Hello everyone, in the previous topic we will learn about what competency is, the KSA model of competency mapping, and the different types of competencies with that knowledge in mind.

Let’s now understand what is meant by competency-based job analysis, we also looked at the various examples of how to write the description for various competencies, along with the details of the proficiency levels, also we have seen how this can be put to use while hiring for recruitments, and we ended up by understanding the meaning of competency mapping, and the various applications of competency-based job analysis.

What is Competency-based job analysis?

Competency-based job analysis is the job analysis that involves collecting data about the observable job behaviors of people who will be doing the job, and stating it in the form of knowledge, skills, and attitude (KSA).

So we can say that the traditional job analysis is more job-focused while competency-based job analysis is more worker-focused. This doesn’t mean that it covers people’s qualities only and not about the job characteristics but the priority is on people’s qualities. In this article, we will look at the documentation part of it.

Key elements for competency

The key components of competency are as follows-

• Competency name
• Competency description– which is usually a one-line explanation and some.
• Behavior indicators for competency– should be observable to distinguish performance.

Let’s take an example of competency now to understand it better.

Competency Name: Customer Focus Competency Description: Ability to understand and provide helpful, responsive, and knowledgeable service to customers. Behavior Indicators: • Is attentive to customers’ needs even during busy periods. • Continually improve relationships with customers by focusing individualized attention. • Takes ownership of customer issues and actively seeks ways to improve customer service.

So you see that all these are observable behavior indicators. We can observe if the employee is attentive to the customer’s needs or not. If he or she is working on improving relationships with the customers by giving them individualized attention, and if he or she takes ownership of the customer’s issues.

Now the staff can be rated on competency keeping in mind the behavior indicators. They can be rated on a scale of 1 to 5 or 1 to 10. Informal terms the scale is called the rubric scale.

Let’s understand this in more detail look at this chat:

Proficiency Level	Meaning
Level 1 = Novice	Is struggling in demonstrating relevant behaviors of competency.
Level 2 = Learner	Knows and understands, however, may commit mistakes in applying sometimes.
Level 3 = Pracititioner	Knows, understands, and applies with a fair degree of consistency.
Level 4 = Expert	Knows, understands, applies, and innovates with a fair degree of consistency.
Level 5 = Master	A role model for a competency, often quoted when looking for a standard, can coach others.

Now for each competency, we can give the employer a rating from 1 to 5 but what do these 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 mean? Well, the rubric scale helps us to define the meaning of these numbers. So here is as you can see all the levels in detail-

Level 1 means that the employee is at the novice level. We will give a 1 rating when the employee struggles with demonstrating relevant behavior of competency.

Level 2 means he is a learner so the employee knows and understands the behavioral indicators but makes mistakes when applying the same. For example, he understands that he needs to give individualized attention to the customers but is unable to do so practically.

Level 3 is a practitioner to the employees not only know, and understand but can also apply the behavioral indicators of the competency with a fair degree of consistency.

Level 4 is the expert we rate an employee for on any competency when he or she knows, understands, applies as well as innovates with a fair degree of consistency.

Level 5 is master an employee is given 5 on competencies when he or she behaves as a role model for displaying that critical competency. Such employees are often coated when looking for a standard, and can even coach others on the new competency.

Now one can also give more details specific to the competency and for the various levels. Let’s see an example of this look at the table given below-

Emotional Maturity– Emotional Maturity is the ability to maintain a sense of professionalism and emotional restraint when provoked, when faced with hostility from others, or when working under conditions of increased stress. It also includes the ability to work effectively under stressful situations, remain resilient, and maintain stamina over the long term.

Level 1: Restrains Emotional Impulses	• Resists temptation to act immediately when it is inappropriate. • Feels strong emotions (such as anger, extreme frustration, or high stress) but does not react.
Level 2: Response Calmly	• Feels strong emotions in the course of a conversation or other tasks, such as anger, extreme frustration, or high stress; holds the emotions back, and continues to act calmly and respectfully towards others. • Acknowledges angering actions or stressful situations and is able to think through and then respond in a calm and composed manner.
Level 3: Manages Stress Effectively	• When feeling strong emotions (such as anger or frustration), holds back and/or removes self from the situation to reduce a negative impact on others. • Responds constructively and professionally to challenges. Provocation and/or disappointments. Uses deliberate strategies or self-control to ensure the ability to function and provide effective leadership in situations of stress or adversity.
Level 4: Calms Others During Periods of High Stress or Adversity	• In stressful situations controls own emotions and calm others as well. • Demonstrates maturity and self-control to engage effectively when challenged or while dining an outcome through. • Remains non-defensive, composed, and optimistic to seek a positive resolution to a highly challenging situation by managing self and others.
Level 5: Maintains Effectiveness Despite Prolonged Stressors	• Able to maintain focus and keep up the stamina for self and others in face of the extremely contentious situations, or during repeated exposure to difficult demands. • Applies specific techniques such as planning ahead to manage optimized stress in self and others; coaches and mentors others to do the same.

