Why Competency-based Management?

As a first step, the competencies needed by the employees should be

defined. This process will ensure that the organization is well positioned to achieve its vision and strategic goals
and initiatives, and to support its values. Once defined, the competencies will serve as the foundation for an
integrated set of HR processes and tools that can be used in Career Management, Learning and Development,
Succession Planning, Recruitment and Performance Management. This program includes a series of fundamental
HR building blocks that will support new ways of operating with respect to the management of the human
resources. Once defined the competencies will provide the means for integrating all human resource activities and
managing human resources at the developmental (Career Management & Learning), the tactical (Recruitment,
Selection, Promotion, etc.) and strategic levels (long term planning to meet the organization’s strategic goals).
They, therefore, impact on almost every initiative and activity in the organization that relate to the effective
management of human resources.

Competency Structure RequirementsThe start point for any competency application is a competency
profile that is valid and constructed in a way that it can be easily used to support all of its intended purposes.
Establishing a clear competency structure is one of the first and fundamental steps in profile development. A
competency structure describes the common rules for defining competencies for success within the organization.
It includes the guiding principles that describe how the profiles will be designed for the entire organization - e.g.,
the format for displaying the competency profile, content for the profile (e.g. behavioural competencies and
technical / professional competencies), core vs unique competencies, etc. There are four basic criteria that the
competency structure must meet: 1. The content of the profiles must demonstrate the competencies that
employees must have, both now and in the future, to achieve the organization’s vision and support its values; 2.
The profiles must support career management, learning and development, succession planning and, as the
program evolves, employee performance management as well as recruitment and staffing; 3. The profiles must
incorporate the more general behavioural competencies needed for success in roles or occupational groups (e.g.
teamwork), as well as the specific technical / professional requirements needed; and finally, 4. All profiles must be
easy to use by all stakeholders.

Reflecting the Vision & Values Throughout the competency profiling process it will be necessary to build
on the important work that has already been accomplished in defining the vision and values for the organization.

End Uses of the Profiles The profiles can be used to support career management, learning and
development, succession planning, recruitment, and as the program evolves employee performance management
as well as staffing. As such, therefore, the profiles must be constructed to support all of these end uses for the
targeted employee groups. • Career Management By definition, career management calls for employees and / or
the leadership of the organization to be able to compare employee competencies against those competency
requirements for both current as well as other roles or jobs in the organization. Thus, the competency structure
must allow the organization and employees to draw comparisons across jobs, roles or levels in the organization.
For example, employees aspiring to advance within career streams must be able to compare the competencies and
proficiency requirements across the more junior to senior levels of this stream. For those employees wishing to
make a career transition, the competency structure must also allow employees to compare their current
competencies with competency requirements outside the typical or traditional occupational career paths. The
competency structure must allow all of this to occur easily and effectively. • Employee Learning and Development
Closely linked to the career development process, the learning tools and programs must support not only the
assessment of individual learning needs to perform in one’s current role, but also to advance in one’s career. The
setting and execution of individual learning plans to address these needs and the assessment of the extent to
which learning goals were met can support learning for current jobs/roles as well as career development for other
roles to which the employee aspires. Also, the competency structure must support goals for continuous
organizational improvement and ongoing knowledge management and enhancement consistent with the
organization’s vision. • Succession Planning and Leadership Development Succession planning and leadership
development includes all of those HR processes needed to ensure that there is a pool of qualified candidates ready
and able to assume key roles with the organization as they become vacant. Typical elements include: the
forecasting of movement and position vacancies within the organization; the definition of the competency
requirements for the various key roles and levels; the regular assessment of current employee competencies
against the requirements and predicted vacancies; and, the planned movement (e.g. career assignments) and
development of employees (e.g. formal development programs; mentoring; self-directed learning; etc.) to prepare
them for future roles and levels within the organization. Succession planning differs from career management in
the extent to which the activities are employee versus organizationally driven. While the organization is
responsible for providing the structures, tools and processes to support effective career management it is typically
an employee-drive process – in other words, it is up to the employee with the assistance of his/her supervisor to
take advantage of the structures, tools and processes the organization has in place to advance in his/her career.
While all employees must take responsibility for planning and managing their personal careers, succession
planning tends to be a more proactive organizationally driven program of activities on the assumption that having
vacancies in key roles would leave the organization vulnerable. • Performance Management The Performance
Management process can be broadly defined to include: o all those functions that support the communication of
performance expectations to employees; o setting individual performance plans consistent with these
expectations; o ongoing feedback and management of performance to support employees in meeting their
performance goals and expectations; and o end of cycle reviews to evaluate how well employees have performed
over the year and to plan for the next performance cycle. While the performance management process must
support the business goals of the organization (i.e. translation of what the organization must accomplish into what
each employee must accomplish), organizations typically use competencies to define how the organization expects
employees to behave in the performance of their job duties (e.g. through teamwork; with integrity; oriented
toward achieving results; with a focus on the client; etc.). Thus, organizations often include competencies in the
planning, review and evaluation cycle to complement and enhance the feedback provided to employees on their
personal performance. • Staffing & Recruitment The competency profiles must support reliable, valid, fair and
unbiased recruitment and selection decisions. They provide the standards for assessing whether candidates have
the potential or capabilities to perform successfully in the target role or career stream. As such, therefore, the
competency profiles must reflect the true (bona fide) requirements for entry into job roles / positions in the
organization and they must not unfairly discriminate against groups protected under Canadian Human Rights and
Employment Equity legislation. They must be sufficiently comprehensive to support the development or selection
of reliable, valid, fair and unbiased screening and selection tools and processes. Incorporation of more general
behavioural as well as technical/professional competencies A complete profile for a job or group of jobs includes
not only the general behavioural competencies (e.g. Client Focus; Results Orientation), but also the specific
technical / professional skills and knowledge needed to perform in target role/job or functional community. Easy
to UseCompetency profiles need to be simple to understand and use to ensure broad acceptance by all
stakeholders (e.g. managers, employees, HR professionals, employee unions/bargaining groups, etc.), while still
supporting all of the intended end uses (see above). For example, “best practices” research suggests that a profile
should have no more than 10 to 12 general behavioural competencies. Otherwise, the tools and processes on
which they are based become unwieldy, time consuming and difficult for employees and managers to use.
Competency Structure The following is an example of a basic competency structure: • Core Competencies The
Core competencies include those key competencies that all employees in the organization must possess to achieve
its mandate and vision. These competencies describe in behavioural terms the key values of the organization and
represent those competencies that are core to the organization’s principal mandate. • Career Stream
Competencies The Career Stream competencies are those behavioural competencies that are common to the all
jobs in the stream, and combined with the organization-wide (core) competencies, make up the suite of
behavioural competencies necessary for success in the Stream. • Technical / Professional Competencies The
technical/professional competencies tend to be specific to occupational areas, roles and / or jobs within the Career
Stream, and include the specific skills and knowledge (know-how) to perform effectively within the jobs of the
Stream (e.g. ability to use particular software; knowledge in particular professional areas such as finance,
biochemistry; etc.). These competencies could be generic to the Career Stream as whole, or be specific to roles,
levels or jobs within the group. The combination of these three types of competencies will make up the
competency model for each of the Career Streams.