Expertise
Definition
Those characteristics, skills and knowledges of an expert which distinguish experts from novices and less experienced people
Description
Expertise is the skills and knowledge an expert has in a specified domain where he is superior to others. Expertise comes about through long periods of deliberate practice.
Assessing expertise
Since expertise in the nuclear industry can be either in performing special tasks which require special skills, or in much broader subjects, like theoretical reactor physics, the assessment of the different expertise require different methods. In certain areas there are relatively good means to quantify an expert's quality:
- the official qualifications (diploma, certificates etc.),
- the number of publications in the special field, their impact factors, citations and other scientometric parameters,
- the number of patents,
- the number of issued grants, etc.
In most other fields assessing the expertise of a person to be hired is more difficult, and needs different - sometimes ad hoc - methods. A test problem solving can be requested from the expert, or designing or preparing a test object, or for testing the special skill he/she should perform a test action (e.g. welding).
