PRE-COURSE READING MATERIAL

Building Value Based

Competencies
A brief introduction

Chandramowly

© 1995 Corel Corp.

What are Competencies?

[Type the abstract of the document here. The abstract is typically a short summary of the
contents of the document. Type the abstract of the document here. The abstract is typically a
short summary of the contents of the document.]
“I am happy to tell you that I have finished reading the MS office manual”
“I see” “Can you enter this data using excel and pull it a pie chart on a power point?”
“Yes, I could do that. But it may take some more time. I haven’t used the on line help demos
yet. By next week I will be certainly ready to do it”
“Don’t bother Gopal, I just need it now. Here goes John. Hi John, will you help me with the
charts and presentation? I know you do that quickly”
“Look! I am just coming out of the meeting with boss. I am terribly upset. You have Ramesh
in your department right? Why can’t you get that done from him? I am sorry I can not help
you now…”
“OK John, relax. Ramesh wont be able help me you know. He complains about work load
and if I still insist, he takes the work and that goes to the wheel of procrastination”. Let me
see what I can do. Yes. I would approach Brinda, she may help me.” Our Manager runs to
Brinda, the Secretary to VP-Finance. When approach, Brinda says, “Sir, it would my
pleasure to do that. But I am sorry, I need to complete this minutes of the board meeting.
Please understand. Moreover, it would affect my incentive plan if I don’t pass this on to the
members by the end of the day”

Knowledge of MS office is required to prepare a presentation. But, knowing that is not

enough. One must be able to apply knowledge. Application of knowledge is Skill.
Knowledge and Skill, both are required to produce results. Some times the combination of
knowledge, skill and experience also may fail to deliver good results because of absence of
another component ‘Will’, the willing attitude to do something, by applying the knowledge
and experience.

Results occur when knowledge, skill and experience are driven by right attitude. McClelland
calls it as “underlying characteristics”. If you can know the underlying characteristics of a
person, you can predict what he could do. Underlying characteristics means what lies
beneath the ‘iceberg’ of human personality. In the above story, Gopal had the knowledge but
not Skill. John had both and not a willing attitude. Ramesh has all but suffers from his known
attribute of procrastination. Brinda, though willing to do, is not motivated to take up this job. If
you examine further, you will detect that motivation is actually connected to the hidden
values of an individual.

The combination of Knowledge, Skill, Experience, Attitude, Attribute, Motive and Values that
promote higher performance in individual and organisations is called ‘COMPETENCIES’

Vinayak and Vishwesh were collage mates and both come out in high ranks. They also got
into a good organisation on their successful campus selection. The scenario after 12years is
different. Vishwesh is a Country Head, managing multiple projects in the same mullti-
national organisation where as Vinayak continues to work as senior programmer.
Kareem Bhai and Yusuf graduated from the same law school with almost matching
credentials. They took up different jobs. Yusuf became an advocate and Kareem Joined a
Bank. Yusuf today is one of the senior members of judiciary and he was not too happy to
meet his friend Kareem after a long gap of 12 years. It was an irony that he had to pass a
judgment of guilt against Kareem in a bank fraud.

2
Excellence is always confined to few but mediocre cases are many.
Some people are effective than others. They approach their goals differently than
average people. There can unknown Mother Elisa who is also serving humanity but
can not be compared to Mother Theresa. How do you differentiate between Harilal
Gandhi and Mahatma Gandhi who are a comparison like mole and mountain? How
different are successful people from others who are not.

Prediction of performance excellence is the key or organisations. In the first

Generation Assessment of Talent was the only criteria. In the 2nd GA, Assessment
was based on Selection and Career Orientation. In the 3rd GA in mid 80s Training
and Development was added. In 90s, the 4 th GA considered: Assessment and
career orientation, Training and Development and Organisational change, was
considered. This opened up new concepts such as 360 degree assessments,
Development Centres, Learning Centres, Self Insight Centres, and Virtual
Assessment etc.

In 1960, McClelland, a Harvard Psychologist and founder of McBer, wrote a land

mark article in the American Psychologist asserting that I.Q and Personality tests
were poor predictors of competency. Later he was asked by the U.S. Foreign Service
to develop new methods that could predict human performance. The goal was to
eliminate the potential biases of traditional intelligence and aptitude testing. This was
the beginning of the field of competency measurement.

What characteristics differentiate outstanding performance was the question before

McClelland’s research team. The team made contrast assessment of outstanding
and average performers using ratings from their bosses. Then they developed a
system called Behavioural Event Interview to provide detailed accounts of how the
interviewees approached critical situations both successful and unsuccessful. The
later stage was content analysis to identify themes differentiating outstanding
performers from average performers. All through the research team used non-
leading probing questions. In the thematic analysis of interview data, the job analysis
part focused on effective performance, outstanding performance was related to
Competencies. That was the first Competency Model

Competency models work well as unifying frameworks for variety HRM applications.
More than 50% of fortune 500 companies have competency based practices which
are built using Resource Panels, Critical Event Interviews or by applying Generic
Competency Models or by combining all the three methods. Besides McClelland, the
UK NQ movement in 1991 and AT&T sponsored studies opened up the Competency
Era.

The effectiveness of competency models depends on simplicity of its organisation

specific contents. The competencies must be clearly stated by indicators and evident
performance impact. They become the fitting tool for all people processes.

