without much problem.