10 steps of competency assessment to help your career growth

Competency assessment is a scientific method to assess ‘how well you do, what you do’, in comparison with your peers in the industry across a chosen group – this could be in your job interview, group, company, or across the globe.?

In a nutshell, it is a way of assessing how proficiently you perform a task by measuring and quantifying your behavioural patterns.

Many people are not aware of how their behavioural patterns affect their proficiency. It can thus be concluded that they are not aware of their behavioural strengths, what their areas of improvement are, and how will they help them in performing beyond their set patterns and take them into the next league.

The 10 steps of Competency Assessment

1.??Understand your needs?

Firstly, understand what you would like to achieve by taking an assessment – sometimes the need arises from a quest for self-development that starts from getting self-aware about your strengths and areas for development. Sometimes it centers around a very specific issue related to a career or personal life. For example, a professional promoted to a managerial position may need to understand the key competencies required to be successful in that role, and who wants to rate her competencies benchmarked with the best of similar global profiles. You have to ensure that you zero in on the right need, which will help you identify the best assessment and the right coach who is more aligned with your need to help you in a targeted manner.

2.??Do online or offline research on Competency Assessment offerings

This research will help you understand the various competency assessments and the offerings that are available in the market, and what are the areas these assessments target because some are targeted toward understanding your personality type, but on the other hand, some assess your current level of certain competencies irrespective of your personality type. For example, Shraddha is an introverted person, but she takes initiative and is motivated to finish her work – these competencies may be missing in the extroverted person as well. Lastly, a tool certified by a certification body is always better than the uncertified ones.

3.??Shortlist the skills or competencies

You must shortlist the skills or competencies that are to be chosen keeping in mind your development goal, job profile, and the short-term and long-term career path you have in mind if you are looking for professional development. It may also happen that the goal is more centered around the personal side. ?Moreover, as the progression in career or life happens, the competencies required may increase or change entirely. However, some of the assessments do not let you choose the competencies to assess because they are well researched to take certain competencies into account for understanding the potential – these assessments help in gaining the complete perspective if the idea is to have an overall development.

4.??Defining the requirements?

Now that you are clear about what you want to achieve and have identified the key competencies/skills required for achieving that, create a list of all the requirements that an assessment should fulfill – after that, either search the assessments yourself based on the requirements or take help of a coach who is an expert and who can help fine-tune the requirements and also help in identifying the right assessment. He may also work on the development of the identified areas post the assessment.

5.??Choosing a competency assessment vendor?

In addition to meeting the requirements, the vendor shortlisted should also have demonstrated a long-term commitment to their clients, and the assessment should be scientifically developed and have a proven track record – if it is certified by an authorized agency, it is an advantage. They should have internationally recognized credentials. The price for different assessments may vary based on the level of accuracy they provide. For example, some of the assessments have a low price, but they do not provide the accurate and detailed understanding required for further development. Once you have clarity on this, you are good to go and choose one of these shortlisted vendors.

6.??Take the online Competency Assessment?

Generally, the number of parameters that are necessary to be analyzed for your competency assessment, and the average number of questions per competency determine the time taken for this online assessment – it also helps understand the accuracy levels. The time taken could be anywhere from 90 minutes to 120 minutes or maybe more. Make sure you have this information in advance and ensure that you have a good online connection and a disturbance-free environment before you take this assessment. Moreover, a stress-free state of mind during the assessment also helps, unless you are taking an assessment for understanding stress levels.

Answering all the questions as genuinely as possible, without answering in a socially acceptable way, will ensure that you get the perfect feedback on the skillset you possess and how you react to various scenarios.

7.??Understand the assessment results

Based on how you have responded to the assessment, your competency quantification results will be generated. Some of the assessments do not provide results in an isolated manner but they benchmark the results with the best global profiles in similar roles and provide the results relative to these profiles. These benchmark comparisons can be on a global basis or at a national level or a corporate level or a team level.

These results along with the benchmark comparison will be the basis for deciding areas for which development or coaching is necessary for you.

8.??Coaching

The coaching process is the highlight of your development journey that starts with a competency assessment. The coach will guide you step-by-step to help you understand and decipher your results and then help you in the process of improving your skills and your response to external triggers. Eventually, you will be guided to move beyond the industry benchmarks for those individual skills.

9.??Reassessment post coaching

?Competency reassessment will help you with the quantification of your skill assessment and understand how the coaching has helped you and what you have achieved post the coaching part. Many candidates who take the assessment and coaching do not go with reassessment considering it to be unnecessary. Though it is not necessary to take the reassessment, it considerably helps in tracking the level of improvement through coaching.

10.??Create situational awareness

The most crucial part during and post the competency assessment is being aware of how you react to external triggers and how this affects your attitude, behaviour, and eventually your growth. This is relevant not only in your work life but also in your day-to-day interactions and how it impacts your relationship with others.?

It is of utmost importance that you internalize the findings from your assessment and development exercises and consciously make changes in the interactions you have with others.

This will ensure that you improve your competencies faster and help you in your personal life.

?Conclusion:

• Understand your needs before you can choose a competency assessment.
• Be clear with your goals, your objectives, and what you hope to achieve by taking a competency assessment.
• Identify and shortlist a few competency assessment organizations that suit your needs and budget or engage with a coach who can guide you.?
• Make sure that their offering to you is relevant to your needs and goals. Also, be clear about what will be their deliverables, and how they will improve you.
• Understand the assessment and coaching methodology and try to engage with the coach before the assessment to get an idea about the development process.?
• Reassess to understand that post assessment and coaching how your competencies changed compared to the benchmark and your initial results.
• Internalizing the learnings to ensure you improve as an employee and in your personal life.
• Make a journal to continue improving the competencies in the future.