Competency

Frameworks 2012:
Are they really being
used effectively?
A white paper by
Silent Edge - 2012

Abstract

This research was undertaken to

investigate the current state and usage
of competency frameworks in the UK.
It is known that objective measures, paired with
developmental training, yield better performance.
This research found that, although there is a
reasonable appetite for measuring competencies,
there is considerable uncertainty as to what sort
of things should be measured. The study found
that only 8% of HR Directors are currently in a
position to identify what good behaviour looks
like amongst their staff.

It is widely acknowledged that competency

frameworks are necessary. However, a lack of
clarity, understanding and expertise can make
it difficult to implement or identify the right
competencies for each role and how to measure
them. Although there is a drive towards using
objectively measureable criteria, there is currently
a lack of understanding about how to do that and
what needs to be done or measured.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Introduction

Organisations require consistency from

their employees, and the ability to
evolve. (Belschak, Den Hartog & Fay,
2010). It is important to have staff that
go beyond the narrow remit of the
role and are able to understand and
perform the full requirements of their
position.
An effective way to remove ambiguity and conflict
from the role is to clearly outline the scope,
remit and actions required to perform it (Rizzo,
House & Lirtzman, 1970). These guidelines can
be established through the use of competency
frameworks, which seek to identify and objectively
measure the key knowledge, skills and behaviours
required for the job. When the job holder is made
aware of these their performance is enhanced.
Therefore, clarity leads to higher levels of
attention to the relevant attributes.

Through the use of objective competency

frameworks, it is possible for the organisation
to give the job holder a well-defined route to
effective performance.
There is an old saying in the management sphere;
If you cant measure it, you cant manage it.
Defining and measuring effectiveness in the core
competencies, particularly the performance of key
workers, is a critical part of management.
As managers and leaders, we need to be able
to measure the right skills for the job and have
a mechanism in place that teaches staff how to
apply their knowledge, skills and behaviours.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Employing people in the first place is a skill, in

which a robust process, such as a multi-faceted
test, criteria based, assessment centre should
be used. Research by the University of Kent
(2011) shows that by measuring the right skills,
knowledge and behaviours (competencies),
assessment centres can offer an appraisal
of applicants with up to 68% accuracy. The
research shows that one of the most common
recruitment tools, the unstructured interview,
has a predictability factor of 15%. Furthermore,
research by both Boyatzis (1982) and McCLelland
(1994) showed that, when recruiting salespeople
for LOreal, 85% were successful in their role when
recruited using an assessment centre approach,
as opposed to only 59% when recruited using
a more traditional method. This 85% achieved
their quotas more often and showed greater
increase in sales per quarter. This means that
using role-specific, objective measure will ensure
that an organisation has the greatest chance of
employing an individual that will succeed.
However, recruiting people is only one part of
the resource equation. Organisations need to
ensure that they are continually measuring their
existing staffs competency. Without doing so,
performance, productivity and profitability are left
to chance.
By having a defined set of competencies for
each role in a business, it outlines to staff the
kind of behaviours each individual needs to
exhibit in order to achieve objectives. Staff work
more effectively and achieve their potential
and businesses benefit from linking personal
performance with corporate goals and values.

Success of sales teams

when employed using
competency measures
85%
59%

Fig 1: Showing the success of sales teams when

employed using competency measures.

What does this mean for HR and L&D?

Defining which competencies are necessary for
success in your organisation can help you do
the following:
Ensure that your people demonstrate
sufficient expertise.
Recruit and select new staff more
effectively making the recruitment
process less resource intensive.
Evaluate performance more effectively.
Evaluate skill and competency gaps. This
ensures the most effective development
programme is matched with the needs of
the individual.
Plan sufficiently for succession.
Make change management processes work
more efficiently.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Using competencies

The use of competencies has fallen in and out

of favour over time, but they are enjoying a
renewed interest at the moment (Sultana, 2009)
due to the more objective focus on performance
measurability in the contemporary organisation.
The modern competency framework can, in
part, be attributed to McClelland (1973), who
questioned the efficiency of IQ testing as a
means of measuring success at work. McClelland
argued that utilising intelligence appropriately in
skill specific roles requires focussed application
of competency, and thus a different method of
measuring and teaching.

What does this mean for HR and L&D?

The identification, management and
application of competencies has become
an important apparatus in the Managerial
and organisational toolkit, and can help
employees fulfil their potential.
Employing people is expensive. Employing
the wrong people, or not training them
to perform at their peak, accumulates
the expense through staff churn or lower
productivity output.

Competences have become a common

and vital tool for operationalising the
nature of the role.