Here in the above table, we have the name of the competency which is emotional maturity, and a detailed description of the same. So here it’s written that emotional maturity is the ability to maintain a sense of professionalism and emotional restraint when provoked, when faced with hostility from others, or when working under conditions of increased stress.

It also includes the ability to work effectively under stressful situations, remain resilient, and maintain stamina over the long term.

Then we have the various levels here along with the behavioral indicators of the proficiency level.

• Level 1 is when the employees are able to Restrains Emotional Impulses.
• Level 2 is when he or she Response Calmly to situations.
• Level 3 is when the person can Manage Stress Effectively.
• Level 4 is when the person can Calm Others During Periods of High Stress or Adversity.
• Level 5 is when the person Maintains Effectiveness Despite Prolonged Stressors.

And here if you see the proficiency at each level is described in detail. You can go above and reach through it if you like it will help you develop a strong understanding of how to do a competency-based job analysis.

Now let’s take another example this is for the competency on client focus.

Level 1	Level 2	Level 3	Level 4	Level 5
Responds to immediate client needs	Maintains client contact	Provides added value	Provides seasoned advice	Ensures continued service excellence
Responds to client needs in a timely, professional, helpful, and courteous manner, regardless of client altitude.	Follows up with clients during and after delivery of services to ensure that her needs have been met.	Looks for ways to add value beyond clients’ immediate requests.	Acts as a seasoned advisor, providing an independent opinion on complex client problems and novel initiatives and assisting with decision-making.	Formulates strategies and processes to evaluate emerging and longer-term opportunities and threats to meeting clients’ needs.
Shows clients that their perspectives are valued.	Keeps clients up to date on the progress of the service they are receiving and changes that affect them.	Addresses the unidentified, underlying, and long-term client needs.	Pushes client to consider difficult issues that are in their best interests.	Determines strategic business direction to best meet chants evolving needs.

We will not be going through it in detail inside it we expect that you will be able to understand it on your own now. Again you can go above and read through it once. Don’t get scared about how you are going to write all of this we will help you in writing behavior indicators.

Now while doing a competency-based job analysis we generally choose 8 to 10 competencies for each job profile and then detail each competency along with the proficiency levels.

There are various applications that people look at in detail later. When it comes to writing in a job posting this detailed information can be used to mention the required and preferred expectations for the job.

Now you remember we had said that these competencies can serve as a checklist while hiring usually if you will see the same profiles across a specific department have almost the same competencies with the difference in required proficiency levels.

So both the City sales manager and Regional manager will require communication skills, rapport-building skills, time management e.t.c. But may require them in varying degrees so the City manager may be required to be 4 out of 7 for the rapport-building skills, while the regional manager may be required to be a 6 out of 7.

Let’s look at this chat to understand this better. This format is called a competency Matrix.

Competency Name	Sales Executive	Sales officer	City Manager	Regional Manager	National Sales Head
A	3	3	4	4	5
B	2	3	3	5	5
C	2	2	2	3	3
D	1	1	2	2	3
E	3	3	3	2	2
F	1	1	3	3	5
G	4	4	4	3	3
H	2	2	2	3	3
I	4	4	4	2	2
J	1	1	2	2	3

So here we see the various profiles for the marketing department starting from the lowest level sure to the highest level of descent and these are the competencies. We have only used letters here for your ease of understanding. Now these numbers here indicate the minimum rating on a scale of 5 required for each competency across each profile.

So if you see the sales executive needs a 3 in Competency A. 2 in B and so on. Now if you notice here the numbers are increasing in the right direction for competency A. Which is easy to understand and what is expected.

Such as your manager or someone who is more experience than you will have a better rating in a competency if you belong to the same department right.

But if you come to competency G and I, you will see an anomaly in the strength here the juniors are required to have more proficiency in these competencies than the seniors.

Now, what could be the reason for this? well, maybe they could be competencies in using some specific software or tools which are used by the juniors and not by the seniors and so the proficiency levels required for each profile are mentioned accordingly. 

What is competency mapping?

