Major problems in constructing competency framework

Author: Iloka Benneth Chiemelie

Published: 18th of March 2014

What do you see as a major problem in constructing a competency framework?

The importance of competency in HRM is measured on the understanding that it helps to determine the best qualities of a company’s human resource. For instance, a competent HR will ensure continued sustainability of the business strategy because the workforce will always perform in line with company’s standards, while the reverse will have a negative effect. Thus, it is important that companies develop their own competency framework in line with set corporate objective. However, such development is not so easy and it comes with a number of issues.

One of the issues involves creating a distinction between competence and competency. This is because they are different in their own nature and cannot be combined, thus confusion between them is a great issues when it comes to constructing the framework. Other areas of criticism of competency framework come in terms of both method and conceptual assumption. One of such criticisms is the case of its static nature, which doesn’t allow for a focus on future, identification of limited range of competencies that can easily be measured and the provision of greater insight into the present behaviors that are rewarded by the management instead of taking into account what effective performance should be in the future (Townley, 1999; Townley and Ezard, 2013). Still in line with understanding issues of developing competency framework, criticisms point to the fact that the framework is too simple, which means human personality are increase and social context is used as the main bases for exercising competence (Elragig and Townley, 2012; Li et al., 2012; Rebarber et al., 2012).

From the above discussion, it can be seen that the major issues in constructing competency framework involves understanding how such frameworks can be developed in line with long-term plans of the company instead of just focusing on present performance, and how social factors can be discounted from the framework in order to determine the workforce’s qualities.

Do you find these frameworks used regularly in your industry or culture? 

Industry based view – yes, this framework is used constantly in my company especially during the period of employment. Applicants are interviewed based on their identified competence and also assigned jobs that meet such. Even after employment, my company has an indirect way of measuring individual’s competence. One of such ways is through their colleagues, who are assigned to rate other staffs based on how they feel these staffs are performing their jobs. Thus, competence framework is a common tool in the organization I work in, and the main purpose is same as identified in this case, which is to measure how staffs are aligning their skills towards the growth of the company.

Culture based view – in my culture, we have a saying that “a traveller is better than a wise man.” Thus, analysis of the above idiom shows that competence framework is very synonymous with my culture. More attention is given to an individual’s ability to do it (competence) and how long he has been doing it (competence gained through experience), instead of how old the person is.

References

Elragig A, Townley S. (2012) A new necessary condition for Turing instabilities, Math Biosci, volume 239, no. 1, pages 131-138, DOI:10.1016/j.mbs.2012.04.006. [PDF]

Li G, Weiss G, Mueller M, Townley S, Belmont MR. (2012) Wave energy converter control by wave prediction and dynamic programming, Renewable Energy, volume 48, pages 392-403.

Rebarber R, Tenhumberg B, Townley S. (2012) Global asymptotic stability of density dependent integral population projection models, Theor Popul Biol, volume 81, no. 1, pages 81-87, DOI:10.1016/j.tpb.2011.11.002.

Townley S, Ezard TH. (2013) A G matrix analogue to capture the cumulative effects of nongenetic inheritance, J Evol Biol, volume 26, no. 6, pages 1234-1243, DOI:10.1111/jeb.12089.

Townley S. (1996) Topological aspects of universal adaptive stabilization, SIAM Journal on Control and Optimization, volume 34, no. 3, pages 1044-1070.