Delamare-Le Deist and Winterton (2005) have

suggested that, when confronted by fast change
at work, organisations need to quickly identify,
measure and up-skill their workforce on the
relevant competencies required to fulfil the
evolving needs of the team.
The way in which competency is measured has
developed too, to incorporate, where required,
a 360 degree perspective (Sanghi, 2007). This
means that the individual self measures and peer
& manager ratings are all collected as useful data.
The use of traditional competency measurement
and the 360 approach, can enable the
organisation to realise the development needs
and skills of the labour force, including clarifying
job and role expectations, hiring the best people,
identifying the need to employ certain people,
maximising productivity, adapting to change and
aligning behaviour to organisational strategies,
needs and values (Lucia and Lepsinger, 1999).
Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Participants and procedure

Participants were drawn from

numerous organisations and multiple
industries across the UK.
They ranged from large global corporate
companies through to smaller startups. They were
approached directly through Silent Edge and
asked to complete an online survey. In total 138
organisations took part in the research.
The survey consisted of 13 questions, the results
of which are discussed further in the document.

A mixed methods approach was used to analyse

the data. This method helped to identify
quantitative and qualitative data, clarify the main
issues and themes within organisations, and
also to understand their attitudes to the use of
competency frameworks within their organisation.
Themes were defined as units derived from
patterns such as conversation topics, vocabulary,
recurring activities, meanings, feelings, or sayings
(Taylor & Bogdan, 1989). This grouping accounted
for the duplication of some statements and any
overlap of meaning that was attributed to local
dialect or cultural colloquialisms.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Results

The results show that, of the

organisations involved, the majority
had a competency framework in place.
71% of organisations that took part in the
research are using a competency framework
within their organisation.
Only 33% of the total population suggested
that it objectively measured the right
competencies, or was known to do so.
51% of frameworks have descriptions that
best describe different levels of competency
relevant to a behaviour which the manager
will tick according to their subjective opinion.
Objective measurement is defined as the ability to
check off known best practice items and critical
job incidents in an applied setting. This may
involve researched scorecards or the employment
of Behavioural Anchored Rating Systems (BARS).

More alarming is that 71% of companies have

implemented competency frameworks but only
48% of organisations can quantify an uplift in
performance. The objective of a competency
framework is to define best practice, measure
actual behaviour, and identify development
opportunities through evaluation. But if 48% of
companies are unable to identify the power of
having competency frameworks at the heart of an
HR strategy then HR Directors will find it difficult
to justify budgets during difficult times.
23% of managers do not like using the
frameworks and do not see any benefit, and yet
79% of respondents are thinking of implementing
or creating a competency framework at this time.
Review of competency frameworks is another
issue that was measured amongst the population.
It was clear from the responses that this is not an
area that enjoys a great deal of consideration.

Only 8% of the competency

frameworks in use today involve
objective measures and result in
positive behavioral change.
As only a third of users have confidence in the
measurable outcome, it is unsurprising that only
23% of HRDs identified positive behavioural
change from the use of these frameworks.
Surprisingly 35% of HR Directors are unable to
identify any outcomes from using a competency
framework.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Using vs measuring

77%

33%

33%
77%

Fig 2: Showing the difference between organisations using competency frameworks

and being able to objectively measure outcomes.

Identified behavioural change

35%

26%
23%
33%
77%
11%
4%

Fig 3: Identified behaviour change from measuring against a competency framework.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Below is a summary of how frequently

participants review their competency frameworks;
1 year 22%
2 years

27%

3 years 21%
4 years

3%

5 years 6%
Unspecified 20%
However, research done by Rodriguez et al. (2002)
demonstrates that if a competency framework
is sufficiently robust and defined then the shelf
life of that framework can be prolonged. This
message substantiates the comments we received
back, which suggested that if frameworks are
changed too often, then it will feel like the
goalposts are always being moved. For example,
to be effective at sales, there is a well defined
best practice approach. This approach has
been defined and agreed for many years and is
applicable across products, industries, countries
and cultures.

What does this mean for HR and L&D?

Being able to access a general globalised
competency framework for a specific
role is the most effective option as they
are more accurate in definition and offer
the greatest longevity. However, these
are costly for individual organisations to
develop themselves, even when they have
the identified expertise already employed.
It is therefore incumbent upon HR Directors
to identify the best fit solution, including
outsourcing where necessary.
The research demonstrates that the use
of home grown frameworks is not having
a positive impact on positive behavioural
change, as only 36% of HR Directors have
noted a favourable behavioural change
from their use.
With 47% of managers seeing either no
change or only a reasonable positive
change in behaviour from using
competency frameworks there is still some
work to do to demonstrate the benefits
and win their approval. So quantifying the
return on investment from framework use
is of paramount importance when looking
to secure managers commitment to using
them in everyday business.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

During the survey, a number of questions were

asked, which gave qualitative information in
return. For each of these questions, themed
analysis was undertaken with the following
findings.
One finding from the qualitative part of the
research is that there is a the lack of use of the
competency data after the assessment has been
completed.
We produced some interesting information
from the assessments but it seemed to go
nowhere thereafter as the managers did little
with it
After taking a lot of time to get the managers
to assess their teams we struggled to get them
engaged to help make the step change in
behaviour we were looking for
So it would seem that encouraging the use of
competency frameworks is one challenge, but
utilising the output to change capability and
performance is another.

