The concept of Competency has attained greater significance with progressive HR thoughts on “what constitutes better performance” on a particular assignment. Competency can be defined as the sum total of many dimensions like Skills, Knowledge, Attitude required to perform in an assignment effectively. A Competency could be represented in various such dimensions called Competency Classes. Every Competency Class has Competency Elements associated with it.

Competency, Class and Elements: Competency is made of elements. A competency element refers to any unique, identifiable and ratable skill, knowledge or behavioral trait.

Competency class refers to any set of closely related competency elements that can be grouped under a single class viz., Knowledge, skills or behavioral traits.

A group of related competency classes make up a Competency, required for effective performance in a task, or assignment.

An Organization can decide to build a single-layered Competency Model or a three-layered Competency Model. In a Single-layered Competency Model, only Competencies are defined. In a three-layered Competency Model, Competency Classes such as Attitude, Skill and Knowledge are defined. Many related Competency Elements are defined for each such Competency Class. Many Classes are associated with a Competency.

For example, consider the following scenario. The Competency ‘Effective Selling’ may require a combination of Classes like Knowledge, Behavioral Trait and Skill. The Class Knowledge includes Market Know-how and Product Understanding. Behavioral Trait could be Assertiveness. The Class Skill could include Negotiation and Communication. Thus a three-layered Competency Model could be built.     

 

Creating Competency Elements: You can define each competency element with a unique code and description.  You can also specify to which competency class for example, skill, knowledge or behavioral trait, the specified competency element belongs. The other details that you can associate to the competency element include a short and a long description, the minimum level of proficiency desired for the competency element to indicate the minimum extent to which an employee should be proficient in the competency element, as well as the active/inactive status of the competency element etc. Whether a competency can be obtained through a training can also be captured.

Creating Competency Class: You can define each competency class with a unique code and description. In addition you can specify the Active/Inactive status of the competency class details. Enter any additional comments with regard to the specified competency class details.

Creating a Competency comprising Competency Classes & Elements: You can define a competency through a unique code and description. You can enter both a short as well as a long description of the competency for more clarity about the competency . If the organization has chosen to implement the single layer competency model, then only the competency details needs to be defined. Otherwise, all the three namely, competency, class and element need to be defined.