Specialists in the areas of Leadership and Management Development, Organisational Development, Competency Profiling, Assessment and Development Centres and Management Selection.

International Consulting

Competency Profiling

The Need

In most commercial organisations the ultimate purpose of Competency Profiling is to:

  • provide focus to the business and the individual
  • identify the key skills, attitudes and behaviour necessary to fulfill tasks or business objectives. 

This is necessary to ensure that business outcomes are achieved.

If standards and the means to achieving them are not well defined, the organisation is unable to deliver products and services to customers on quality, deadline and price. As a commercial concern the business soon becomes economically unviable.

What We Offer

Our experience at Oakwood Group suggests that making an assessment regarding how well the personal attributes of a potential employee match the requirements of a role is central to the recruitment and development process. Recruitment is rather like an iceberg.  What is easy to observe above the surface are evidence of skills and knowledge.  What you do not see and what is deeper and below the surface, however, are a candidate’s attitudes, beliefs and values.  These need also to be profiled but are more difficult to assess.  They therefore require greater skills and the use of increasingly sophisticated tools that we bring to our clients.

How We Work with Organisations

Oakwood’s Competency Profiler (“COMPASS”) sets out the basics of:

  • Personal Development Plans,
  • Training Needs Analyses
  • Training Evaluations and
  • Provides the business with a working Succession Planning document.

“COMPASS” is a simple, user-friendly software programme. It has been written, and it is intended to be used as, a working tool from a line manager perspective. It is based on the individual’s job description and a straightforward comparison between what the job requires and the personal level of competency of the jobholder.

This powerful tool analyses the individual training needs, expands this throughout the whole business, thereby producing a full Needs Analysis for the total Business.

The programme can be interrogated to produce personal, section, departmental and corporate reports. These are produced in simple graphic form for ease of understanding. By establishing the corporate gaps, HR/HRD specialists can target their training budget to the areas of greatest need making this an excellent and exact method for evaluation.

Similarly when a vacancy or a new job is created the programme will produce a report of all those internal candidates who could undertake that position with a minimum of training. This represents a significant cost saving when it comes to interviewing and selection. 

Who We Have Worked For

In the UK, Lloyds TSB has been a major client.  We have also worked with a number of large international companies predominantly in the financial services, energy and infrastructure sectors.

Next Steps

Competency profiling, if designed and managed effectively is a valuable tool for both the individual and organisation. It has the potential to focus recruitment, talent management, training, development and learning, making a measurable increase to performance and profits.

So if you think “COMPASS” would be help to your business, call us to arrange a meeting +44 (0) 1444 459500. The first exploratory and explanatory visit is free.

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