3
 What is a
COMPETENCY?

Observable and
measurable
TYPES OF COMPETENCIES
Knowledge, Skill
and Attitudes,
Attributes, Values
and Motives that CORE COMPETENCIES
must be applied to Required by an organisation
achieve results to meet its mission, vision,
values and strategic plan.
Applicable to all positions of
an organisation
Your Functional
Competencies gets you
Competencies are more hired.
intangible and difficult ESSENTIAL COMPETENCIES
to define. We can say Your Behavioural
that It describes a set Generic competencies
Competencies takes you up
of behavioiurs that required
or pull you level
for a down.
irrespective of the functions.
produces outstanding Attitude,in
not Activity that
Defined band levels
A Competency
performance in a job. decides the Altitude
Is “an underlying
DEFINING FUNCTIONAL
Characteristic of an
COMPETENCIES COMPETENCIES
Individual that is
causally related to Specific to particular
criterion referenced to functional positions. Defined
effective and/or superior
performance in a job
situation.

David McClelland

4
 COMPETENCY CONNECTION

An employee meets MISSION VISION VALUES

departmental goals
by achieving own Mission is Vision is How we expect to
KPIs, using reach our
the the mind’s destination. The
competencies in purpose, picture of underpinning of
line with the the reason desired our choices and
business strategies for future. means to achieve
aligned to the the same

GOALS are mile stones we set. TASKS are activities to reach Goals

5
COMPETENT
Qualified to perform to standards of the Job processes

COMPETENCE
The condition or state of being competent

COMPETENCY
Cluster of Knowledge, Skills and Attributes resulting in Superior
performance

COMPETENCY MODEL
Listed collection of competencies and standards of performance
establishing behavioral indicators for specific job positions

ATTITUDE
The mindset that underpins the way a person feels, thinks and acts

BEHAVIOIUR
The way a person feels thinks and acts. It is the key word in
Competency context. Behaviour is observable through set of actions
demonstrating a competency.

TRAIT
A distinguishing characteristic of personality, behavioral style or
tendency

KNOWLEDGE
Intellectual and information capital which includes facts, data,
procedures and experiences collective organizations

SKILL
Doing and performing an activity, demonstrating competency to

6
KEY DRIVERS OF LEADERSHIP SUCCESS

Generally we have great strategies but lack competencies to implement the

strategies. You can not implement III Generation strategies for II Generation
Organisation with I Generation Mindset – Sumantra Ghoshal

People Management and Personal Characteristics form the key

drivers of Leadership success, than strategic expertise or process
mastery.

Visionary Companies do different things. Most of it is related to

‘People’ and ‘Personal’ areas.

DRIVERS OF
LEADERSHIP SUCCESS
A research conducted by CCL
(Centre for Creative Leadership) by
surveying senior managers and
Leaders, to know what drives
leadership success. There were
four findings: Strategic
Management, Personal Character,
Process Management and People
Management. The research found
that the degree of responses was:
13%, 35%, 12% and 49%
respectively.

7
What is not competency?
Competency is not performance. Competency is that which bring out performance.
Workmen can not perform to standards without competencies. But competencies
stated cannot guarantee that workers will perform adequately. Zero defect production
run is not a competency. It is result of manufacturing process. The competency of
operational expertise must be used to achieve zero defect. Competency has cause
and effect relationship with results and it should not be confused as process output.

Competency generally is termed as a combination of Knowledge, Skill and Attitude.

Let us analyse the competency of a Marketing executive.

1. He has the market knowledge and understands the pricing dynamics.

(Knowledge)
2. He sets up a product introduction project (Skill)
3. Meets all the commitments in timely manner (Attitude)

However, the results indicate the project failure. Why? The combination of the above
three aspects are not competencies. To display behaviour of competency he must

1. Use the understanding of market pricing dynamics to develop suitable prising

models
2. Position a new product introduction so that it is clearly differentiated in the
market
3. Acts in full understanding of human behaviour and expectations. Manages
emotion of self and others valuing individual differences and achieves
commitments

Can Do / Will Do Evaluation

This is a popular performance analysis tool to look at improving employee
performance.

Can’t Do Can Do
Motivation is the
‘intent’ which
drives the
Knowledge, Skill Motivation
and Attitude to Will Do emerges from
perform an action underlying
displaying characteristics of
behaviours Won’t Do a person

 Can Do/ Will Do category is an ideal situation where encouragement and

reward is the key.

8
  Can’t Do/ Will Do indicate competency gap and development/training is the
key.
 Can Do / Won’t Do indicates presence of skills but not motivated which calls
of counselling.
 Can’t Do / Won’t Do case, has deficiency in both skills and motivation
resulting in Job-in-jeopardy situation.

What is Competency?
Competencies encompass

that promote higher performance in

individuals and organizations

Hire for academic skills has become an old adage. The crusade now is to hire right
people with right behaviour. Since excellence is always confined to few, it is big
challenge to find out who is effective and who is not. The best way is to observe
superior performers and achievers. How they perceive, behave and act upon
challenges brings out the indicators of competencies.

