Important Milestone: Competencies for Competitiveness

In a previous post the table below was suggested as a framework to build the competency requirements of the organisation.   

	Technical	Soft Skills	Management	Company In house Systems and Procedures
Aware
Basic
Operational
Expert

Each column needs to be unpacked so that an individual company can select those competencies which are key to its competitiveness.

Some experience and more research have suggested the following “menus”:

Technical	Soft Skills	Management	Company in house Systems and Procedures: Role Specific
Contract Management	Strategic thinking	Enterprise Management	Accounting/ Finance
Compliance Management	Critical thinking	Group Management	Inventory
Risk Management	Thinking agility	Business Management	Payroll
Intellectual Property Management	Decision making	Functional Management	Customer Relationship Management
Logistics/  Return Logistics Management	Problem solving	Manage Managers	International Logistics
Financial Management	Negotiation	Manage Others	Statutory Compliance
Marketing Management	Emotional intelligence	Manage Self	End user computing (e.g. Microsoft Office etc.)
Warehouse Management	Self awareness
Procurement and Materials Management	Self-belief
Financial Management	Self-promotion
Human Capital Management	Stress management
	Communication
	Presentation / public speaking
	Technical writing
	Facilitating
	Mentoring / coaching
	Active listening
	Interviewing
	Selling
	Quality client service
	Team work
	Conflict resolution
	Networking/ Collaboration
	Cross-cultural intelligence

Each business is different: every company maintains and grows its competitiveness in different ways.

Now comes the interesting part:

• These menus need to be verified in terms of our own organisation. Best recommendation is to workshop. 
• Copy and paste these menus on to as many separate documents as there are position in the organisation. Then, for each position, tick off the competencies needed and ADD any which have been left out. These additions will most likely be needed under the “Technical” and “Company in house Systems and Procedures” pillars because these tend to be specific to a particular postion (i.e. role specific). There will be blurring between each pillar: this should not be a concern – what is more important is to capture all the competencies for each job under one of the pillars. Some of the competencies listed may need further unpacking (example: Warehouse Management may need to be specified in much more detail). There may well be competencies which have been listed here but which are not required. 
• The question which needs to be asked during these workshopping sessions is “In order for us to be as competitive as possible, what competencies does each person holding this position need?”
• In capturing these competencies try to ensure that, as far as possible, requirements do not only reflect the NOW of the position but what it will be in the next TWO TO THREE YEARS.
• Once all the competencies have been captured for each position, by indicating against each competency the LEVEL (Aware, Basic, Operational, Expert) at which that competency is required for that position, a competency profile for each position is created. 

This is an important milestone: the competency requirements have been objectively established for each position and they reflect our organisation.

Having obtained this vital information about the organisation, we need to find out, in future posts, how it can be used to turn our people into super performers. 

Does a methodology for creating competency hold values for your organisation?

If so, is it worth spending time in developing these?

Survey Pinpoints Training as Opportunity to Supply Chain Success

There is a golden thread throughout Barloworld Logistics 2013 supplychainforesight* survey – training.

In respect of South Africa’s competitiveness, 82% of the survey’s respondents identified education and skills as being one of the constraints.

In this context, the finding that seventy-nine per cent of respondents said supply chain and logistics innovation is essential to optimising business performance is very significant.

Survey participants identified five top strategic business objectives: each of these has important training implications which are shown here:

Business Objective	Training implications
Increase flexibility, agility & responsiveness	Achieved through delegation of responsibilities as close to direct interface with the client as possible. Requires high degree of competence at all levels of the organisation.
Introduce new products & services	Requires product specialists who are equipped with the skills and knowledge to innovate and effect change.
Expand into emerging markets	Two pronged approach required: marketing and logistics expertise. In emerging markets it is the skill in the logistics area which often gives the competitive edge.
Use supply chain as a competitive advantage	Key element to a competitive supply chain is that the people who operate it know what they are doing and how their scope of operation impacts on others.
Grow & expand internationally	Intimate knowledge of target markets needed, coupled to the competencies which can deliver the right products to the right place, at the right price, at the right time, every time.

Whilst identifying these strategic objectives, 66% of participants identified a general skill shortage as a constraint to their achievement.

