What is competency mapping? Competencies IS the collection of success factors necessary for achieving important results in a specific job or work role in a particular organization. Success factors are combinations of knowledge, skills, and attributes that are described in terms of specific behaviors, and are demonstrated by superior performers in those jobs or work roles. Attributes include: personal characteristics, traits, motives, values or ways of thinking that impact an individual’s behavior.
Competencies in organizations tend to fall into two broad categories: – Personal Functioning Competencies. These competencies include broad success factors not tied to a specific work function or industry (often focusing on leadership or emotional intelligence behaviors). – Functional/Technical Competencies. These competencies include specific success factors within a given work function or industry. Three other definitions are needed: • Competency Map.
A competency map is a list of an individual’s competencies that represent the factors most critical to success in given jobs, departments, organizations, or industries that are part of the individual’s current career plan. • Competency Mapping. Competency mapping is a process an individual uses to identify and describe competencies that are the most critical to success in a work situation or work role. • Top Competencies. Top competencies are the vital few competencies (four to seven, on average) that are the most important to an individual in their ongoing career management process.
“Importance to the individual” is an intuitive decision based on a combination of three factors: past demonstrated excellence in using the competency, inner passion for using the competency, and the current or likely future demand for the competency in the individual’s current position or targeted career field. Although the definition above for “competency mapping” refers to individual employees, organizations also “map” competencies, but from a different perspective.
Organizations describe, or map, competencies using one or more of the following four strategies: 1. Organization-Wide (often called “core competencies” or those required for organization success) 2. Job Family or Business Unit Competency Sets 3. Position-Specific Competency Sets 4. Competency Sets Defined Relative to the Level of Employee Contribution (i. e. Individual Contributor, Manager, or Organizational Leader) Tools for competency mapping:
Literature Review: A preliminary approach for defining job content and identifying required competencies is to conduct a review of the literature to learn about previous studies of the job or similar jobs. Focus Groups: In focus groups, a facilitator works with a small group of job incumbents, their managers, supervisees, clients, or others to define the job content or to identify the competencies they believe are essential for performance. Structured Interviews: In structured interviews, carefully planned questions are asked individually of job incumbents, their managers, or others familiar with the job.
Benchmarking interviews with other organizations are especially useful in achieving a broader view of the job or determining which competencies are more universally deemed necessary for a particular job. Behavioral Event Interviews: In behavioral event interviews (BEI), top performers are interviewed individually about what they did, thought, said, and felt in challenging or difficult situations. The competencies that were instrumental in their success are extrapolated from their stories. Often, average and low performers are also interviewed to provide a comparison.
Surveys: In surveys, job incumbents, their supervisors, and perhaps senior managers complete a questionnaire administered either in print or electronically. The survey content is based on previous data collection Observations: In this data collection method, the research team visits high-performing incumbents and observes them at work. The more complex the job and the greater the variety in job tasks, the more time is required for an observation. In any educational or professional setting, making good decisions about competency is difficult, at best.
Certification decisions – whether or not to certify an individual in a profession or trade – are particularly complex; organizations must create sound assessment procedures to ensure that appropriate decisions about the knowledge and skills of individuals are made. This brief discusses the advantages and disadvantages associated with the various types of tests used for assessing competency. We hope you find it useful as you and your organization develop and refine the testing procedures for your certification program. Assessment Strategies in Certification Settings
Three main types of assessment strategies are commonly used to make decisions about achievement and competency in certification settings: 1) Structured Response; 2) Constructed Response; and 3) Performance Assessments. Structured Response This strategy is the most common type of strategy used by certifying organizations. In structured response assessments, the test taker is provided with a set of pre-selected responses from which to choose the correct answer. Tests are scored easily with the use of an answer key: either the test taker selects the correct answer or does not. The correct answers are counted to obtain the test taker’s score.
Many different types of test questions can be used in structured response assessments. Examples include: True/False questions Multiple choice questions Matching questions Constructed Response The test taker constructs correct answers to questions in order to demonstrate mastery of content. Constructed response assessments require raters – or judges – to make decisions about whether the answer provided by the test taker is correct. Tests are generally scored using a rubric – a guide with the qualities, content, or processes the answer must contain in order to be correct. Examples of constructed response questions include:
Essay questions Short answer questions Fill in the blank questions Performance Assessments In performance assessments, the test taker responds to some sort of prompt (e. g. , a written scenario, a live situation) that requires the translation of knowledge into some sort of action. In these assessments, the test taker must “perform” the skills that are required by his/her profession. Similar to constructed response assessments, performance assessments are often scored by raters using a rubric that details the attributes and procedures that must be present for successful demonstration of the skill.