Long term Job success and uninterrupted performance excellence doesn’t result
without right motives and values of the ‘underlying characteristics’. Some people are
more effective than others. Competency is the key factor that distinguishes success
and failure or superior performance and average performance. The same is true with
organisations as well. Most organisations have great plans and strategies and the
research shows that over 70% of the reason for Organisational failure is not
deficiency of strategy or technical know- how, but it is lack of competencies to
implement strategies, to execute goals.

Competent people add value and the incompetents destroy value. People with
developed competencies maximize return on investment since they understand the
task and do things with commitment to win.

9
Knowledge and Skills are visibly displayed in a situation or an interaction. Those are
easy to learn and assess. The one layer of underlying characteristics is what one
thinks about one-self, the confidence or motivation to do things. Beneath this lies,
what this the persona of how this person has responded to similar situation or
information. Is he able to see the whole picture in the mind’s eye? The ‘intent’ drives
knowledge and skill to perform. The ‘intent’ cannot be seen but one can observe that
in a displayed behaviour. So, which behaviour results final event is the central focus.

Competencies distinguish excellent performers from others. Follow up for customer

contact or answering customer’s inquiry accurately are not a competencies. Building
rapport with a customer to resolve a critical issue is a competency.

Programming skills, Managing Information systems, Creative writing or engineering

are Functional competencies. Self-management, Emotional Maturity, Inspiring others
is Behavioural competencies. What get you hired are functional competencies and
what take you up are behavioural competencies.

Competency Elements

Competencies generally have a title, a summary statement of definition and a set of

behavioural indicators. The behavioural indicators are also represented in levels of maturity
and difficulty. Example: Competency -Communication / Presentation. Promotes ideas
effectively (Level 4), Explains concepts at appropriate level of understanding (Level 3),
Clarifies and formalizes agreements (Level 2), Guides discussion to a desired end point
(Level 1). From top Level 1 to down Level 2 the behaviours indicate different levels that are
relevant to organisational culture and practice. Behavioural descriptors are used for deciding
job fit, defining a job, providing a career path or assessing a person against a position.

Why competencies are required?

Competencies are required to achieve excellence, enhance performance, face
challenges successfully, get desired results and optimize performance. The survey
conducted by Centre for Creative Leadership brings out four major reasons for
leadership success: People Management, Personal Characteristics (, Strategic
Management and Process Management, in that order. People Management and
Personal Characteristics being the top drivers of leadership, both are evidently
connected to business success. James C Colliuns and Jerry I Porras brings out the
fact that visionary companies have produced cumulative stock return of $6356 in
1990 for an investment of $1 in 1926 (Built to Last). Visionary companies do things
different and most of it is related to ‘People’ domain.

What competencies actually do?

“You can not implement third generation strategies, for second generation
organisation with first generation mind set,” said Sumantra Ghoshal.

10
Application of competencies will raise the bar of organisational performance. They
provide stable measures of success of career path. Also helps to define
empowerment, accountability, and succession planning and performance standards.
Competency model represent the engine that drives integrated performance
management system.

How many competencies must be in a model?

Career architect of Lominger Inc. has 67 competencies and most of the current
organisations realize that lesser the number better the usage. The optimum number
can range between 5 to 25. After interviewing 5000 people with multiple career
specialties in over 60 F500 companies, identified are these 14 competencies that
distinguished successful performance at all levels.

Continuous learning, Initiative and risk taking, honesty and integrity, flexibility, self-
confidence (Personal Competencies), Judgment and problem solving, team work,
creativity / innovation / change (Team competencies), Responsiveness to
internal/external customers, planning and organizing and quality results orientation
(operational). The 14 competencies are in 3 groups of Personal, Team and
Operations. In the same way, competency models are built for organisation based on
what competencies they need to achieve their long-term objectives.

Understanding the concept of a Competency

Each competency reflects three intrinsic elements that are integrated. It shoots up
form the ‘Motive’, there is an ‘action’ and finally ends with a ‘result’. The following
diagram indicates these intrinsic elements relate in case of a competency: Empathy
Empathy is a competency. It is about understanding and entering into another's
feelings. Empathy is felt and seen as a person with this competency used it. It is an
outcome of a competency used. It is known from the behaviour where one shows
concern and listens well. That is the behaviour and action part of the competency.
This action and behaviour emanates from the underlying experience of a person in
dealing with people and his ability to sense perceptions of others. The action and
behaviour demonstrating the competency is connected to the intention and motive of
persons.

11
 Competency
Outcome Empathy Display/Visibility

Shows Concern ,
Listens well

Action Behaviour
Experience in dealing with
people, sensing perceptions of others

Level of emotional
involvement, anxiety/Comfort
level towards others

Beliefs, Attitudes, values,

Motive options/Assumptions Intent
about others

12
Different Types and Levels of Competencies

To illustrate, let us examine competencies of two people. One is a neurosurgeon

(NS) specialized in brain surgery and the other is a computer technician (CT) who is
an expert in maintenance of computer hardware. Their job similarities are both work
pm brains which are essential to functioning of the ‘system’. Their jobs differ since
the compute technical works alone and the neurosurgeon works with other surgeons,
nurses and attendants. Both must have some common competencies such as :
‘system’ orientation to conduct diagnosis, fine muscle control to operate with precise
movements in small spaces, ability to take initiative to find additional information
needed to solve problems to repair or maintain the ‘system’, accurate understanding
of own abilities/, must know when to call on others to help or transfer the ‘client’ to
another practioner.

