Competency profile for the US President.
I watched Lincoln the other day
and was impressed both with the film as
well as Daniel Day Lewis’s acting which has been giving him awards at all the
major events. As I watched the film progress on the main theme of the 13th
Amendment, what struck me was the sheer determination shown by Abraham Lincoln
who managed to win an incredible victory using means fair or foul as one of the
characters put it” by the purest man in America”. Watching the entire drama unfold,
the HR professional in me asked the question ’ what are the competencies
required to be a successful President’ and
by implication, to assess the competencies required by anyone to succeed
, be it in corporate or personal environment or even in government.
As if on cue, also happened to
read an interview with David McClelland, often referred to as the Father of
Competency Profiling where he suggested that while designing the Competency
matrix, care must be taken to study the best, the average as well as the most
representative sample, to get a realistic picture of what should work best for
a company. While a typical Behavioural Event Interview is suggested when
meeting representative job holders, functional analysis for various activities
is equally critical to understand the process as well as the people, managing
various functions.
A look at the practices followed
by companies trying to arrive at the Competency Matrix indicates that due to
time as well as fee constraints, most companies using Consultants for this
activity, restrict the BEI as well as profiling to cover only a few of the
senior levels, thus leaving a vast majority of the working population
uncovered. A Competency matrix, based on such data will obviously miss out on
some important functions and activities and be rather ineffective. Thus in a
manufacturing plant , if only the Managers and above are involved in
formulating the Matrix, we lose out on
work related ( technical and behavioural) competencies of those on the
shop floor (night shift, supervisors, packing line etc.) whose entire work and
life cycles have an impact on the way the work is done at the plant.
My own view is that a driver needs
a competency matrix just as much as the Vice President or Plant Head though the
level of the skills and knowledge may be rudimentary for the driver, while
behavioural demonstration need to be in line with the Company culture. (think
of the driver fetching an important visitor from the airport where a lot of
critical first impressions are being made).
Another interesting aspect of the
Competency aspect is how little of the information gathered, generally from
seniors who are men, helps in developing a matrix where women may come to
occupy very senior positions. A mention made by some practitioners is to note
how aggressiveness is a competency associated with men while women managers can
be equally assertive in a more balanced manner. Some of the most successful
Women CEOs in India probably owe a lot to their mentors ( a leading Bank, large
MNCs come to mind) who in turn could also contribute to developing a distinctly
gender neutral Competency matrix for the future where a number of able lady
managers of today could take charge.
A third category is the
unorganized sector where the term Competency is almost unheard of but where a
large number of companies have grown to attract attention. Here again a study
into the reasons for their success and healthy margins would throw up some
basic truths of entrepreneurship, ability to overcome hurdles using native ingenuity
and the art of achieving a lot with limited resources. While the search for
identifying Core Competencies seems to be on the wane, a lot could be learned
of the competencies required for managing multiple tasks in the unorganized
sector.
Another interesting feature I
noticed is the Competency of Customer Service Orientation, considered essential
for the service sector. But then do we not need it for the manufacturing sector
where a major setback by way of rejection of finished goods can be avoided if
the same competency of customer orientation is inculcated among the production
staff? Or again, the competency termed as Leveraging Relationships, so
necessary in the service sector can also be very effective in other sectors
both for internal as well as external customers.
In short, when we talk of
developing a Competency matrix for any organisation, what is critical is not
just what is gathered from the Top Management
but also how successful we are in capturing the Culture Competencies
which can broadly be identified under Relationship, Achievement as well as Personal attributes of
getting work done and celebrating success. A combination of Functional and
Behavioural Competencies therefore will help in arriving at a reasonably
balanced Competency Matrix for an organisation. It will then be easy to define
a matrix with different degrees of competencies applicable to those in
functions at all levels. More and more youngsters joining the workforce today
are keen to develop their competencies just as the older workforce struggle to
catch up with them on technical competency.
While on competency needed for
various positions, it may do good for all of us if someone can actually define
the Competency profile needed for our Politicians and Ministers as the fortunes
of an entire nation and over a billion people are dependent on them.
Feedback from readers is most welcome.
Job Xavier- Mumbai
98923 29188
