Get the Most from Your Competency Models: Understand All Competency Models Are Not the Same

Since their inception 40 years ago, competency models have progressed through distinct stages, in sync with changes in organizations. As a result, there are many types of competency models, each appropriate for a specific task. But we treat them as if they are the same. 

To get the most value from this valuable tool, we need to understand and recognize the differences in the meaning of “competency.” In the last blog post I described the roots of competencies.  In this post I will describe how they have evolved, and the best use of the various competency modeling methods.

Proliferation of Competency Modeling Methods: Moving from Clarity To Confusion

Corporations have wanted competency models since about 1990. Since they can genuinely drive business results and shape culture, organizations were willing to pay for competency models. As a result, consultants got in the competency modeling business in a big way.  

Initially, competency models were only developed for high-leverage jobs such as sales executives and leaders. A $250,000 competency research project carried out over two months was a good investment because individuals in these jobs drive organizational results.  Further, interpersonal (e.g., teamwork) and intrapersonal (e.g., multi-tasking) savvy are very important in these sorts of jobs and the behavioral event interview (BEI) method was exceptionally good at capturing these capabilities. 

Competency models soon began to trickle down to other job-families. Different methods of developing competency models also proliferated. Consultants argued that their methods were unique and better. 

Many consultants used executive interviews to understand competencies.  Often, the interviews started with organizational strategy and then inquired about the human capability needed to achieve the strategy. These capabilities became the organization’s competency model.

Some used focus groups to quickly capture ideas about competencies from leaders or incumbents. Often the focus groups learned about competency models and then generated examples of behaviors that achieved exceptional results.  Synthesis of these behaviors led to a competency model.

Other methods were clearly cheaper.  An organization could purchase a standard dictionary, or a card deck, of possible competencies. By thinking about the target job, it was just a matter of picking the right cards.  Using this tool, a professional could build model in an hour.

Competency models were also published and compared. Some noticed that leadership models from different organizations were quite similar. Would you go to the trouble of building a model if 80% of  competencies are the same in all organizations? 

Standardized competency models were developed. These models were built by integrating many competency models (research) or using on someone’s ideas of what it takes to be a successful employee or leader (theory). These standard models describe good management and leadership, but note how far we have moved from research to unlock the unconscious secrets to high performance! Many of the competency models were simply theories described in behavioral terms.

Ultimately, confusion reigned.  Everyone was talking about competency models, but in fact they were talking about different things.  There was (and still is) no agreement on the meaning of “competency.” 

Some large organizations (e.g., AT&T) had hundreds of unrelated competency models built with different methods and with different underlying assumptions! Many organizations became overwhelmed.  Some went so far as to ban competency models, at least temporarily.

Where We Are Now:  Many Methods to Address Multiple Challenges

Was this a fad or something else? Three things have happened:

• We learned a lot about the inter- and intra- personal capabilities required for key positions; many leadership competencies are better understood. For example, nearly everyone in business now talks about “emotional intelligence.”  Daniel Goleman, who coined the term, trained under McClelland at Harvard, and notes that this inter-and intra-personal intelligence was influenced by competency research
• The idea of a competency changed and became vague.  Whereas competency was defined as “a pattern of thought or behavior that differentiated average from superior performance,” now it more generally means behavioral performance expectations. Beyond that, there is little agreement about the definition of competency
• We went too far.  We started to think that competencies are the only human capabilities that matter. This is clearly a mistake. Many professional jobs do not rely heavily on inter- and intra- personal capabilities  If you are hiring, developing, promoting or rewarding an engineer, use skills or tasks! 

Competencies are clearly not a fad.  After 40 years, i am confident that competencies are a key and useful tool for Talent Management. 

With the benefit of hindsight, we should have a more sophisticated understanding of competency models and what they can do for your organization’s performance. We should recognize that competency models built using different methods have different sweet spots. As a starting point, here is summary of the various modeling methods and situations when they are best used. I welcome your thoughts and additions.

I welcome your thoughts and additions.

Charley Morrow

Sage Assessments

Unconscious Competency: The Unrecognized Root of Competency Models

In the bad old days, personnel departments just analyzed two things: jobs, which are really collections of task, and skills, which are what people can do.

Starting in the 1970s, however, David McClelland and his protégés developed a different method. Their efforts were a reaction against psychometric testing and the traditional methods of describing, predicting and developing employee performance.

These Harvard-based Freudian psychologists believed that unconscious motives, thoughts, and behaviors are important. They used projective, not psychometric, tests. This does not mean they were obsessed with the deep secrets of the id’s conflict with the super-ego. They believed that humans are not aware of all their assumptions, schemas, and skills. Today, cognitive psychologists and instructional designers would agree. In fact, some training programs deliberately build unconscious competence.

The Unconscious Competence Matrix

McClelland and his protégés investigated the conscious and unconscious thoughts, feelings and behaviors in interviews with high-performing incumbents.  They inquired about critical incidents and they analyzed the common themes that emerged in the stories. This method was called the behavioral event interview (BEI).

1. The researchers were identifying what high performers paid attention to—the story an incumbent chose to tell. They did not focus what they are able to do (skills) or the job requirements (tasks). BEIs are projective tests—like a Rorschach ink-blot test.
2. They only focused on the thinking, motives and behaviors that differentiate superior from average performance. They did not develop exhaustive lists of skills and qualifications needed to do the job. 
3. The often found the difference between superior and average performance was a matter of inter- or intra-personal skills, such as collaboration or emotional intelligence.
4. The analytical (vs. theoretical) results were often surprising. For example, the competency that differentiated the best from average sales people in a furniture chain was “elicits tactile expressions.” Getting someone to express how furniture should feel (vs. how it looks) is the key to selling furniture.  
5. New insights were common.

They unlocked the secrets to high-performance! A genuinely new and different method of developing employees was born.

Now, competency models have become a standard part of HR and leadership development. Many professionals are confused and overusing competencies. We have forgotten about, or ignored, the history of competency models. Competency models have become too common and few organizations use them to unlock the secrets of high performance.

Recently, I was asked to inventory the skills of an organization for workforce planning using a competency model. The model was comprised of general capabilities such as “teamwork” and “communication.” The model was not up to the task; it could not identify whether the organization has the right people with the right skills for the future.

I have heard some equating competency models with knowledge/skills/abilities (KSA) lists. This intellectually lazy simplification is the root of the confusion about competencies. It is better to distinguish competency models as a unique approach to improving performance.

KSAs and competencies are different! KSAs, which are the result of jobs and skills analysis, are associated with individual-differences psychology (e.g., personality and intelligence testing). KSAs work well for some tasks (e.g., workforce planning). Competencies, which are the result of BEIs, are associated with Freudian psychology. Competencies work well for some tasks (e.g., leadership development, understanding intra- and inter-personal demands of jobs). Both methods can be appropriate in certain circumstances. Bottom line:

• Competency models should not be the basis for all HR tasks. For some purposes skill- or task-dictionaries work better.
• There are multiple methods of developing competency models and there is a sweet spot for each. I will blog about this in future posts.

Charley Morrow
www.sageassessments.com