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competenacy

December 29, 2010 08:36 AM 1
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Join Date: December 29, 2010
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Post Date: January 1, 1970
Posts: 5
Location: India

competenacy

What is Competency?

Competency is the vital behavioral skills, knowledge and personal attributes that are translations of organizational capabilities and are deemed essential for success. They distinguish exemplary performers from adequate performers.

 

In that regard, competencies offer a highly descriptive means of discussing job performance. They go beyond traditional job descriptions because they focus on how employees perform their jobs, not simply on what they do. While job descriptions detail specific tasks, competencies encompass the tangible and intangible abilities employees possess.  For instance, a necessary competency for a marketing professional might be the ability to perform detailed market analysis while another competency might be leadership qualities, as evidenced through the ability to build consensus.

 

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.

 

Based on the above definition, it can be said competency only include behaviors that demonstrate excellent performance. Therefore, they do not include knowledge per se, but do include applied knowledge or the behavioral application of knowledge that produces success. In addition, competencies do include skills, but only the manifestation of skills that produce success. Finally, competencies are not personal work motives, but do include observable behaviors related to motives. See figure below for an illustration of these key points.