An interesting article from ere.net titled The Role of the Hiring Manager in Recruiting. The author cuts to the quick in one of his bullet points:
The industry-experience trap. Industry experience is not only highly overrated, but it’s also the quickest way to sub-optimize the talent you recruit. If you think of the pool of top-quality, top-quartile talent, the minute you say they must come out of the food industry or the high-tech industry, you’ve reduced that pool of available talent by about 98%! The fact is that for the majority of our jobs, top talent with high learning agility can learn the nuances of our industry, but industry-experienced candidates who do not possess high learning agility will never become top talent or future leaders for you.
I emphasized the last sentence since that is a battle with which we are most familiar. The author is absolutely correct in that statement, yet companies often revert to an overemphasis on experience – especially when hiring salespeople. I believe they do it because it is difficult to discern a strong salesperson from a weak salesperson who interviews well (unless you are using assessments).
So, all things appearing equal, it is safest for the hiring manager to hire the candidate with more industry experience. If that candidate fails, the hiring manager can say they aren’t sure what happened – the person had great experience.