Why competency mapping

Description: Competencies are derived from specific job families within the organization and are often grouped around categories such as strategy, relationships, innovation, leadership. If there's one colour that's in fashion these days, it's pink. But don't look to Paris for why. The current ubiquity of pink has its roots in the American expression 'pink slip' used to describe the termination notices issued by employers to employees. In these times of layoffs, the job place is awash in pink.

People speculate about which company will let loose pink slips. They trade horror stori. Voluntary retirement scheme is a method used by companies to reduce surplus staff. This mode has come about in India as labour laws do not permit direct retrenchment of unionized employees. Description: VRS applies to an employee who has completed 10 years of service or is above 40 years of age. It should apply to all employees by whatever name called , including workers and executives of a com.

MBO is a management practice which aims to increase organizational performance by aligning goals and subordinate objectives throughout the organization. These targets then need to be periodically reviewed by higher levels of management.

Communicate the expected performance on each competency. We lay out the competencies in the offer letter itself. Training: Structure learning pathways around your defined competencies. Our goal is to help companies create personalized learning journeys for employees by combining digital learning and social learning interventions.

Communicate the results to each employee. For example, a software engineer should know the proficiency levels they need to hit in each competency in order to get to the next role of senior software engineer. Make it transparent. There are many management books out there on how to build great companies that focus on strategy, team building and culture.

The science of competency mapping is often overlooked, but it is just as important. This is a BETA experience. You may opt-out by clicking here. More From Forbes.

Nov 11, , am EST. We kicked off with the tried-and-tested method of collecting job descriptions and specifications. Here is a brief description of what these terms imply:. We continued to perform the next steps in the process. First, we met the team leads, who were able to provide job descriptions that they typically used for hiring various roles in their team.

Apart from this, they did not have any documented skill list. We then met the managers of each subunit. They were additionally able to give us some Excel sheets that had a brief description of the tasks that their team members performed. This gave us a summary of job specifications. Often, competency maps are mixed up with job descriptions and specifications.

We found this happening here too. We had to help our stakeholders understand the following differences so that we could enlist their help to identify KSAs for job roles.

Having provided a better understanding of the importance of competency mapping, we proceeded to work with stakeholders to identify skills for job roles in the engine department. Job descriptions and specifications were a good starting point to arrive at the KSAs for every role. We had detailed interviews with team leads and managers, which helped us consolidate skill lists and fill some of the gaps. For example, some key technical skills, such as knowledge of CAD design, were stated in job descriptions.

But tertiary skills, such as emission testing ability, were missing. Some behavioral skills were also missing from job descriptions. We felt it was necessary to observe the tasks of some sample audience of each role for some time and also interact with them.

The intent was to understand if the KSAs we had identified earlier mapped to real-time tasks being performed. During the job shadowing exercise, we found that, indeed, there were some changes that needed to be made to KSAs, as some skills had become redundant for certain roles, and for others, there were new skills that had become necessary.

We were able to tweak KSAs and map them more accurately to tasks and corresponding roles. We also analyzed all hiring and exit data in the organization to understand the typical skill requirements vs gaps. This gave further insight into the kind of skills that existed in the organization versus what was essential for success in a specific job role.

We then met the top-level management stakeholders, discussed the skill list we had gathered, and enlisted their help to validate data. Through step-by-step data analysis, we were able to derive a comprehensive skill list related to different job families in the engine department.

Having prepared a list of skills for job roles in the engine department, we went on mapping skills to competencies required for each job role. Then record your findings in a simple spreadsheet or dedicated competency mapping software.

Competencies can be assessed at the number of stages :. Benefits for the employee include a wareness of the long term plan of the company and the long term plan for your own development and m anaging expectations. The companies that map skills typically have advanced planning capabilities. They often have a well-defined growth plan and they use competency mapping to get where they want to be.

On the micro scale, this is beneficial to the employees who are able to see the next steps their careers will take. On the macro scale, knowing the long term plan, the mission, and vision of the company makes people more engaged in their jobs. It also shows how the steps they take will affect their careers. For example, in the context of employee assessment, the evaluation of progress is based on universal, objective rules that are known upfront.

This takes the stress out of the evaluation process. Employers can close skill gaps with employee training programs which nurture the growth of new capabilities to be used on the job.

This is beneficial to the employees who are given the chance to advance their skills at work, be it through training, certification, or training budgets.

Education and certification opportunities are a strong contender when it comes to attracting talent, especially in competitive industries like tech. For example, findings from the Dice Salary Report suggest that training and education are the biggest gap in important vs. Education opportunities also have a positive impact on retention. This could indicate that learning is more easily available in industries other than tech.

Benefits for the employer include a ssessing and closing skills gaps and r educed turnover. According to LinkedIn Workplace Learning Report , understanding skill gaps is the 1 priority this year for talent developers worldwide.

Once you map the skills people have, you can place them in the right teams to maximize their productivity.