Competency Management: An Overlap of HR and Business Planning

Business goals are a crucial part of business planning; in other words, it highlights what the company wishes to achieve in a specified period of time. But what ensures that human talent is sufficiently equipped to meet these goals? This is where ‘Competency Management’ comes into the picture.

Competencies can be viewed as a combination of skill, ability, behavior, values, and knowledge (practical/theory), they are ‘how’ an organization leads its human resource towards achieving ‘goals.’ Competencies define in behavioral terms what employees need to do in order to produce what the company requires, or put another way; all business strategies revolve around competencies.

Competency management is one of the oldest and most efficient ways of ensuring employees and the organization’s high performance.

• It would help the employees and the organization to analyze where they lack and improve.

• The need for potential resources, training, and skill development for employee development can be detected.

• They support organizations’ strategic goals and are essential for success in the industry.

• Represents the organization’s culture.

• Better competency management can set one’s organizations apart from the competition and give it an edge in the market place.

Different organizations have varied business goals and descriptions of the requirements of human beings in their organizations, and so, different core competencies. Competencies such as innovation, safety, quality, and hard work are few of the core competencies organizations can have. But for different job roles, companies can define job specified competencies. Earlier, a competency management model or framework was designed by the organizations themselves. However, over the past decade, numerous companies and software have been developed to help organizations manage, categorize, and search employees with the desired skill set.

For instance, NASA uses its system to anticipate human resources needs and manage recruitment activities. A system is a Web-based tool that allows users to edit their own information and to search for others. NASA publishes its own “Workforce Competency Dictionary,” which defines specific categories of skills. For instance, it describes “Partnership & Business Development” as requiring “Knowledge, capabilities, and practices associated with the effective targeting and acquisition of external partnerships and business opportunities, including funding opportunities for projects and programs.” Similarly, the Coast Guard’s system maintains an online dictionary of competencies.

Or sometimes, organizations hire companies known as competency management systems, which are developed to help the organization with its competency management. These solutions help by designing the core competencies and competencies for each and every job description by analyzing a company’s culture and business goals. Competency management systems (CMS) help organizations by storing, searching, analyzing competency related data such as the use of a specific application for coding employees. These specified skills are used to define the competencies of each job.

Even though competency management technology is relatively new, it makes it easier for organizations to accomplish their business goals and smoother for companies to function. No organization can deny competency management’s importance in organization’s growth and prosperity. Strong competencies are one of the key factors that drive an organization’s needs towards enjoying global leadership.

We encourage constructive feedback and suggestions, and would like some from you in the comments!