{"id":1121,"date":"2009-11-04T01:00:41","date_gmt":"2009-11-04T09:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/?p=1121"},"modified":"2009-11-02T10:13:57","modified_gmt":"2009-11-02T18:13:57","slug":"leadership-competency-design-%e2%80%93-five-most-common-mistakes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/?p=1121","title":{"rendered":"Leadership Competency Design \u2013 Five most common mistakes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Guest Author:\u00a0 Stephen B. Jeong, Ph.D.<\/em><\/p>\n

Designing and using a set of reliable and valid leadership competencies is critical for organizations seeking to go from point A to point B.\u00a0 Leadership competencies are essentially an ideal profile specifying the types of skills, knowledges, and behavioral traits you want your leaders to possess, and therefore, exhibit.\u00a0 Leadership competencies can used as part of a broader talent management system and succession planning, for leadership identification and development purposes, and\/or as part of a performance management system \u2013 e.g., via a 360 degree feedback.<\/p>\n

Despite the prohibitive cost associated with its design and use \u2013 anywhere from $75,000 to $400,000, depending on the size and scope of the project \u2013 many organizations fall short of the reliability and validity requirements set forth by such governing bodies as APA (American Psychological Association) and SIOP (Society for Industrial-Organizational Psychologists).\u00a0 As a psychometrician and a consultant, I have found the following five steps to be common in leadership competency design.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Starting from the top \u2013 Many believe (HR\/OD professionals and consultants alike) that there are specific leadership competencies that is fixed \u2013 meaning that if you find leaders possessing certain qualities (critical thinking skills, strategic orientation, market awareness etc.), you can plop him\/her into an organization and he\/she will bring out the magic.\u00a0 Given the large number (in the hundreds) and variations in competencies purported to be important, it is highly unlikely that one set of competencies apply to all organizations. As with Olympic athletes, while one generally needs to be \u201cfit,\u201d this does not guarantee a gold medal in every event. In other words, like athletes, different organization need different sets of competencies in order to optimize their competitive edge.\u00a0 This means starting from the top.\u00a0 A solid set of competency, therefore, is modeled after what an organization needs; not something offered \u201coff-the-shelf.\u201d\u00a0 This step ensures that you identify precisely those skills you feel is \u201cnecessary\u201d for your organization to be successful.<\/li>\n
  2. Validating with existing leaders \u2013 Once you have a set of competencies deemed important, it is critical to run them by existing leaders to obtain their thoughts on how important each competency (and related questions) is.\u00a0 This step is important for two reasons:\u00a0 First, it legitimizes the competencies in the eyes of those who are being assessed \u2013 i.e., the leaders themselves; thus, getting them to buy-in on the idea.\u00a0 Second, it satisfies the \u201cface validity\u201d requirement set forth in the major governing bodies.\u00a0 In other words, if I am design a test to select competent mechanics, I need to run the test by real mechanics in order to be sure that the test is measuring what it is intending to measure.<\/li>\n
  3. Validating against actual performance \u2013 Once the first two steps are complete, the next step is to assess existing leaders on these competencies and compare these scores against their performance evaluations.\u00a0 The most objective was to do this is through a 360 degree assessment \u2013 i.e., obtaining judgments from subordinates, peers, and supervisors. In this way, an objective scores on each of the competency is obtained without the inflated scores often seen with self-rated assessments.\u00a0 After some reliability checks and data cleaning, the aggregated scores are compared against the same leaders\u2019 past performance scores.\u00a0 If the set of competencies deemed important for an organization are, in fact, what the organization values, then the correlation between those same competencies and performance ratings should be positive.\u00a0 This is called \u201cconcurrent validation.\u201d<\/li>\n
  4. Validation against future performance \u2013 In addition to validating against current performance levels, the same competencies should be compared against performance some point in the future \u2013 e.g., 9 to 12 months.\u00a0 This technique, known as \u201cpredictive validation,\u201d further ensures that the set of competencies are, in fact, deemed important and that leaders are being assessed \u2013 at least partially \u2013 on those competencies.\u00a0 **Note: Although unlikely, it is possible that performance management system is entirely different, and event, opposed to the set of competencies being assessed.\u00a0 In such a case, the performance management needs to be refined to be aligned with the competencies.<\/li>\n
  5. Setting competency cut-off scores or categories \u2013 Finally, once data have been obtained on the competencies from each leader, there is a need classify individuals according to their scores on each of the competencies. While it may be tempting to choose an arbitrary category, this may lead to classifying most, if not all, leaders as needing improvement.\u00a0 Thus, it is better to allow the data to choose the size of the difference that is meaningful to the population being tested.\u00a0 This approach, known as the \u201cdata-driven\u201d method, is done by using the \u201cstandard deviation\u201d (or average difference) of the competency scores.\u00a0 This approach ensures that the different score categories are based on the population at hand (each organization will differ on what this deviation score is) and is a known \u201clegally defensible\u201d strategy.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    In sum, there are a number of common mistakes (mostly by omission) that occurs in the development of leadership competencies.\u00a0 While the above steps may seem overly rigorous, there are ways to incorporate them without making the process overly daunting.\u00a0 The result is a set of competencies that (a) will be viewed by incumbents as legitimate, (b) has proof that it is measuring what it is supposed to be measuring, and (c) ultimately allow you to place your complete confidence in the intervention stemming from its use.<\/p>\n

    Stephen B. Jeong, is currently the Managing Director of Waypoint People Solutions – www.waypointps.com<\/a>, a human capital consulting firm that focuses on high precision employee diagnostic surveys using cutting-edge measurement technology and methodologies. He holds Ph.D. in Industrial-Organizational psychology from the Ohio State University and has been advising private, public, and government organizations since 2000.\u00a0 He can be reached at stephen.jeong@waypointps.com.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Guest Author:\u00a0 Stephen B. Jeong, Ph.D. Designing and using a set of reliable and valid leadership competencies is critical for organizations seeking to go from point A to point B.\u00a0 Leadership competencies are essentially an ideal profile specifying the types…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_coblocks_attr":"","_coblocks_dimensions":"","_coblocks_responsive_height":"","_coblocks_accordion_ie_support":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8,20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-strategies","category-talent-management"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1121"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1121\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1150,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1121\/revisions\/1150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/systematichr.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}