However, it is competence (the ability to actually do the job) that is the foundation of the safety and professionalism upon which we will survive and thrive.
Not always so. Please bear with me if the following is perceived as yet another old warrie - but in the early Fifties, RAAF trainee pilots were awarded their pilots brevet (wings) on completion of a 12-15 month course and with 210 hours total. That included an instrument rating called a White Card. Much of the instrument flying training was on limited panel - no artificial horizon or directional gyro. That was because of the limitations of early gyroscopic instruments which would topple beyond 55 degrees angle of bank. Nasty business in IMC or in a spin. The two limitations or restrictions on the White Card instrument rating was that MDA's were increased by 100 feet and I think the take off cloud base minima was 200 ft although I can't be certain of the latter.
The highest grade instrument rating in the RAAF at the time was the Green Card. To qualify for the Green Card the pilot had to have a minimum of 500 hours pilot in command in his log book. It could be all single engine or a combination of SE and ME. The main privilege of the Green Card was the authority it conferred on the holder to take off in zero visibility. This of course could be required in times of war or operational emergency. After all, RAAF pilots are trained for war.
The point here being, that a decision to conduct a blind take off was a highly critical one (for obvious reasons of high risk) and that 500 hours in command had by then given the pilot the exposure or experience needed to evaluate the situation that required a zero forward visibility take off run. Keep in mind, runway lights on the centre-line rarely existed in wartime and in fact the take off could well be from a field in thick fog.
A newly graduated RAAF pilot with his 210 hours and a White Card instrument rating, could usually fly to the standard required for a Green Card instrument rating - including a zero visibility take off run. Today, his civilian equivalent newly type rated CPL 200 hour graduate on a 737, should easily meet the standard of a Command Instrument rating test in a simulator.
But to gain 500 hours of in command time (not ICUS) in the RAAF could take at least two or more years. Fighter pilots on Mustangs picked up maybe 250 hours a year while transport or bomber pilots went through the usual copilot duties for a year or more before upgrading to a Hercules, Dakota or Lincoln command. Then eventually a total of 500 command hours would be attained and the pilot could then be tested for his Green card. It was a coveted award and because of its status was a hard test with no punches pulled especially on limited panel skills. The Green Card was therefore, above all things, a measure of the pilots decision making experience in the air.
It is that vital decision making time which is nowadays often absent from the second in command of an airliner who may have only 250 total flying hours before crewing a jet transport.
I think it would be unwise to dismiss previous good quality command experience as inconsequential - leaving it to "on the day" competence at completing a sequence of flying manoeuvres, as the main requirement to be appointed as second in command of a jet transport.