By Blessing Kemlo
Recruitment decisions begin long before a candidate meets a hiring manager. They begin when an organisation decides what counts as evidence of capability.
A job description asks for a degree, a specific title, experience in a named industry or a familiar career path. Those requirements may be necessary. But when every requirement becomes a rigid filter, a hiring process can exclude people who could do the work well—and advance people who know how to present the expected signals.
Familiarity can masquerade as capability
A CV is a useful summary of a person’s experience. It is not a direct measurement of how they will solve a problem, learn a new system, handle ambiguity or work with others. A candidate may have the right title but limited evidence of the capability the role actually needs. Another may have built that capability through a different industry, community work, project delivery, caregiving responsibilities, self-directed learning or a non-linear career.
This is not an argument for abandoning qualifications or professional standards. In regulated and safety-critical roles, credentials can be essential. It is an argument for checking whether each screening criterion is genuinely connected to successful performance.
Ask what the requirement is doing
Before excluding candidates, hiring teams can ask:
- Is this qualification legally, professionally or operationally essential?
- Does the number of years requested predict a capability we can define and assess?
- Could a practical work sample provide better evidence than a job title?
- Are we rejecting career changers because they lack skill, or because their experience looks unfamiliar?
- Which requirements were copied from an old job description without being reviewed?
Build a better evidence model
Start with the outcomes the person must deliver in the first six to twelve months. Translate those outcomes into capabilities: analysing data, managing stakeholders, diagnosing faults, coordinating work, communicating risk or learning a technical process. Separate must-have requirements from preferences, and make the difference explicit.
Then choose an assessment method suited to the capability. A short case exercise may reveal problem-solving more clearly than a generic interview question. A structured interview lets candidates be assessed against the same criteria. A portfolio or verified work example may help where previous job titles are not comparable. For every method, provide reasonable accommodations and avoid tests that introduce irrelevant barriers.
Fairness and business performance belong in the same conversation
Broadening the evidence used in recruitment is not about lowering standards. It is about making standards more precise. When employers define capability clearly, they can compare candidates more consistently, explain decisions more confidently and discover talent outside the usual pipeline.
South African labour-market research has documented qualification and skills mismatches, although figures vary by year, population and method. Such findings should not be used as a shortcut to judge any individual candidate. They are a reminder that qualifications, jobs and capabilities do not always align neatly.
The question for employers is simple: are we selecting for the work that needs to be done, or for the profile we have grown accustomed to recognising?
At Govel Fraser, our approach to talent intelligence begins with the problem, the required outcomes and the evidence—not assumptions about what a capable person must look like.
Govel Fraser | Unlocking Dignity Through Opportunity.