Delving more specifically into the supply chain area, participants identified five supply chain objectives, each of which has its own training implications which are discussed below:

Supply Chain Objective	Training Implications
Improving service levels to customers	Whilst technical competence cannot be over emphasised, what are often overlooked are those soft skills which are key to improvement of client service levels.
Improving flow of business intelligence between the business	A crucial skill in this area is the ability to mine, analyse and interpret supply chain data from both within and outside the company.
Lowering procurement costs and reducing order lead times	Smart procurement is predicated on access to supply market data, the ability to interpret it and to use that information to build strong, collaborative relationships with suppliers.
Improving visibility in the supply chain	Each movement of inventory through the supply chain requires a flow of data. Visibility in the supply chain relies on the ability of those involved to network a number of different systems so that relevant information is secure but accessible to all who need it.
Optimising inbound and outbound transportation	Optimal logistics performance relies on a high  degree of knowledge and skill in areas of compliance, consolidation and control and at different degrees of complexity.

Whilst competence, skills, knowledge and expertise are critical to the achievement of these objectives, the availability of supply chain skills was identified as a constraint to the achievement of these objectives by 66% of participants.

The survey found that there is a growing recognition that innovation is critical to success: 90% of correspondents agree that emerging and new business models in South Africa require supply chain innovation but few are confident that universities, amongst others, are able to drive innovation.

Turning to logistics and transportation as an industry, only 38% of participants rated this industry as being the most innovative in South Africa.

Cusp of opportunity

The supplychainforesight* survey shows that whilst competitiveness requires competencies in a wide range of fields, the lack of such competencies is a major constraint to the achievement of objectives at a number of different levels.

This, coupled to the disarray which characterises much of the formal South African education and training infrastructure, presents organisations which are serious about supply chain optimisation with unique opportunities: it is those organisations which are able to grow those competencies which will become the winners.

Examples of developments which now make this possible are:

• Developments in e learning technology make it a reality for all who require it, irrespective of where they may be;
•  By harnessing both e- learning and social media, course developers are able to create learner driven training products which accommodate all learning styles and which result in the seamless transition between the learning intervention and its application in the workplace;
• The growing accessibility of a wide range of best in class information, procedures and practices means that training programmes can be constantly updated and reinvigorated;
• At the same time, programmes can be developed which address not only the specific needs of the organisation but also identified skills gaps of individual employees;
• Finally, delivery and management of training is under the organisation’s complete control.

South Africans businesses are never slow to capitalise on opportunities and the number of them which are developing their own training facilities is growing.

Is it not time to be evaluating the competitive advantages which such a strategy can bring to your organisation?

* 2013 supplychainforesight

Serial Innovation, Smart Partnerships and Sustainable Advantages

Published by Barloworld Logistics

Research Conducted by Frost & Sullivan.

Used with permission

Getting Real – Determining Realistic Training Requirements

The matrix shown below was introduced previously as the starting point for determining who we should train on what.

This time around I would like to focus on the development of this matrix to determine the competency needs of our particular organisation.

Reason suggests that, since our organisation must be unique in order to survive in a highly competitive market, we must be employing different competencies from those of our competitors, right? Yes, to an extent.

What actually makes us competitive is, I would suggest, more the WAY in which we employ a common set of competencies in serving our clients, rather than the employment of unique competencies.

For example, supply chain management companies derive much competitive edge from unique software packages to manage the supply chains of their clients: the ability to create such packages is made up of common competencies applied in a work environment which enables creativity to flourish.  It is the environment in which competencies are applied which determines the uniqueness of the final product, not the actual competencies being applied.

In summary: our organisation’s competitiveness is developed from the unique way in which we harness competencies.

To use this matrix to determine the training needs of each individual in our organisation we need first to establish what competencies in each of the vertical columns are required by our organisation. The technical skills required in freight forwarding can for instance be vastly different to those used in the warehousing industry: every company has its own in house procedures and systems and so on. Whilst soft skills and management competencies are quite generic, we need to analyse carefully the way in which we apply them because this is the source of much of our competitive edge.

How to determine our organisation’s competency needs? It is strongly suggested that this is not something which can be taken on by one individual - in smaller companies of say less than 50 individuals, the four to five key individuals need to be involved; in larger companies all line managers should be extensively consulted.

The recommended process is as follows:
List the competencies needed by your organisation under each of the four headings Technical, Soft Skills, Management, Company In house Systems and Procedures. In building this competency profile, be careful to define not only those competencies which are needed now, but also those which will be needed to sustain the company in terms of its long term strategic goals.

For each job/ job category in the company, select the level of proficiency which each job/ job category requires under each of the four headings.

A word of caution: this task requires time and commitment on the part of those involved. Very often what we may think is required in terms of a competency at a particular level of proficiency may be far removed from the reality of the job. This is because the more senior we become the less we tend to know about how things are actually done at the coalface. This exercise therefore represents a good opportunity to find this out.  

The result will be a competency profile of each job.

In the next article I would like to explore these competency profiles in more depth with examples and also make some suggestions of competencies which need to be included from the point of view of the international supply chain management environment.