Agree you shouldn't take experience at face value, but I do think it's critically valuable to explore experience in an interview. In an interview, I try to ask

Agree you shouldn't take experience at face value, but I do think it's critically valuable to explore experience in an interview. In an interview, I try to ask questions about the job they'll be doing rather than backward looking behavioral questions. But you can still apply what you know about their past experience to forward looking questions: If they fail on certain areas, but just haven't had a chance to work on that type of problem in their previous experience--it's a lot less distressing. But if they're failing at things they "should" know better from their experience, it's a huge red flag. So for example, someone who says their an expert in web development should have no problem deciding on the best way to manage application state given HTTP's statelessness. Someone coming from a C++ background who struggles with exactly what tools to use for this might still grow to be a fantastic web developer.