What's so great about experience?

In looking around at the very few job postings out there, I see a lot of strange postings. One was looking for someone to work the front desk of a hotel but they had to have experience working in suburban hotels and anyone who has worked in downtown hotels would not be considered. Now I will be the first to admit that I read job postings I have no interest in applying for because I find them amusing and because job postings are often so poorly written that they are amusing. I have never found a great difference in the job skill set needed to work down town than out in the suburbs.

Yet we are conditioned to think that having some experience or familiarity with a certain market segment is essential to succeed in that market. While I can see that to be true in some areas I have to say that I believe it to be very short sighted in others. Now of course, if we have a heart condition, we all want to go see a cardiologist and not a ophthalmologist. There are dozens of examples just like this. But I find that for the majority of us who are working in service industries, we posses a certain skill set which is transferable and which in some cases may bring a fresh perspective.

There was a great example from an exercise run by the Army towards the end of the cold war. They were gaming what was generally believed to be how the war between NATO and the old Warsaw Pact forces would play out. In one exercise a group of ROTC students defeated a ground of Army War College graduates by using new tactics not previously in the planning. Many of the War College graduates had seen combat in Vietnam and needless to say were upset that they had lost. They protest claiming the ROTC students used unorthodox tactics to win and should forfeit. When Adm. William Crowe the then head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff found out about the dispute he commented that the enemy isn't supposed to do what we expect it to do. They are the enemy.

Experience often leads to a certain level of intellectual laziness and a comfort that with the experience comes a certain level of entitlement. Experience only works when it is constantly being challenged by a new and changing environment. The person who looks at the situation and claims, "that's what we have always done" is poison to the organization. This is not to argue for change for the sake of change, but it does argue for constant motion to stay ahead of the curve that is always changing.

Speaking as a public relations and marketing professional, I have to know not only what is going on in my own industry, but I need to understand how my profession is changing. I need to understand how this impacts my clients and what threats and opportunities it offers. In other words I need to keep moving. The major conclusion I hope you can take away from this is that experience itself is not anything great, it is how you evolve along with the environment and continually re-invent yourself as someone who offers a set of relevant skills. Experience is less impressive as how you react and deal with change!