Examples of performance assessments include: Computer-Based Simulations Oral Questioning Live Skill Demonstrations Key Concepts: Validity and Reliability All assessment strategies – structured response, constructed response, and performance assessments – have both advantages and disadvantages. Accurately measuring competency is tricky, and although we know a great deal about how to develop high quality measures, no test is perfect. Before jumping into some of the tradeoffs associated with various assessment strategies, you should know about two key concepts that affect the quality of a test: validity and reliability.
The higher the validity and reliability of a test, the better! Types Of Competencies There are many types of competencies that can help you align your human capital initiatives with your business goals and strategies. Whether your needs are broad or specific, ITG can provide a competencies solution that’s right for you. Business – General business knowledge and skills. Individual – Knowledge, abilities and behaviors that result in an individual’s personal effectiveness and effective interactions with others. Functional – Job specific, i. e. “technical” to the particular job competencies.
Core – General competencies that have been defined for everyone in the organization. Leadership – Competencies specific to leadership roles. Management – Competencies specific to management or supervisory roles and are generally more task oriented than leadership competencies. COMPONENTS OF COMPETENCY There are four major components of competency: 1. SKILL: capabilities acquired through practice. It can be a financial skill such as budgeting, or a verbal skill such as making a presentation. 2. KNOWLEDGE: understanding acquired through learning. This refers to a body of information relevant to job performance.
It is what people have to know to be able to perform a job, such as knowledge of policies and procedures for a recruitment process. 3. PERSONAL ATTRIBUTES: inherent characteristics which are brought to the job, representing the essential foundation upon which knowledge and skill can be developed. 4. BEHAVIOR: The observable demonstration of some competency, skill, knowledge and personal attributes. It is an essentially definitive expression of a competency in that it is a set of action that, presumably, can be observed, taught, learned, and measured.
The four dimensions of competency There are four dimensions of competency: Task skills Performing the task/job to the required standard. Task management skills (variables) Able to do more than one thing at a time and managing the tasks correctly. Contingency management skills Responding appropriately to irregularities and breakdowns in routine within a job or workplace. Job/role environment skills (outcomes) Able to deal with the responsibilities and expectations of the work environment. PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT SYSTEM Integrating competencies within the performance management
process supports the provision of feedback to employees not only on “what” they have accomplished (i. e. , performance goals), but also “how” the work was performed, using competencies for providing feedback. Integrating competency with PMS helps:- Employees in understanding performance expectations and enhancing competencies. To provide a mechanism for providing positive feedback about an employee’s training achievements and on-the-job performance To provide job standards for performance appraisal To provide clear direction for learning new job skills Pre-requisite steps
Organization Strategy Organization Objectives Manager/Work Unit Objective Performance Planning Performance Management Start of Period During the Period End of Period Definition of Job Responsibilities Goal Setting Performance Appraisal Evaluation of competency: In the context of individual environment interaction,evaluation judges measured competences against a defined benchmark (Straka, 1974). In this context, two approaches are distinguished: norm-referenced and criterion-referenced evaluation (Linn and Gronlund, 2000). In the case of norm-referenced evaluation, the measured
competence is interpreted and judged in terms of the individual’s position relative to some known group. Criterion-referenced evaluation (7) is interpretingand judging the measured competence in terms of a clearly defined and delimited domain. The two approaches have common and different characteristics. Both require a specification of the achievement domain to be mastered, a relevant and representative sample of tasks or test items. They use the same types of tasks and qualities of goodness (e. g. validity, reliability) for judging them. The differences – to some degree a
matter of emphasis – are: a) norm-referenced evaluation typically covers a large domain of requirements with a few tasks used to measure mastery, emphasises discrimination among individuals, favours tasks of average difficulty, omits very easy and very hard tasks, and requires a clearly defined group of persons for interpretations; (b) criterion-referenced evaluation focuses on a delimited domain of requirements with a relatively large number of tasks used to measure mastery, emphasises what requirements the individual can or cannot perform, matches task difficulty of requirements, and demands
a clearly defined and delimited achievement domain (Linn and Gronlund, 2000, p. 45). These different orientations of the two approaches have distinct impacts on the statistical measurement model. The norm-referenced assessment or the classical model is bonded with the normal curve whereas criterion referenced assessment is aligned with probabilistic models focussing on degrees of mastering a requirement and not related to the performance of other persons (Embretson and Reise, 2000). Criteria may be international, national, regional, institutional, individual standards such as personal
goals, philosophies of companies (Section 4. 4), state syllabuses, occupational profiles or NVQs (Sections 4. 2 and 4. 3). Characteristics of competency mapping Observable Behavior Motives, Values , Traits, Self Concept Attitudes Knowledge Skills Competency may take the following forms: Knowledge Attitude Skill Other characteristics of an individual including Values Motives – Driving, directing, selecting force Traits – Physical and mental characteristics Self concept – Attitude, values or self image Knowledge – Information in specific key areas Skill – Ability to perform physical or mental tasks
Intrinsic characteristics of competence Leadership Respect Fairness to self and others Drive for excellence Persistence Objectives of competency Competency mapping serves a number of purposes. It is done for the following functions: Gap Analysis Role Clarity Succession Planning Growth Plans Restructuring Inventory of competencies for future planning Concepts of competence Task competence – Cognitive mechanism Decisional competence – Ability to decide Societal competence – Condition of possessing social, emotional and intellectual skills and behaviors needed to succeed as a member of society.
