The hunt for tech talent never stops. To have the best results, employers not only have to keep their recruitment team up, but also need an effective competency management to maintain employee's development and track if their tech skills are relevant to their current role. Who are competency managers? Why are they important in tech? What benefits can they facilitate? Let’s find out.
WHO IS A COMPETENCY MANAGER?
Competency manager –is a C-level executive, responsible for: 1) identifying the key skills that an employee needs to obtain the target level of performance in a specific role; 2) facilitating the growth and reconfiguration of employee skills to fit them within the business strategy of your company.
Normally, competency manager engagement is needed during workforce planning, talent acquisition, succession management, and other stages of employee carrier path.
To dive further into competency management, let’s define the very concept of competencies.
WHAT ARE THE COMPETENCIES?
Competencies are the set of skills, values, and behaviors of a certain employee. Competencies define not the professional objectives themselves but more how these objectives will be achieved.
“Customer focus,” “integrity,” “safety first” attitude, or some technical abilities are all examples of competencies. Clearly defined competencies make an employee’s professional life so much easier. He or she knows exactly what to do, how to accomplish company goals and what results are expected from them.
COMPETENCY MANAGEMENT FOR EMPLOYEES
In-house competency management starts within the management teams. Working closely with a competency manager they should create a list of 7-10 competencies for each role within your company.
The result of such collaboration should be a competency model that will articulate to the specialists what is expected of them in their job, and how to achieve their performance goals at your company.
COMPETENCY MANAGEMENT FOR EMPLOYERS
Defining and formulating key competencies of your organization is also one of the competency manager's responsibilities.
Every company needs a competency framework. Normally, it is a list of 4-6 key competencies. Competency framework helps to build and articulate values and culture of your company, while differentiating it from competitors.
WHY IS COMPETENCY MANAGEMENT IMPORTANT IN TECH?
When it comes to developers, easily switching jobs due to high demand, competency management is crucial.
If your company wants to hire the best tech talent, the first thing you should provide is continuous training opportunities. Programmers do care about the company’s tech stack.
As to Stack Overflow, training opportunities are the second most important reason for a job change after a compensation. Competency manager studies the knowledge and skills of your company employees to provide them with better opportunities for learning and growth.
THE BENEFITS OF COMPETENCY MANAGEMENT
Employee retention boost
Retention is a serious challenge in IT recruitment. Finding and recruiting an employee is a time-consuming and costly process. No wonder that companies want their talents to stay with them for as long as possible. When your team sees that you care about their career growth, they will more likely stick with you longer and be more loyal along the way.
Reduced recruitment and training costs
Always having a full picture of your team competencies (or the skills they are mastering on the way), can help you eliminate the need to hire externally.
In this regard you might want to invest in internal training and events such as hackathons to boost your team’s expertise. Budget that is normally spent on talent sourcing and recruitment can be optimized in repurposed within the company.
Increased productivity
Another benefit of implementing a competency management approach is an increase in motivation and productivity. Company transparency and career plan are the cornerstones of this process.
In simple words, if your company develops clear career paths and invests in training, your employees will do their best to fit in. On the other hand, when company management is open about its financial and market goals, the team will understand how their work benefits the business and become more productive.
Better hiring process
Hiring mistakes can be incredibly costly. Studies show that 80% of talent turnover happens because of hiring the wrong people.
Competence management makes sure that each new employee you hire effectively adds value to your business.
Better succession
Hiring senior talents is an especially expensive and lengthy process. Competency management can help with that too.
You might not even need to seek externally. Being fully informed of your employees’ skill sets and career goals, you will clearly see the specialist deserving a promotion. This way you can also detect a candidate for further training and replacing the employee who leaves.
IN A NUTSHELL
The potential for your organizational growth lies within your team. Along with team leaders and HR department, competency managers can connect the skills of your team with company goals, while lowering an attrition rate, boosting employee performance, and helping in effective succession planning.
