The technocracy literature often assumes that political parties appoint technocratic ministers primarily because their lack of affiliation with the nominating party helps to shift blame during challenging periods, such as political or economic crises. Yet, technocrats may also be selected for their expertise to enhance government legitimacy and to provide more effective policy solutions. These dimensions—party independence and technical expertise—are frequently conflated in the empirical literature, making it challenging to discern whether and when parties prioritize ministers’ independence from party politics or their specialized skills. To address this gap, we introduce fine-grained measures of the two defining traits of technocratic ministers – party outsiderness and expertise – based on detailed biographical data. This approach allows us to disentangle these dimensions and to better understand the specific motivations driving technocratic appointments in different situations. We propose that prioritizing one dimension over the other reflects distinct appointment strategies by political parties. Drawing on biographical data of ministers from six European democracies (Germany, France, Austria, Netherlands, Finland, Switzerland) covering multiple decades, we test hypotheses on how various types of crises, along with party-system and party-level factors, influence appointments of party outsiders and experts to ministerial office. Results contribute novel perspectives on technocratic appointments and carry important implications for government legitimacy and accountability.