Legal competence – A person P has the competence to change a legal position LP if and only if, there is an action A and a situation S, such that if P in S performs A and thus goes about it in the right way, P will, through A, change LP. Levels of competency Process of competency mapping Step 1: Identify customer value Activities of any organization have to result into economic value to thecustomer. Organizations are interested only in the products and services required by the customers. So that organizations have to define their outcomes.
Step 2: Identify strategy and objectives • Understand business strategy and objective of organization. • What is objective behind doing competency mapping in organization? Step 3: Build business processs Then organizations have to define their business process to enable them to deliver outcomes to customer requirements in a brief time at an economical cost with out sacrificing quality. Step 4: Identify value of business process Then companies have to define the time, cost and quality standards of each task of the business process. Step 5: Job analysis
We can use 18 method of job analysis to analyze jobs. Step 6: Identify competencies • Then define the competencies required for each task in terms of knowledge, skills and attitudes to complete the task within the quality standards defined. • Connect the competency mapping with your any of above mentioned system • Discuss with line managers about the project • Find out the competencies required to perform each Job • Rate the competencies according to importance to perform job Difference between competency and skills: Skill is a part of competency.
Competency consists of three parameters- Knowledge (K), Attitude (A) and Skills(S). For example- I might be having very good interpersonal skills or people skills, but I will not be competent to join a company as HR Professional unless I possess adequate education/ experience (Knowledge) and the right temperament/ behaviour (attitude). While rating skills, you have to determine what abilities are required to perform a job practically but while rating competency, you have to determine the set of abilities/ skills required along with the knowledge and attitude needed for the said job.
e. g. Singing is a skill… but yoodling is a competency (Kishore Kumar) e. g. Writing is a skill…. being ambidextrous is a competency Competency: Problem Solving Problem solving is a competency that requires several skills, knowledge and behaviors to be performed well. For example, to solve problems effectively one must have the skill to define the problem, have knowledge of all possible solutions, and exhibit behavior that enables him or her to make a decision. Skill: Event Planning Event planning is a skill that can be taught to anyone with the ability to learn it.
Several steps may be considered when planning an event, and different tasks must be completed for different kinds of events. All of these things are hard skills, but may be part of an overall competency like leadership or problem solving. Competency: Communication Many people refer to their strong communication skills, but communication is really a competency that relies on a combination of certain skills, behavior and knowledge. To communicate effectively, for example, a person may need to understand cultural diversity, have advanced language skills, and behave with patience. Skill: Presentations
Through reading books, taking classes and practicing, it is possible to learn how to give effective presentations. Presentation skills are more easily absorbed by some people than by others, but a presentation is still a task one can learn how to perform. Presentation skills may be part of a larger competency such as communication. Distinctive competencies, the basis for competitive advantage, can come from technology, industry position, market relations, cost, business processes, manufacturing processes, people, customer satisfaction, or just being first. Leadership Competencies|
Leading the organization:- managing change- solving problems and making decisions- managing politics and influencing others- taking risks and innovating- setting vision and strategy- managing the work- enhancing business skills and knowledge- understanding and navigating the organizationLeading the self:- demonstrating ethics and integrity- displaying drive and purpose- exhibiting leadership stature- increasing your capacity to learn- managing yourself- increasing self-awareness- developing adaptability Leading others:- communicating effectively- developing others- valuing diversity and difference- building and maintaining relationships- managing effective teams and work groups | A core competency can take various forms, including technical/subject matter know-how, a reliable process and/or close relationships with customers and suppliers. [1] It may also include product development or culture, such as employee dedication, best Human Resource Management (HRM), good market coverage etc.
Job competency relates to the demonstration of various skills, aptitudes, and performance levels as they are related to a specific position or job within a company. There are several ways to evaluate job competency, based on what level of activity or performance is considered to be acceptable within an organization. Here are some examples of criteria that are often associated with evaluating job competency. Sometimes referred to as role competency, job competency is essentially evaluated from the very beginning of the employment cycle and continues through until the end of the state of employment. When a prospective employee is under consideration, a company will attempt to properly evaluate the competence level of the individual, as it relates to the position that needs filling.
