 |
Strategic Skill Profiling
Using the Scaled Comparison
Determining the Critical Skills for Strategy Implementation
This example has been prepared to illustrate how an organization with the strategic objective of a "Web Customer Service Portal" could implement an assessment of both a job and the human capital required. The following are the broad steps that need to be taken to assess both the job and the skill needs:
- Prioritize the skills required for successful implementation.
- Assess the actual skill profiles of each professional in the unit.
- Aggregate the individual skill data to derive and prioritize a "strategic skill gap" for every important skill.
- Close the skill gaps with tailored development programs.
- Reassess to determine the success of the previous steps.
The following format is used to determine the critical skills required for strategy implementation:
| Question:
|
Which skill is more important to the successful implementation of our Web Customer Service Portal strategy?
|
| ORACLE database design and administration
|
|
BEA Weblogic application server
|
|
|
This kind of question can only be answered by persons who know the requirements of the strategy. All of the existing and prospective skills are then compared with each other to determine the critical skills the strategy requires. (The examples below show just a portion of the decisions that are made.)
| Question:
|
Which skill is more important to the successful implementation of our Web Customer Service Portal strategy?
|
|
|
Determining the Actual Skill Profile of the Critical Job
The same process, using the same skills, but a different question is used to determine the actual skill profiles of each person in the critical job. The persons completing this part of the assessment do not need to know anything about the strategy, rather they should be people who have a thorough day-to-day knowledge about how the worker in question actually performs.
| Question:
|
In which skill is Joan Martin more proficient?
|
|
|
The Ideal Profile of Strategic Skills
The first result of the assessment is the Ideal Profile of Strategic Skills. This report shows the skills ranked according to their importance to strategy implementation. This assessment is provided by a select group of internal experts who are thoroughly familiar with the strategy and the positions as well. The Ideal is not derived from all those who participate as evaluators of the target employees.
|
|
The Actual Profile of Strategic Skills
The Actual Profile is obtained when each person occupying the strategic position is evaluated by 5 to 7 co-workers who interact with them frequently and are in the best position to judge in which of the skills the job incumbents demonstrate greater strength.
|
|
The Strategic Talent Gap
After all job incumbents have been assessed on their skill proficiency, the Actual Skill Profile for the critical job can be determined, by combining and averaging the data from all individuals. This "average actual" profile is then compared with the Ideal Profile required by the strategy. This is how it looks:
|
|
|
The "Gap" information can be seen as the distance between the "A" (actual skill level) and the end of the black bar (ideal skill level). This "Gap Analysis" report is a visual representation of the data gathered, which exist in numerical form on other reports. The most important gaps are with the skills at the top of the list. In this example, the second skill "SQL Systems Administration" is a very important skill, and also exhibits a large gap between Actual and Ideal.
Closing the gaps between Actual and Ideal is the function of a human capital development program. You track your success by periodically readministering the Strategic Skills Profile to see if your efforts are closing the gaps and increasing your readiness.
And when you reassess, be sure to look at the Ideal Skill Profile as well. None of these concepts are static, and as the strategy gets implemented, cultures evolve as well. The ideal may need adjusting.
How do I get more information?
|
|
|
|