How can you quantify uplift in

performance?
There are a number of different methods of
measuring uplift in performance and these
vary across the spectrum. For example, some
organisations are in the process of using a
360-degree approach to measurement, whilst
others suggest that using formal measurement
criteria, such as performance reviews and the
application of scoring ranges yield objective
scores. In some cases, the production of evidence
to support scoring is also used. But are scoring
ranges really objective? Surely there is a significant
amount of subjectivity involved, as one persons
perception of a 5 (on a scale of 1-5) would be very
different to someone elses.

Fig 4: How can you quantify uplift in performance?

Summarised responses using a word cloud.

It was also not clear how each organisation

actually manages to settle upon an actual score,
or what BARS they are using. Some simply
measure levels of competence through single
outcome measures, based on whether they had
hit their target or not for example.
There is, in practice, evidence of staff being
asked to self score their level of performance.
Many organisations suggest that measuring
competencies is either not easy to do, not
consistent, or something that they are aspiring to
achieve.
Finally, one organisation even suggested that
scoring against competencies is detrimental
to performance improvement, believing that
it is better to take people through levels of
achievement. Those that learn quicker, can
progress quicker. This view, however, appears
to contradict the research outlined above and
would still demand identification of the required
competencies to be able to know how to achieve.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

How do you know the outputs of the

competency framework are reliable?
Some organisations have an evidence based
process in place which is consistently reviewed,
and in some cases this is further supported by
use of a 360 methodology. In other cases, there
exists a global, companywide framework used
throughout the organisation to measure similar
role profiles, which matches the approach
suggested by Rodriguez et al. (above). It was also
mentioned that in some cases, the users of the
competency framework and the systems they are
contained within, should be trained in their use to
ensure a high level of consistency.

Our framework is critical to us to

measure performance.

Realistically, some organisations may not either be

using or even miss-using competency frameworks
due to the fact that they are not user friendly and
difficult to understand.

We are just not sure what we should

be measuring.
It was not uncommon to find that some
organisations only have a framework in place
for certain management levels. In these cases
respondants suggested that they would like
to improve upon this and identify / implement
further for different roles.

Fig 5: How do you know the outputs of the

competency framework are reliable? Summarised
responses using a word cloud.

Conversely, there were a number of organisations

who identified the failings of their framework,
but saw this as better than nothing, even
without being objective. One responder noted
that competency measurement was done by
each department, but there was a lack of shared
thinking across departments. Furthermore,
others suggested that their measurement and
output are getting better, but are a long way
from being complete. However, there were many
organisations that acknowledged that they simply
do not know whether the output is reliable or
whether they are measuring the right behaviours.
One even observed that they were not sure what
they should be measuring.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

When asked whether there is a particular reason

why an organisation would not implement a
competency framework it was clear that, for
many, the perceived complexity or sheer number
of job roles within the company was a consistent
theme. In some cases it simply came down to
the organisations current status, based on their
priorities at this point in time.
It is interesting to note that, given the known
power and organisational advantage of using
appropriate competency frameworks, only 22%
of respondents who are not currently using
competency frameworks are looking to implement
one within their organisation. Of these, 79% are
unsure where to go for advice to implement the
right framework for the right role.
Finally, we posed an open question asking for any
further comments on the subject.
Responses to this question were varied and
did not necessarily follow a theme. There were
suggestions that:
There is too much reliance on measurement.
Would you not rather have the people that
can solve problems creatively?
Some people are successful without fitting the
competency framework. We should not edit
out success.

Simplicity and ease of use are key. Must be in

useable business language.
Our system has expected behaviours
per grading band (1-3, 4-6, etc), which
has really helped managers to drive
transition/performance to the next level. We
have an ipsative approach that has made the
process more consistent.
Our framework is critical to us to measure
performance.
Most employees welcome an objective
measurement, structure and feedback for their
own development.
We have a developed and reviewed
framework, but we are not getting the best
out of it. This is frustrating.
Since introducing competency frameworks, we
have changed focus from the why are they
doing to the how are they doing it. It has
enabled us to change our culture and
reinforce assessments and training.
We have been using ours for just over a year
and are beginning to see some business
impacts. We will now look to do more longer
term evaluations of people.

We tried frameworks before but failed. We

now focus on using a more simple framework
linked to talent management.

Clear and measurable competency definitions

are of overall better use to orgnaisations in
terms of the output and information they
provide.

Competency should be directly linked to

business performance.