Each also must have some competencies that differ from the others. The CT must
have ‘efficiency’ to ‘fix’ the computer by solving the problem as quickly as possible.
The repairs should involve a minimum loss of computer functioning time, minimum
time spent and a minimum replacement of parts. CT can also take moderate risks in
attempting solutions, maximizing effort at the repair based on the needs of the
computer user. Each use a different body of knowledge

The NS must take minimum amount of time during the surgery but cannot take
moderate risks and seek shortcuts that might work as a means to desired results.
Neither the NS nor the patient can afford experimentation. Though efficiency is
important, NS cannot afford to take risks. NS must have efficiency to work with team.
The key difference: Risk orientation and ability to manage work of others.
How do competencies differ from skills and knowledge?

Competencies only include behaviours that demonstrate excellent performance.

Therefore, they do not include knowledge, but do include "applied" knowledge or the
behavioural application of knowledge that produces success. In addition,
competencies do include skills, but only the manifestation of skills that produce
success. Finally, competencies are not work motives, but do include observable
behaviours related to motives.

BEHAVIOURAL INDICATORS
The most important evidence of competency is behaviours. Behaviours can be physical
actions or verbal statements. Behaviours are directly observable from the actions of
Competent people. Outstanding people display their behaviours more often, in more
situations and derive better results.

13
Behaviour impacts three aspects. Context, Action and Outcome. Context of an actions
takes in the people associated, resources available, technology complexity, deadlines and
such variables. Deep understanding of context is necessary to decide to executive action.
What action taken or not taken decides the consequences of result. Behaviour indicators will
show us the impact of action on the result and also how it influenced and affected the given
context.

“I was in a rush to meet the dead lines of despatch and missed out a small item” (Action exists
but did not affect the context and the outcome is negative)

CAREER DERAILORS

Certain behaviours or personal characteristics will cause obstruction to career and make
people to fail moving up.

14
Competency Based Interview or Behavioral Interview
Competency based interview is a structured interview that is used to collect

information about past behavior and performance. As past performance is a predictor of

future performance, a behavioral interview attempts to uncover the past performance
by asking open-ended questions. Each question helps the interviewer learn about the
past performance in a key skill area that is critical to success in the position for which a
candidate is interviewing.

Using the STAR Technique

In a behavioral interview, the interviewer will ask questions about past experiences of
a candidate using STAR technique. The STAR technique is a way to elicit answers to
each question in an organized manner that will give the interviewer the most information
about the past experience of candidate.

What was the Situation in which you were involved?

What was the Task you needed to accomplish?

What Action(s) did you take?

Following are some structured guidelines for conducing interviews effectively

15
Step 1: General Guidelines

 Arrange for a quiet location free of interruptions.

 Put the candidate at ease. Create a relaxed, friendly atmosphere and use a
conversational rather than interrogative tone.

 Listen actively. Communicate interest and attentiveness both verbally and non-
verbally.

 Check your understanding when needed.

 Use open-ended questions that will allow the person to really, tell you something
about themselves.

 Keep an open mind.

 Avoid snap judgments and try to maintain objectivity about the interviewee’s ability to
do the job.

 If you are perplexed or surprised at the person’s behavior or statements, ask

questions to be sure you truly understand.

 Create a positive impression of your organization and yourself.

 The interviewee should feel that he or she is being treated with consideration,
fairness and professionalism.

 Be sensitive to physical and cultural differences.

Step 2: Plan your interview

Review the Job Description and the candidate's resume. Carry required Interview materials
i.e, JD, Competencies, Assessment Form etc.

Figure out how much time you will devote to probing for competencies. Best
Practice is to probe for 2-3 competencies, allowing about 10 minutes per Competency.

Prioritize the competencies. Pick the 2-3 competencies that seem most relevant to the
position you are interviewing for, and rank them in terms of importance.

Some Useful Open-Ended Interview Questions:

 What interests you about this position?

 Tell me about your last job.
 What did you like most/least about your last job?
 What's most important to you in a work environment?
 What particular skills, abilities or background do you think would make you a good fit
for this position?
 What are your longer-term career goals? How would this position fit

16
 with those?

Step 3: Conduct the Interview

1. Zero in on what seems significant.

 Ask for an overview of the event so you can get a sense of what to follow up on. Get
the background before you get into the details. What was the context of this event?
How did you become involved? What was the end point? How did it turn out? The
event may be a single meeting, a project spanning several months, or anything in
between.

Examples:

 Tell me more about how you got involved.

 You mentioned a meeting with the consultant; tell me more about that.
 Take me into that discussion. What was your role?

If it is not clear to you what you should follow up on, ask the candidate to tell you what part
was significant. For example: “Is there some part of that project that stands out for you as
significant—a milestone or decision point that you were involved in?”

 Ask for events within the past two years, if possible, in which the candidate played an
active part. More recent is better, so the candidate can remember details. Give the
candidate time to think of an event or situation that addresses your question.

 Be patient and supportive. Most people are not used to this style of interviewing and
it can be awkward

2. Keep the candidate focused on actual past events.

Keep questions brief, specific, and in the past tense.

Examples:

 What did you do then?

 What were you thinking when she said that?
 What did you say?
 How did you feel when that happened?
 What led up to that decision?
 What happened next?

