About Purpose is about your purpose.
Aim: Identify and articulate your purpose.
Arm: Shape yourself around your purpose.
Act: Achieve your purpose.
Programs:
| Receive our Free email newsletter |
Listen to article
Position Descriptions 101
Bob Ryan, About Purpose, Inc. ©2008
Make a note: “Write competencies for our position descriptions.” Got it? Good, now go do it.
If you’ve already done it, congratulations! You’re probably way ahead of your competition.
If you already know how and you haven’t done it for all your position descriptions, go get it done now. You’re flirting with employment disaster and you’re on borrowed time.
If you don’t know how, then this article is for you. You may have gotten lucky with current hires, but you surely need to get good, competency-based position descriptions into place before you hire anyone else.
First, a little background. Position descriptions are necessary – for you and for your employee. They are the best way of describing mutual expectations and setting the stage for success in the job. In addition, they are a vital tool for internal organization to assure smooth, non-duplicated work flow in your organization. Competency-based position descriptions have the added benefit of providing a clear line of succession where employees can see what they need to do to prepare themselves for promotion within the company. Finally, they provide a base for questions of growth and development, coaching and even discipline.
Everybody knows what a position description is, but few people use competencies to write them. Most often, they provide a few areas of responsibility, a list of tasks and the line of accountability. Those are effective and necessary as far as they go, but if you add competencies, you will greatly improve your position descriptions and they will become a valuable tool in your organization for leadership, management, and supervision.
Competencies are simply a list of knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary for the success of a position. They differ from a list of tasks or responsibilities. Here’s an example of a task versus a competency:
TASK: The secretary will sort all incoming mail; file industry-related information bulletins in the library; open all letters; discard all junk mail; channel all checks, invoices and statements to bookkeeping; scan remaining mail; and forward to the appropriate recipients.
COMPETENCY: The secretary will show an ability to read and understand English. S/he will demonstrate an ability to discern relevancy in all incoming documents and make decisions about routing, scanning and discarding. S/he will exhibit a mastery of electronic document handling and use of the company e-mail system.
As you can see, there is a major difference between listing the tasks and defining the competencies required for successfully accomplishing them. What seems like a simple list of duties is actually made up of some pretty sophisticated knowledge and abilities.
The key to competency based job descriptions are the “show me” verbs: “show, demonstrate, establish, make known, prove, illustrate, exhibit, document,” etc. They confirm the extent to which the knowledge, skills and attitudes are present. They establish a level of success against which you can measure an applicant’s or a job-holder’s current competence. They create a menu of developmental steps required for improvement and for excellence.
Adding competencies to position descriptions is the surest way of assuring positions will be filled by successful candidates and that everyone involved will understand the extent of the position. Begin working on them today. The first one may be tough, but it will get easier as you practice.