To be of value it has to measure the right

things.

Users must be trained to understand and use

the framework and develop their staff from
the output.

Open communication about the process is

essential. If this is done right a competency
framework is essential in order to establish
standards and clarify expectations.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Discussion & recommendations

The results suggest that there is

insufficient identification of good
quality or appropriate competency
frameworks in use by UK organisations.
Those organisations that are currently
using competency frameworks may not
be doing so effectively or correctly.
The potential outcome of this is that HR
professionals and business managers may be
attempting to invest in their people, but not
actually adding any value to the staff, the
organisation or the bottom line. Not correctly
measuring or knowing how to correctly measure
competency is ineffective, but to measure the
wrong competency and then implement a training
or development program or organisational
strategy around this is damaging.
Furthermore, a question mark remains over the
level of measurement alignment for the role and
also in the context of the corporate strategy.
There are many competency frameworks currently
in use that cannot objectively identify what good
behaviour looks like. It appears that the current
methods of measurement in the UK needs some
attention.

Objective measurements are essential,

not just for bottom line profit, but also
to avoid expensive litigation.

Finally, it has been observed, particularly in

the US, that subjective performance measures
have led to lawsuits being brought against
the employer, due to their inability to actually
measure good performance and feedback. An
example is Vaughn v. Edel (1990): A discharged
black female employee, Emma Vaughn, brought

a Title VII action against Texaco, Inc. The evidence

showed that, to avoid a discrimination suit,
Vaughns supervisors were told not to confront
her about her work. In neither criticising Vaughn
when her work was unsatisfactory nor counselling
her how to improve, Texaco treated Vaughn
differently from other employees because of
her race. While the companys decisions not
to criticise Vaughn may have initially appeared
beneficial, with objective feedback she might
have sufficiently improved her performance so as
to avoid termination. The court upheld the jurys
$465,000 punitive award. Uplift in performance is
just one of many examples of how organisations
are now finding objective measurements to be
essential, not just for bottom line profit, but also
to avoid expensive litigation.
Years of research demonstrates that measuring
the right competencies and being able to develop
staff on the back of skills gap analysis, yields a
higher level of overall performance, both at an
individual level and also at an organisational level.
However, a large percentage of UK organisations
lack the motivation, skill or desire to identify,
develop and implement an appropriate, sound
and easy to use system.
Increasingly, information is becoming available
from both academic institutions and commercial
organisations on the importance of identifying
and measuring correct and relevant competencies
for roles. This report suggests that a large
majority of organisations concentrate on using
competency measures, with an aim to identify
and train good behaviours, but they are not
currently achieving the uplift in performance and
therefore return on investment from their use.

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

Credentials

For over a decade we have been

true innovators within the sales
development arena.
We were founded in June 2002, born out of the
frustration which two international Sales Directors
felt at the sales training industry. Silent Edge was
conceived to break this status quo.
During the last 10 years we have grown into a
market leading sales development organisation
with an international footprint. We work with
a variety of clients including Barclays, BT, ADT
and Archant and have a proven track record of
increasing revenue for each one.
Over the past 18 months we have developed and
refined a technology platform unrivaled in the
global sales development market. We have the
ability to objectively evaluate the behavioural
capability of any sales role, frontline, sales
management and sales leadership. We then
develop a bespoke development journey that will
sustainably change the behaviour, and therefore
the performance, of an individual, a team and an
entire sales force.
Sales is our passion. In a first for the UK we have
recently agreed to work with the Sixth Form at
Cranbrook School and take 60 of their students
through a robust 12 month sales development
journey. This will empower them to move into the
working world armed with the skills that they will
require to excel in sales.
Our vision is to have sales recognised as a
profession, and we are continually striving to
improve standards and lead change.

Silent Edge was brought in to help

improve the sales performance of
our business centres for 3 out of 15
regions. Despite the adverse economic
conditions, and in less than a year,
the programme has delivered 8%
growth in revenues and a 900% ROI
in the 3 regions they worked with.
Consequently we have decided to roll
out the solution to other divisions in
our organisation.
HR & Training Director
Reed Specialist Recruitment

Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

References

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Rizzo, J. R., House, R. J., & Lirtzman, S. I. (1970). Role conflict and ambiguity in complex
organizations. Administrative Science Quarterly, 15, 150163.
Rodriguez, D., Patel, R., Bright, A., Gregory, D. & Gowing, M., K. (2002). Developing competency
models to promote integrated human resource practices. Human Resource Management, 3.
Sanghi, S. (2007). The Handbook of Competency Mapping (2nd ed). London, UK: Sage Publishing.
Sultana, R., G. (2009). Competence and competence frameworks in career guidance: Complex and
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Competency Frameworks 2012: Are they really being used effectively? - 2012

References

Silent Edge Limited

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