This will mean taking a look at the educational credentials of the prospective employee, as well as past work history. Based on this basic information, it is possible to ascertain the viability of continued discussions with the prospect. However, if investigation into these factors indicates that the prospect lacks the type of skills required for an acceptable level of job competency, then the company is able to reject the application and focus the search in other directions. COMPETENCY MODEL DEVELOPMENT AND ASSESSMENT | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Threshold V/S Differentiating Competencies Competency mapping is a way of assessing the strengths and weaknesses of a worker or organization.
It’s about identifying a person’s job skills and strengths in areas like teamwork, leadership, and decision-making. Large organizations may use some form of this technique to understand how to best use each worker or how to combine the strengths of different employees to produce the highest quality work. Individuals may also find that this type of assessment can help them prepare for a career change or advance in a specific job field. Functional and Behavioral Models Many competency mapping models break down strengths into two major areas: functional and behavioral. Functional skills include all of the practical knowledge that a person needs to perform a job.
For instance, functional requirements for a secretary might include typing ability, familiarity with computer systems and office machinery, and bookkeeping knowledge. These skills are generally easy to measure through skill tests or task-specific questions, and can help define whether a worker is capable of carrying out his or her basic responsibilities. Behavioral assessment is sometimes more difficult to quantify, and is the focus of most competency studies. This type of analysis examines personal skills such as leadership, active listening, teamwork, and morale. Crafting questions and tests that accurately identify behavioral strengths and weaknesses can be difficult, because a worker may try to answer in a way that makes him look his best rather than providing an honest response.
This type of testing is important for getting a complete picture of an individual’s skill-set, however. Questions might focus on how the person sets goals for himself, how he adapts to changing situations, or how he deals with failure. Work History An analysis of a worker’s past performance and work history can give the results of competency mapping better context. If a worker scores poorly on leadership in tests, for example, but has a long, documented history of being an excellent leader, it is possible that the test did not measure this ability accurately. Considering testing scores in the light of real performance helps create a balanced view of a worker’s capabilities. Benefits and challenges of competency mapping: Benefits for Businesses
In large organizations, competency mapping models are often used to improve employee performance, to help with hiring or promotion decisions, and to provide a critical look at the current workforce. The process can be complicated, but typically begins with identifying those competencies that are most important for a specific position. For example, if an executive wants to internally promote a new manager, he might begin by listing the required job skills and ideal behavioral traits needed for the position. From this list, he could create a questionnaire that maps a candidate’s competencies in the desired areas. After all the candidates answer the questionnaire, the executive can then compare the results using the competency scores to determine the best person for the promotion.
How the questions are worded can be critical to the overall usefulness of the process. Good questions are generally very specific to the job and carefully worded to eliminate vague answers. For instance, an ineffective question might ask “Are you good at time management? ” People may interpret the term “good” in many different ways, and may be tempted to answer positively to make themselves appear to be better workers. A better question might be “Do you finish projects before their deadlines most of the time? ” Since this question can be verified by work history and allows a “yes” or “no” answer, it may provide more useful information. Challenges for Businesses
While this technique can be quite useful to large organizations, it does require thought, time, and analysis, and some companies simply may not want to do the work involved. When enough time is not put into preparing a questionnaire, the results may not be very useful. Some companies choose to hire a external consulting team to handle the modeling, testing, and analysis process for them. This type of skill analysis can also backfire if the workplace does not respond to the results. Companies that engage in competency mapping need to be prepared to make changes to take advantage of the skills and abilities revealed in the assessment. This may mean that job descriptions and responsibilities are changed or swapped, and departments are merged or split as needed.
Training and incentive programs may be needed to improve core skills for workers who are struggling with performance issues. While these changes can cause initial confusion and anxiety, actively responding to the results can often improve employee performance, raise morale, and create a more efficient workplace. Benefits for Individuals Competency mapping can also be used to help those seeking employment show the specific skills which would make them valuable to a potential employer. Many employers now purposefully screen applicants for specific characteristics, so once a person knows her strengths, she can emphasize them on an application or in an interview.
A company may be looking for someone who can be an effective team leader or who has demonstrated great active listening skills, for example. Knowing that she has these strengths and being able to discuss personal examples of them with prospective employers can give job-seekers a competitive edge in the market. Usually, a person will find that he or she has strong skills in five or six areas. Employees who want to increase their worth may find that an area identified as a weakness is worth developing. In other cases, the process may reveal that a person needs to find a new type of work or a different work environment that is better suited to his or her abilities.
Challenges for Individuals One potential limitation of personal testing is that individuals often have a few blind spots regarding their own skills and personality. People tend to overestimate their abilities, which can limit the usefulness of any test. They may also have difficulty accurately answering questions that ask how others view them in the workplace. This gap between how a person sees himself and what his skills really are can sometime make the results of self-testing assessments questionable. For the most accurate results, test-takers must be prepared to answer questions candidly and resist the temptation to overestimate their abilities.