Ask for dialogue. If the person can’t remember, say “Give me a sense of the conversation.

(”If you are getting generalities, philosophizing or hypothetical actions (e.g. "Well, the way
we used to approach it was to…."), bring the candidate back to the specifics (e.g. "What did
you do in this case?”).

17
  Keep the focus on relevant stories. If the candidate starts into a story that clearly will
not provide evidence of the competency you are interested in, remind him or her of
the starting question, and restart with the same question (or an alternative starting
question, if there is one). For example: Remember that we are interested in a time
that you needed to convince someone to change his or her mind. In the situation you
started to tell about, it sounds like you weren’t directly involved in the convincing. Is
that right? Can you tell me about another time you did that?

 After focusing on each event or part of an event, follow up with probing questions to
get more information about the candidate’s behavior in that event.

 Take brief notes. If more than one person is conducting the interview, it can be
helpful to have one person do the probing and another person do the note taking.

3. Keep the candidate focused on his/her role in those past events.

If the candidate is talking about what “we” did, ask, “What was your role in that?”

If you are still not getting clear information about what the candidate did, stop him or her and
say, "I'd like you to stay with what you yourself actually did."

4. Probe for thoughts and feelings behind actions.

Examples:

 How did you reach that conclusion?

 How did you know to do that?
 What was your reaction to that?
 What were you thinking at the time?
 What were you thinking before going into that meeting?
 What did you find satisfying/frustrating about that?

Questions about feelings or reactions can provide a lot of information about what a
candidate values or is motivated by.

5. Keep your responses to a minimum.

In order to make the best use of time, say no more than necessary to keep the candidate on
track. It's fine to be reassuring if the candidate seems uncomfortable, but try to avoid
verbalizing your own reactions (e.g. agreeing or disagreeing, expressing surprise or
approval, telling related stories, etc.). You don't want the candidate to know your feelings or
reactions to what they are saying. Instead, focus on learning more about the candidate's
behavior in the event.

Refrain from asking “leading questions” - questions that point a candidate towards a

particular answer, or express a bias or judgment.

18
 Leading Questions Better Questions

 Tell me what kind of  Tell me about events

preparation you did for leading up to the
the meeting. meeting.

 Didn't you check with  Could you say more

anyone else before about how you ended
making a decision? up making that
decision?

 What did you say to

them when they  What happened
criticized your proposal? next?

6. Keep track of time.

Keep an eye on your budgeted time. If you are not getting any useful information, you can
stop probing about a given event and either ask for a new story to address the question, or
move to another starting question.

At the end of the interview, give the candidate a chance to ask any questions or add
anything else relevant about his or her experience or qualifications.

Step 4: Assess What You Heard

Immediately after each interview, review your notes or confer with your colleagues about the
following:

What evidence did you hear for each competency that you specifically probed for?

What were the actions, thoughts or feelings that you think provided evidence

of each competency? How strongly did you hear that competency (i.e. did you hear some
ambiguous evidence once, or clear evidence several times)? Remember that listening for
competencies in this sort of interview is as much art as science.

There will very likely be some evidence that you can't clearly match up with a competency,
or is ambiguous or unclear. That's okay. If something seems significant anyway, take note of
it.

What other competencies from the specified Job Competencies did you hear evidence of?

19
Sometimes you might hear more about a competency you weren't specifically looking for
than about the competency that your question was aimed at. That's fine, and can be
important information in itself.

What other things of interest did you hear?

Within the stories that the candidate told, there will likely be information about skills, abilities
or expertise that may be relevant to the position.

NOTE: Some people aren't good at being interviewed for competencies. A

particular candidate may have difficulty remembering relevant stories, or may have difficulty
giving good, concrete, first-person information from which you can infer competencies. If that
happens, you can't necessarily conclude that the candidate does not demonstrate those
competencies. The best you can do is to say that you are not sure, and to rely on other
sources of information.

SPECIMEN COMPETENCY DEFINITION

TEAM WORK

Definition

Ability to work with others to accomplish desired team outcome. Developing team
members by providing opportunities to effectively work and contribute. Capability to
recognise team stregth, value of diversity, opportunity to build and capture potential
to achieve best results.

Behavioural Descriptors

 is able to work in and lead a range of different teams to achieve a desired outcome;
 recognises the opportunity for team working and building teams;
 develops individuals as team members, identifying team strengths and weaknesses;
 able to work with others to ensure cumulative contributions and enable teams to
manage themselves effectively;
 acts as an advisor to teams, often mentoring the team leader if required;
 recognises the value of the diversity within teams and how that can be captured to
achieve best results.

Behavioural interview Questions

• Gaining the cooperation of others can be difficult. Give a specific example of when
you had to do that, and what challenges you faced. What was the outcome? What
was the long-term impact on your ability to work with such people?

20
 • Please give me a best example of working cooperatively as a team member to
accomplish an important goal. What was the goal or objective? What was your role in
achieving this objective? To what extent did you interact with others on this project?
• Tell me about a time when your coworkers gave you feedback about your actions.
How did you respond? What changes did you make?
• Describe a project you were responsible for that required a lot of interaction with
people over a long period of time.
• How have you recognized and rewarded a team player in the past? What was the
situation?
• Tell me about a course, work experience, or extracurricular activity where you had to
work closely with others. How did it go? How did you overcome any difficulties?
• Describe a problem you had in your life when someone else’s help was very
important to you

KNOWLEDE MANAGEMENT / SHARING

Definition

Ability to set up an organisational process that synergises data and infomration

criticla to organisation. Talent for capturing creative and innovative capacity of

humanbeings and sharing for orgnisational adaption, survival and core competence.

