By Michael Klazema, lead author and editor for Backgroundchecks.com

It’s one of the biggest questions asked by first-time hiring managers: Is it better to hire people based on their experience or their potential?

From a cursory Google search, you will see that the most popular answer to this question is “potential.” Most hiring experts seem to think that hiring someone for what they could do in the future is a smarter choice than hiring someone because of what they’ve already done. However, the truth is that there is more nuance to this discussion than either answer. Below, we’ve outlined opposing arguments for why you might hire based on either experience or potential, and how you can incorporate the best of both approaches to achieve results.