We all have individual set of competencies that can take us notches up the ladder of success. You were able to grab your ideal job because your core competencies were just what the employer was looking for in a suitable candidate. However, after getting the job, did you ensure consistency in your set of knowledge, skills, and attitude? Or better yet, did you make an effort to strengthen your competencies even more and work on those that need improvement?
In your workplace where you demonstrate most of your effective work competencies to contribute to the success of company goals, your employer is also constantly monitoring your performance level and how well you make use of your attributes. This is all about assessing employee competency. You need to have continuing competency to be at par with the outstanding and efficient employees at work. The employer evaluates three types of skills in every employee through a competency-based interview:
a. Content Skills
These are your qualifications and experiences on a certain field of expertise.
b. Functional Skills
These skills would include interpersonal skills, people-oriented skills, communication, organizational and management skills.
c. Self-Management Skills
These are your attributes and traits such as being a self-learner, multi-tasker, and a self-helper.
Ways to Develop Continuing Competency
There are many ways to acquire and develop competency. Several factors such as life experiences, formal education, work experiences, self-help programs, and training and development programs contribute to your overall job competence as a working individual. Your employee competency will be determined and evaluated based on job performance.
On-going coaching sessions and feedback sessions are also helpful for employees like you to personally assess competencies. Every company must deliver a regular feedback of employee performance. Also, feedback must not only highlight what they are good at but also include the areas they need to improve on. Through these methods of ensuring continuing competency, a company can save on administrative costs and increase employee retention.
Competency-Based Training
As mentioned above, training is one of the approaches to develop continuing competency at work. Companies must provide its people with on-going training and refresher programs associated with the needed competencies and the KSA (knowledge, skill, attitude) of the employees.
Competency-based training focuses on the employee’s capabilities or what the person can do and offer in the workplace. Every company has a set of industry-determined performance standards requiring all employees to function and perform efficiently in a particular industry or profession. With competency-based training and education, employees get the chance to develop and enhance their knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to achieve the required standards expected in their employment.
A basic feature of competency-based training is that every individual’s accomplishment is gauged against the competency standards instead of measuring the achievements against those of others. Through this, employees will be able to concentrate on improving their required job competency list to perform the tasks and duties with more satisfaction.
Most competency-based training programs consist of modules that are categorized into learning outcomes. These segments are developed based on the industry standards. The training assessment is also developed in a way that each participant will be able to achieve all the learning outcomes in each module.
Benefits of Competency-Based Training and Education
The main advantage of incorporating competency-training programs in an organization is continuing competency on all employees. With this, you get to understand your own work performance better. Also, trainings and continued education can help you plan for a better performance in future tasks and projects because it gives you an idea of what competency to enhance more on.
Moreover, with highly effective core competencies, there is a chance for promotion and filling in a job title in the higher position. If this opportunity comes, you must be prepared for another competency-based manner of interviewing. This type of interview has always been regarded by companies as one of the most effective ways in a selection process.
Performance appraisal is an essential tool in measuring your performance rating for a specific period at work. You have a bigger chance of getting a high performance appraisal rating with an efficient manifestation of your competencies for your specific scope of work.