Competency mapping is the process of identification of key competencies for an organization and/or a job and is used for different functions such as job analysis, recruitment, training e.t.c.

In many places, you will see that people use the words competency mapping and competency-based job analysis interchangeably. So this means that the competency-based job analysis is not only used for writing the job post or for recruitment but has other applications also.

Applications of Competency-Based Job Analysis

The applications of competency-based job analysis also act as a foundation for a variety of human resource development initiatives. The applications of competency-based job analysis are as follow-

• Manpower Planning
• Recruitment and Selection
• Evaluating Performance and Remuneration
• Training and Development
• Utilizing

Manpower Planning

The first application is manpower planning by using competencies here the HR in top management now not only knows how many people are required but also knows the competencies required in these people. So there is a better understanding of the kind of people required and not just the head count.

So let’s see your company’s sales ACs and you want to hire 5 sales executives. Now earlier you would have started looking for any kind of executive. But after knowing the competencies required you can be more focused on your planning.

For example– you want five sales executives with product knowledge of AC, excellent selling skills, and a positive attitude thus, the focus is not only on quantity but also on quality also.

Recruitment and Selection

The second application is recruitment and selection. So the competencies can provide the framework to the panel of recruiters against which they can select or reject each candidate. This helps in being more focused while selecting candidates.

We have already seen how this can be done in the example of the marketing departments above. So basically now that you know the competencies required for a particular job profile you can be more focused on finding the right candidate that fits.

Let’s say you want to hire a retail store executive you also know that a retail store executive needs to be punctual so that he is present in the store when the customer arrives, does while hiring you can clearly find out whether the candidates you are selecting are punctual or not.

Had you not known that you wanted punctuality in this role you would have not looked for it in the candidate and you would end up hiring a missed fit. So you see how knowing the competencies for each job profile gives more clarity to the recruiters as well as to the candidate. So you can use this competency matrix while hiring as well.

Evaluating Performance and Remuneration

The third application is evaluating performance and remuneration. Competencies are used as benchmarks against which the assessors can understand the current status and gap. It is also helpful in ensuring self-awareness.

Now, these competencies help in giving parameters for performance appraisals. So the managers can now assess each employee against a list of competencies, and then see if they match the minimum expectation or average or are excellent in a particular competency.

For example– let’s say while recruitment for a roll the rating of 2 out of 7 for a competency A was okay. But after working for 6 months you want the minimum threshold to be 3.

You can link this with remuneration as well. So you can say that if the employee has a rating of 5 out of 7 he/she will be given a 10% hike for those who have 6 out of 7 will get 15%, and those who have 7 out of 7 will get a 20% hike. So you see how competencies are also put into use for deciding remuneration.

Training and Development

The fourth application is in training and development. Based on the evaluation of the employee HR can plan training and development sessions based on these competencies to fill the gap.

So let’s say when you hire a salesperson he/she has a rating of 2 out of 7 in the competency of product knowledge, but you want him/her to have a rating of 4 out of 7. So you can organize a training session for upskilling this new joinee. Now after the training is done you can again evaluate the employee and see if he/she has a rating of a minimum of 4 or not.

Utilizing

The Lost application we will look at is utilizing. So employees can be given various tasks based on that competency. Let’s say the marketing team has two marketing managers both managers A and B are in the same position.

But A is an extrovert while will B is a more analytical inner approach. In this case, A can be given assignments on client interaction while B can be asked to make reports.

I hope you understand. Now, having knowledge about the competencies for each profile can actually help the HR and managers drive various other functions in the life cycle of an employee, and apply a more focused approach.

So competency mapping and competency-based job analysis are not just used for writing job descriptions or for job postings but are important and useful in many HR functions.

With this, till now we have understood what is meant by competency-based job analysis, we have looked at the various examples of how to write the description for various competencies, along with the details of the proficiency levels, also we have seen how this can be put to use while hiring for recruitments, and we ended up by understanding the meaning of competency mapping, and the various applications of competency-based job analysis.

So, that is all for today guys see you in our next blog. If you like our article please don’t forget to share it with others & follow our Instagram page for your daily dose of Motivation, and if you want jobs & internships updates or more articles like this you can follow our Linkedin page too.

Thank You,

Regards

Grooming Urban

Also Read What is competency, the KSA model of competency mapping, and the different types of competencies What are Job Analysis, Job Description, and Job Specification? Manpower Planning, Its importance, types, steps & factors involved in forecasting manpower requirements. The Functions of HRM, SCAMPER Technique, & Challenges in the Role of HR What is Human Resource Management (HRM)

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