Competency assessment definition and examples

30 of June, 2022

Competency assessment casts a long shadow as a primary area of responsibility of HR departments. It was first conceived in the seventies as an orientation away from intelligence tests, university grades and dazzling CV’s to focusing on the “value” that a new hire may bring to an organization. Keep reading and find out how competency assessments can help you hire the right candidate. 

What is a competency assessment?

The term really took off in a 1990 article, Harvard Business Review by Gary Hamel and CK Prahalad. They argued persuasively that core competency is unique to every organization and provides a competitive advantage. That led to a focus on culture and how a new hire would fit with the company’s mission.

Competency assessment is based on a collection of success factors across several different domains. Widening KSA’s legacy of knowledge, skills and abilities into such areas as motives, traits, self-concept, and responses to varied on-the-job situations. These domains combine each other into a single field as competency models against which applicants are variously tested for their alignment with the organizations core needs, values and mission. 

What makes the work of HRM’s especially difficult? To work across so many domains that are not as easy to assess as intelligence and technical skills, such as: problem-solving skills, analytical thinking, emotional maturity, interpersonal skills, conflict resolution, adaptability and innovation. Even harder is to combine these core competencies into actionable Business Intelligence (BI).

But good news, there are tools available for HR’s most challenging task, and Sesame HR is one of them. Gain actionable intelligence from complex data-sets with people analytics; a sophisticated tool specifically designed for this task.

How to test competency assessment effectively

When it comes to testing competency, HR managers need to generate a small list of characteristics from different domains. Then look at each job and analyze superior performers from poor ones. But how is this done? Here are a few ways to test candidate competency.

Competency-Based Interview

HR sets a list of set questions focusing narrowly on one or another specific competency comparing demonstrable performance in the past against the core competency criteria and marked accordingly on the principle that past behavior is the best indicator of future performance. The questions are often generic as in:

• Describe a situation in which you showed leadership.
• Tell me of a time when you handled conflict in the workplace.
• What has been your biggest achievement in life?
• Tell me about a time when you improved your workplace.

The only problem is that the candidate may answer following the STAR model:

• Briefly describe the Situation 
• Explain the Task 
• Outline the Action 
• Summarize the Result

Competency-based questionnaires

Competency-based questionnaires set before an applicant a list of standardized questions and/or ones developed solely for the purpose of competency mapping. But, these questionnaires are very specific; they differ based on whether they’re designed for employees, for managers or for senior-level executives. The Common Metric Questionnaire (CMQ) covers five domains: background, contact with people, decision making, physical and mechanical activity and work setting.  Functional Job Analysis (FJA) is a qualitative analysis in target areas: things, data, worker instructions, reasoning, people, mathematics and language. 

Assessment Centers

Contrary to first impressions, assessment centers are not physical locations, but rather a process to determine the “fit” or suitability of candidates to a specific type of  job role. The different job tasks are simulated in the form of validated test series in order to assess whether the key competencies of the candidate are aligned with the competencies by the company in demonstrated activity. 

Direct Observation 

The applicant works responding to client calls, carrying out technical activities or interacting with colleagues in specific on-the-job situations. As a prior list of positive and negative on the job behavior is prepared in terms of competencies needed and mistakes on the job. The goal is to identify critical incidents on-the-job when the employee was successful or not successful in meeting the job requirements to assess the possibility of success or failure in just those critical situations in one or another workplace.

Psychometric Assessment

Psychometric assessments are instruments to assess the mental capacities and behavioral styles of employees in an organization in the domains of aptitude, reasoning, achievement, and personality testing. 

Sesame’s performance management is road tested

It has escaped no one in HR departments that our role is changing with the circumstances that surround us. In today’s business environment hybrid work needs a new set of skills, and the competency assessment format itself needs to evolve. To gain actionable insights from data silos we need a unified view of data; here is where Sesame HR comes in to play.

Reporting, and analytics need to stay up-to-date so that the HR managers gain the needed business intelligence (BI) in real-time to keep up with new challenges. Sesame HR is a software that has many features. One of them is the ability to build a great work environment through performance management. It delivers visual and up-to-date competency mapping and reporting. It is a competency reporting instrument whose time has come.