Behavioural Descriptors

 Makes effort in acquiring new knowledge and shares job related information
 Applies new knowledge and shares with team
 Uses strategies to increase knowledge base of team members
 Anticipates need for new knowledge and skills and takes intiative to learn
 Seeks new knowledge from multiple sources and seamelessly adapts and helps
others to apply new knowledge and skills in all job areas

Behavioural interview Questions

• Tell me about a time when you had engage yourself in acquiring, sharing and storing
a specific knowledge. What was that? What process you followed? What were the
challenges?

21
• KM can be defined as an effort to make the 'know how' in people’s heads and to
make sure that it is accessible and available to the entire organization. In this context
can you share your own experience by citing a situation?

• What methods you recommend for knowledge storage and safety? What systems
you believe in to follow?

•
• Considering the general knowledge flow restrictions such as ‘no time to share’ or ‘not
willing to share’ etc., how do you ensure that knowledge transfer ‘happens’ in your
area of work
• What methods or systems you suggest, or believe in to ensure consistent acquisition
of knowledge?
• What is the effective way to ensure that knowledge acquired is applied at work?
• How do you ensure that the juniors are groomed to learn? What measures do you
take to ensure that?

E mployee ’s Guide to

Competency
Development
22
W i t h c o m p e t e n t – i n c o m p e t e n t – o ve r d r i v e n i n d i c a t o r s

23
 • ....... competency model has a bifocal vision of enhancing
Bifocal people effectiveness by addressing individual competency
gaps/developing new competencies and achieving
Vision of organizational effectiveness continuum. ....... leaders and
the Model managers must constantly make effort to have right people
with right competencies in right places to help ....... to
achieve its mission and vision by using its values and
business strategies. The ....... leadership competencies are
developed following the competency research guidelines,
by interacting with selected executives and employees
representing all the key functions from each of the units.

• The key position holders and the employees representing

winning the cream of ....... operations and support departments
were the input providers. These inputs formed a huge data
behaviou pool of behaviors of performance excellence; it was duly
captured in behavioral event interviews and competency
rs model familiarization programs, conducted involving
representatives and heads of the units.

• Similarly functional /technical competencies were also

captured by interaction with different levels of each
department to complete scripting of the competency
dictionary. One must understand the components and
winning behavioral indicators of each of these competencies, which
behaviou enable development focus, define learning activity and
appropriately address compentency gaps. It is important to
rs review this before we move on to the next area of
competency development and coaching.

• This guide is designed for the people who have accepted

their limitation or weakness and firmly decided to learn to
Why this develop or improve themselves in the areas of work or
Guide? personal life. The ....... behavioural competencies can be
applied to any employee at any level. ....... values are the
basic requirements for every employee.

• It is mandatory to identify minimum three competencies or

values for each ....... employee.

• The manager and the associate must clearly understand

Identify 3 the identified competencies by carefully going through the
Competenci definitions, behavioral indicators and development tips
provided in this manual. Managers must also ensure to put
es a year in place a 360 DFB system for the eligible employees and
help the participant employee to identify the feed back
sources. The development plan of an employee will have
inputs from 360 DFB also. It is essential to build a
performance culture where in the employees move up to a
new position not by chance, but by developing and
demonstrating new competencies.

24
 • The responsibility for executing a development plan lies
with the manager who would set clear time frames for all
the PMS activities.

• Amar and Zameer are at the age of 26, have the same
IQ, skills and say 100 units of behavioral and functional
competencies. Both of them are graduates and hold a
Story of postgraduate diploma in fashion technology. Both of them
Amar and had joined different organizations and were paid almost
similar compensation as supervisors in the year 2001.
Zameer During 2003 both have moved up in their salary and
position. Amar sits back feels happy proud and
comfortable with his progress and achievement at the
same time Zameer's fire is flaming up within him. He
becomes more attentive and watches all the changes
around him and within him. He decides to build on new
skills and widens his shoulder to take on more
responsibilities. He is excited about multitasking and
enjoys sharing his thoughts with others influencing them
to move as well. In the process he is more thrilled about
the vast opportunities and breadth and depth of ocean of
learning.

• During 2006 Zameer's continued acquisition of new

competencies at a compounded rate over time grows at
the rate of 6%. Amar grows at only 1% per year.

• Just compare the difference between a bank account of

over 20 years earning, 3% V/S 8%. Similarly the career
related capability of Amar at the age of 26 would be at 1%
annual growth. Zameer will have 6% annual growth. At
the age of 50 both Amar and Zameer are in two different
leagues. Amar now is heading a unit of 300 employees
and Zameer is a group technical director.

• How did Zameer Succeed? There could be several

reasons. But the main reason is, he had the attitude and
behaviors to keep up with the environment. Leaning
became a way of life for Zameer. The world around is
perpetually complex and unstable. Zameer perceived this
and became a continuous learner to adapt himself in his
work and personal environment.

