Sixty‐three professionals in the field of interior design were asked about the importance of competencies for interior design entry‐level positions and the importance of learning the competency at school or work. The forty competencies were chosen from areas that the Foundation of Interior Design Education and Research (FIDER) suggested for inclusion in a comprehensive interior design curriculum. Professionals in this study indicated that oral communication skills, furniture arrangement, space planning, and color theory were more important for entry‐level positions in interior design than the technical competencies of lettering and line drawing, elevation drawings, use of technical drafting equipment, and freehand sketching. The respondents also indicated that history of architecture, perspective drawing, color theory, and lettering and line drawing were competencies which should be learned at school rather than in work experience.