How to Create a Competency Development Plan

Key takeaways

Implementing a competency development plan can help your business build a stronger workforce and remain competitive.

• Competencies fall under different categories, such as leadership or technical competencies.

• Helping employees develop competencies is effective for retaining talent and gaining a better understanding of your team's capabilities. 

• You can create a competency development plan by first identifying the competencies you want your employees to develop, selecting learning materials, and measuring results.

Discover the value of competency development and the steps you can take to start building competencies in your workplace. If you’re interested in helping your staff start building competencies, Coursera for Business offers a wide range of learning materials, including tailored learning paths delivered as Guided Projects, Professional Certificates, and videos. 

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What is competency development?

Competency development is a process of improving your team’s skills, behaviors, knowledge, and attitudes, which are the vital elements that help them find professional success. Competencies represent a broader range of attributes than skills alone. A skill refers to a specific ability, while a competency refers to several skills, specific knowledge, experience, or personality traits, such as a tendency to enjoy collaborating with others. Competency development offers a process for identifying the competencies your team could improve and approaching learning and training opportunities or the best results.

Read more: What Is Competency-Based Training?

Examples of competencies

The competencies critical to your company depend on your industry, the type of work it does, and the values of your company culture. You can break competencies into smaller categories, such as core, leadership, and technical competencies. Within each category, you can also include subcompetencies.

For example, a company that values innovation and quick thinking might list core competencies such as adaptability, collaboration, and critical thinking. A company that values strong customer relationships may list core competencies such as customer service, communication, conflict management, and cultural awareness.

Other examples of competencies may include: 

• Ownership of work 

• Flexibility

• Negotiation

• Initiative

Why is developing competence important?

Competency development is essential to staying competitive and offers you the ability to make better development decisions, improve the competencies of your workforce, plan for the future, and retain top talent. Examine the various ways these benefits can impact your business.

Better decision-making with limited development resources

Competency development plans help you gain a better understanding of what your team is capable of and identify areas where they could improve. Doing so provides insight into the effectiveness of professional development programs, helping you focus your time and money on only the programs that will help your team the most.

Improved skills and competencies company-wide

Implementing competency development allows your team to develop new competencies and improve performance. A more skilled workforce is more likely to accomplish its goals on individual, team, and organizational levels.

Better recruitment and retention

Competency development helps you retain your skilled workforce and makes recruiting easier. By giving you a roadmap for the skills required to succeed, you have a more targeted idea of the candidate you’re looking for. As your employees develop stronger competencies, they are more likely to mirror the engagement and investment you make in them by staying longer with the company.

Planning your workforce for the future

Competency development helps you look toward the future and prepare your team for changes. You can prepare your staff to take on increased responsibility in the future by helping them sharpen their skills and competencies now. When your senior staff retires, you’ll have natural successors ready to take their place.

What are methods by which people can develop competence? Your how-to guide

If you want to create a competency development plan but aren’t sure where to start, these five steps can help you create and fine-tune your competency development plan.

Step 1: Identify the competencies important for your workforce.

Think about the goals and objectives you hope to achieve by implementing a competency development plan. Then, identify the competencies your ideal workforce would have. You can reach out to your human resources (HR) department to help define competencies, but make sure you seek feedback from your team. After all, they are the experts completing the work. Also, communicate with your company about your intentions to create a competency development plan to include and engage stakeholders.

Step 2: Collect data about current competencies.

After you understand the breadth of competencies your company needs for success, you’ll next measure the competencies your employees currently have. You can observe your employees, talk with people about their work and careers, or ask staff members to fill out questionnaires. These strategies can help you gain a better understanding of what your team is capable of and where skills gaps may exist.

Step 3: Determine development objectives and select materials.

After you understand what skill gaps exist in your team, you can determine the competencies to prioritize, who should be a part of development, and which materials or methods will be best to help your team learn. In some cases, you will encounter competencies that are helpful company-wide, while in other cases, you will develop specific profiles for different roles. For example, you may need different competencies from your accounting team than you will from your marketing team.

It is also helpful to create profiles of your employees outlining their competencies. You can use this information to offer personalized career development and set performance goals.

Step 4: Implement a competency development plan.

Next, it's time to implement your competency development plan. Your first initiatives may target specific employees or roles in the company, or you may offer broader company-wide development first. Implementing your plan goes beyond providing one training program; it marks the beginning of a documented process you can replicate. As you build and grow your competency development, your plan can address more specific competencies or roles in the company.

Step 5: Evaluate progress and determine the next steps.

Competency development is a process that you can continuously improve by evaluating the results of development initiatives and determining the next steps. You can look at how overall development programs worked, how well staff responded to them, and how individuals progressed on competencies. You can also set new goals for your workforce. With all that you’ve learned, you can return to step one and reexamine your goals and the values most important to your company, assess your team’s current competencies, and begin planning the next phase of your competency development plan.

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