• At one time recruitment was a challenge, but today there is

Changin an additional challenge of retention. We are constantly
impacted by the changes around us. These changes
g Times reach us in the form of challenges. The method and
strategy adopted to interact with and lead people of 70`s or
80`s will not yield the same best results today. The
competencies required to develop for moving up the ladder
are also changing.

Process
of 25
Learning
 • Technological changes constantly demand us to learn new
things to catch up with the day-to-day work process.
Developing a new competency is driven by a natural
process. It is not easy because what needs to be learnt is
sometimes unlearning. This demands a change in certain
behaviors and revalidating our approach to change
management. It is a natural process in the time sense of
sowing and reaping, learning algebra before calculus or
crawl and learn to stand before walking.

• It is important to remember that each one of us is in

different stages of growth and maturity levels in intellectual,
emotional and spiritual areas. Hence comparisons could
be dangerous. Every one has to start learning new
competencies from where he is, picking up the thread
Start where he left. Unfortunately there is no short cut to learn
leadership competencies. This is also applicable to
from functional competencies, which are acquired only by
following a step-by-step process proved to be efficient.
where What comes in the way of learning competencies must be
tackled. Personal image, power consciousness and social
mirror sometimes restrict our learning capability. Learning
process is a straightforward activity and not an imitation of
appearing to be learning. Learning is a value and it is clear
honest and up front unlike trickery and duplicity, which are
disvalues.

• When a manager and his associate identifies a

competency for development, they need to analyse the
selected competency carefully, to set learning agenda.
Definin Competencies are comprised of different components.
For instance, the competency negotiation has a skill
g component, experience component besides other
Learnin components such as emotion, complexity and
attitudes/belief. Before finalizing a development plan to
g learn ‘negotiation’ a manager must identify the specific
component such as skill, emotion or attitude (Ex:
knowledge and skills- needs to learn basic negotiation
skills, attitudes and belief-can apply negotiating
knowledge and skill to work situation. emotion-strongly
wants to succeed and win in negotiation.) .

• Knowing the components of a competency will help

development decisions.

• The component ‘skills’ are like software hardwired to

The Skill brain. If the skill is more complex it is harder to develop
competency. The competencies such as interpersonal
Compone relations, planning and prioritizing, teamwork can be
developed focusing more on the skill component. Such
nt competencies can be developed through training, by
reading, coaching and on providing tips.

Experienc
26
e
Compone
 • The experience component is something, which has to
be acquired and get proper exposures to learn the
lessons of success and failures. Decision-making,
integrity and ethics draws in experience component
more than other components. One way to develop
such competencies is to provide part time
assignments.

Attitude • Our assumptions and attitudes form a powerful internal

motherboard of belief network. Some competencies
Compone depend on a person’s attitude, values, opinions and
beliefs.

• Competencies such as nurturing human talent,

emotional maturity, empowerment and delegation etc
depends more on beliefs and attitudes. Hence these
Tough competencies can be developed by power coaching
and mentoring, helping an individual to reflect within
Areas and discover the need to change.

• Some competencies depend on person’s intellectual

Multi abilities, doing complex parallel processing or multi
tasking. Quality consciousness, customer focus,
Tasking managing performance and change management are
the competencies where in the perceived importance is
Compone more on multitasking. One of the best way to manage
multitask is to use a suitable tool such as ERP,
Microsoft outlook or get assistance from some people
to manage storage memory requirement and
processing speed.

• A competency coach operates on a clear

understanding of causal flow of competencies. The
causal flow model can be represented in a simple
equation;

• Behavior +Actions= results

• The behavior encapsulates the intension, willingness of

a person to carry out work, his motive and self-concept.
It drives the action part, which consists of functional
knowledge, skill and execution. This combination
Causal produces outcome. Hence it is important to identify
which behavioral or functional aspects yields desired
Flow results.

• The Causal flow links employee capability and the final

results. Employee capability is known by analyzing how
capable is an employee at a given time and where he
would like to move up by developing competencies
Input for required to achieve job demands. The difference

Developme 27
nt Plan
 between where I am and where I want to be is the
competency gap, which should be addressed by a
developmental plan.

• An individual aspirant must ask himself whether he is

clear on what he should accomplish and what his
organization wants;

• What he needs to learn and how it helps;

• How would he learn – what should he do to develop

and what is the learning model.

• Answers to these questions become the input for

development plan.

Select • While developing competencies, care must be taken to

the avoid over use of competencies, which are detailed for
each of the ....... competencies in the annexure.
Specific Research shows that competencies such as integrity-,
ethics, planning and customer focus are some of the
most commonly used competencies.

What
• Before proceeding on a development plan managers
Accounts for secure awareness and acceptance of an employee on
his or her development needs. Once an employee
Personal understands and accepts a developmental need and
honestly aspires to change, half of the problem is
solved.

• The next part is to draw an individual development plan

and execute the same. A 360-degree feedback of a
Inputs manager will certainly help him/her to focus on
development areas, which are indicated by the majority
from 360 of the 360DFB respondents. The objective of the 360
DFB DFB is to read, understand, accept and do something
about it for improvement.

• The Lominger`s researched development model

suggests six sequential steps. In an initial level an
employee is clueless about his development needs.

• At level 1, he becomes aware of some needs as

perceived by others for his development.

