Why You Need a Competency Framework

17 October 2017

There’s no doubt that, if you want to progress as a manager, you need to continually develop your competencies, skills and knowledge. To do that successfully, you must have a clear idea where you stand right now and where you want to be in the future.

Why You Need a Competency Framework

A manager competency framework provides an outline for the clear assessment of your current abilities and your potential development. It’s a way of creating a plan of action that hits the mark. We all have strengths and weaknesses and understanding these is the key to moving forward. Competency frameworks are not only useful for managers but can also help develop other staff in more focused and productive ways.

Building a Personal Development Plan

Personal development requires you to take control of your own future. It works best when you have assessed your current status and are realistic about what you need to improve and the skills that must be developed. This can’t be done in a vacuum and, while self-evaluation can get you so far, input from others is vital.

We often see ourselves in a subjective light so it’s important to get feedback from those around us. This could include feedback from peers, work colleagues or through working with a mentor or coach to help identify those important developmental areas.

In short, this is all about getting to know yourself, warts and all.

What Are Your Values and Competencies?

Core values are the things you believe in and how you react not just in the work place but in life in general. These cover aspects such as:

  • Integrity: How you handle power and authority, whether you make a decision and stand by it, and how you act when dealing with issues of unprofessional or unethical behaviour.
  • Professionalism: How you view work and achievements, your competence in certain areas, and how you handle different challenges in the workplace and how you react to stress.
  • Respect for diversity: How you handle people from different backgrounds, whether you treat men and women or people from different ethnic backgrounds equally, and how you work to avoid stereotypical responses.

Your core competencies are the skills and abilities you need to do your job. These include good communication, the ability to work in a team, planning projects and organising teams to reach business goals or how you keep up with the latest technology. Managerial competencies are an extra layer and cover aspects such as your vision for the future, your ability to serve as a role model for others, how you build trust and the way you make decisions.

Having a list of easily identifiable competencies gives managers the chance to clearly inform future continuing professional development. It allows you to review current performance on each competency and then set your own goals and PDP to improve areas where there needs to be improvement. It also gives those around you who may be providing feedback a better insight into the kind of information that is relevant to each competency.

Let’s take communication as an example. As with any competency, this will have a number of positive and negative indicators. A positive one would be that you speak and write clearly and effectively or that you are able to tailor your language or approach to the audience you are addressing during a meeting or presentation. A negative indicator could be that you lack confidence when talking to a group or that you tend to stick to one style of communication, irrespective of your audience.

The competency framework gives you a number of parameters to judge and rates your performance from unsatisfactory, through to needing more development, competence and then outstanding performance.

Without a clear understanding of how you are performing and what goals you need to achieve, your personal development can become something of a lottery and may well lose direction. At its heart, a competency framework provides you with a clear route to success, enabling you to focus on those aspects of your performance that matter.

To explore applying Competency Frameworks in your organisation contact solved hr. Call us on 07714 790024 or email info@solvedhr.co.uk