6 • At level 2, one accepts one’s own the developmental

needs
Sequential
Steps of
Developme 28
 • At level 3, one is motivated to fix the issue and acts on
a development plan, approaches a coach and so on.

• At level 4, one would be working hard on a set plan,

building and acquiring a new competency.

• At level 5, one blends the competency learned and

attempts to do that well at work.

• And finally at level 6 good things will happen showing

up desired results.
Selecting
Competen • While all the 20 ....... competencies can be used for
obtaining feedback in some special cases, it is
cies for suggested to select most specific ones applicable to
business. The most common competencies, which are
360 DFB subjected to 360-degree analysis, are-Communication,
listening, Problem solving, change management, team
work, integrity and ethics, leadership vision etc

• It is also important to know the relationship between

learning capability and weight of knowledge. The
Know research shows that the learning capability of people
tapers down as their knowledge base is expanded.
Learning
Capability
• Managers can decide developmental activities after
carefully analyzing the proposed activity and how it
helps in developing a competency.

• If an employee is assigned with a specific task with an

event of success or failure an employee will have an
Creating opportunity to develop competencies such as problem
Developme solving and leadership vision. To improve interpersonal
relations a person may be asked to work with a new
nt Activity set of people or more number of people. If one needs
to enhance “initiative ” competency he should be given
tough deadlines and work, involving heavy travel and
longer hours.

Don’t • To improve “innovation” competency in an employee a

manager can provide all inputs with one or two critical
‘Feed All’ aspects missing, which makes a person to discover the
missing parts to resolve by putting the puzzle pieces
– make together.
them
• By providing an opportunity to work under a significant
discover! boss the competencies such as decision-making,
leadership vision, self-discipline or accountability can
be enhanced.

29
 • Reflecting on the global practices and research 70% of
the successful companies invest resources on
developmental actions by providing work assignments
whereas that of average companies is 10%. The % of
Research investment on training courses is in the ratio of 3:7 in
data on respect of successful and average companies. But
spending resources on coaching, mentoring and
Developme feedback is almost of similar magnitude in both the
cases. The key factor that triggers learning is the
ntal willingness to learn. Willingness to learn generates
positive thoughts, which helps an employee to develop
faster yielding better results.

• As David J Schwartz in his book Magic of thinking big

exclaims "Mind is a thought factory with two foreman in
Mr Triumph charge of production. They are Mr. Triumph and Mr.
Defeat. While Mr. Triumph is in charge of
and Mr manufacturing positive thoughts, Mr. Defeat emanates
Defeat negative and depreciating thoughts.”

• To summarise, a manager can help his associate to

Summing identify two or three ....... competencies/Values. This
can be done carrying out skill gap analysis, reviewing
Up… performance appraisal, performance interview data or
looking at the summary of 360-degree feedback.
Analyse each competency and its components to
decide on cost effective development actions. To get a
competency-based program, learning/ opportunity
designed, one can make use of development centers,
provide self-development resource guides or computer
aided video assisted programs. Mentoring, coaching,
train the trainer and continuous development
competency programs is however compulsory for
ensuring developmental actions.

30
1. Team Work

Composition
Ideal Team work is a combined effort of individual accomplishments. “Together Everyone
Achieve More” is the key message. Those organisations who only reward individuals would
fail to develop a team culture. Team work is the best way to integrate different tasks for a
common goal by cutting across boundaries. Succcess of team building lies in identifying job
roles, challenges and rewards with a team than with individuals.

Competence concept
Ability to work with others to accomplish desired team outcome. Developing team
members by providing opportunities to effectively work and contribute. Capability to
recognise team stregth, value of diversity, opportunity to build and capture potential
to achieve best results.

Incompetence Image
Comfortable with with one-on-one and not with groups or teams. Avoids holding team
meetings or team participation. Do not create team challenges to energise team.
Instead of trusting a team, prefers to control and move on to individual actions.

Overdriven Competence
Takes only team approach and underplays individual values and trust. Over
democratic and waits for overal team inputs and deliberaions. Fails to develop
pipeline leaders and may not retain best talents. In the process of holding on to team
work individuals may be distressed.

T ip s t o d e v e lo p t h i s C o m p e t e n c y
 As a manager, keep the focus of Performance Management Process in mind
since you are more responsible for team/division/departmental output than
managing one individual.
 People work better when goals and defined and alingned and would liketo
measure how they are progressing. The starting point is to focus on team
objectives and then define individual goals. On deciding the
team/division/departemental objective creat a plan and encourage team
members to draw individual plans in alignment
 Enrich people with challenging work and teams with challenging tasks.
 Different folks need diiffrent strokes ! Deal with individual focus but remember
to be fair to all.

31
  Normaly people judge before understanding. Learn the Habit 5 ‘Seek first to
understand, Then to be understood’. Understanding is not necessarity
aggreeing. It is imiportant to empathize and interpret what the team or a
member desires and help them to learn, know more by investing your own
time.
 If you face conflicting goals from individual members, focus on common
goals, priorities and problem of the team objectives and oveal business
objecive.
 Learn to display sense of joy and humour and create opporunties for the team
to have fun celebrating success and wins.
Compensatory Competencies and Reading
Focus on Dr. Covey’s 1st and 5th Habit. Read Tom Peter’s ‘Thriving on Chaos’ or
Robert Bolton’s ‘People Skills’

32