Competition is a concept whose application in the business environment has been extended and intensified in the last ten years. In the educational environment, its application exceeds four decades, and in Industrial Psychology its application has been almost on a par with its foray into the business environment, since the late 1970s.
Currently, three differentiated approaches coexist, and almost faced in their definitions and in their methodological schemes, although this has not yet transcended the academic environment, seeking epistemic clarity.
There are several defining approaches to the concept of competence, the following being one of the most traditional, conventional and accepted, belonging to the educational or curricular school: “… is the set of knowledge, abilities, skills and attitudes, applied towards achieving the proposed objectives, in a determined area of personal, social or organizational performance ”.
In the psychological school, one of the most representative definitions is that of Spencer, who defines the concept of competence as "… the set of underlying characteristics in individuals that determine superior performance."
In the business field, there are those who work with a definition of the expanded educational school: "… set of knowledge, abilities, skills, attitudes and values, applied in an ideal way at work, towards the achievement of proposed objectives".
Others, from a managerial perspective, define competence as: “… the ideal performance in one or more dimensions of the social or organizational dynamics, such as relationships, technology, operations or administration, or the ideal performance of an activity and / or set of tasks inherent in a work or business process, towards the achievement of proposed objectives, based on a set of knowledge, abilities, skills, attitudes and values.
It should be noted that, in the three approaches, “ideal performance” stands out as a condition or premise of validity of the concept of competence.
The educational school, due to its focus on curricular design, emphasizes in its definition the capacities underlying the competence, that is, the knowledge, abilities, skills and attitudes.
These speak of competition, referring to the individual's ability to perform in one or more specific areas. The competence is in the individual and derives from her systematic preparation in a certain area.
The psychological school, for its part, talks about the individual's competences, which consist of attitudinal aspects or individual characteristics. For them, competence is intrinsic to the individual, in terms of her inclinations, thinking style, or attitudinal traits.
The management school talks about competencies, considering them as “each differentiated unit” of personal, social or organizational performance, which integrates desired behaviors (results) and underlying skills (individual capacities).
Examples of such differentiated units of performance are: in the personal area, interpersonal communication and emotional self-control; in the social area, leadership and interpersonal negotiation; and in the organizational area, strategic planning, and production scheduling and control.
In the business context, competence is a requirement of the process or organizational dynamics, and must be present in the individual, depending on the demands of his position.
For educational or curricular school, a chemical engineer must demonstrate proficiency in chemical process design, or in chemical process control; Competition is associated with the individual according to her professional profile.
For them, work processes are the environments where the individual is going to deploy his acquired skills in the educational environment, complemented by experience.
In the business environment, chemical process design or process control are considered competencies, in themselves, or differentiated units of performance, inherent to a certain work process, and that must be present, or be developed, in the occupants of certain charges.
From a managerial perspective, investment administration, innovation management and operational risk control, among others, are called competencies. From the educational point of view, these are areas in which the individual must demonstrate competence.
Ultimately, these are not conflicting positions, because very likely, part of the existing confusion may lie in the misuse of the terms and not so much of their meaning.
Perhaps, in the managerial field we should not continue talking about "inventory of competences", but rather "inventory of areas of competence". Likewise, we should not call leadership or accident prevention “competencies”, but call them “areas of competence”.
Regarding the psychological school, let us consider that Spencer & Spencer emphasize that the inherent competences of knowing how to act are a deep and resistant part of the personality.
In this sense, from a managerial perspective, motivation to achieve, orientation to order and precision, assertiveness and directivity, or ability to influence, among others, we could consider them as talents, rather than as competencies, to align ourselves with the most recent theoretical formulations..
Those of us who place ourselves in a managerial perspective, affirm that the aforementioned are attitudinal bases of some competences, and explorable in the process of personnel selection.
The psychological school, for example, classifies achievement motivation, self-image, cooperation and teamwork, emotional self-control, gift of command, among others, as competencies.
Some consultants, from a managerial perspective, do not consider achievement motivation and self-image as competencies, because they are not differentiated performance units, based on knowledge, abilities, skills and attitudes, but dispositions, personal traits or attitudinal components that are foundations of various competencies, such as leadership, interpersonal negotiation, or ability to achieve.
On the other hand, emotional self-control, as well as cooperation and teamwork, are considered in the managerial approach as competencies (or areas of competence), as they are differentiated units of performance, based on knowledge, abilities, skills and attitudes.
We know that the psychological school accepts the existence of technical competences (or technical areas of competence), inherent in work processes, which are developed in individuals through study and experience. Likewise, the educational school recognizes the existence of personal and social competences (personal areas of competence and social areas of competence, we would say according to our previous reflection).
Although there are coincidences between the three approaches, such as the premise that competence is demonstrated in practice through observable behaviors, there are differences with important methodological implications, and developments and applications are being generated in the business environment, reflecting the adoption of definitions without epistemological foundation.
An example of the differences noted is the methodological interpretation of the level of mastery of the competences, and with respect to the gaps resulting from an evaluation or diagnosis of competence.
In this sense, the representatives of the educational school state that the domain must be 100%, otherwise the individual is not competent.
For them, competence behaves as a discrete binary variable, which only admits two values: zero or one hundred percent (competent or not competent). The gap is undesirable for them.
For some representatives of the management school, such as the undersigned, competition behaves as a continuous variable, admitting dispersed values within a wide scale, considering the gap as something natural.
Of course, if we talk about certification of competences, in the managerial approach, the level of mastery required must be the highest possible, when it comes to technical or specific competencies of positions that deploy their action in high risk conditions, such as the pilot from an aircraft or a surgeon.
According to the managerial approach, the same competence, such as interpersonal negotiation or leadership, can present different degrees of required mastery, depending on the nature and scope of each position, even when each competence is considered as unique or a non-fragmentable whole.
In this sense, a competency assessment instrument is generated, and it is applied to all those who have the same one associated with the competency profile of their position.
The instrument is designed on the basis of proficiency indicators, in terms of observable behaviors, and the processing of the results considers the variations in proficiency levels required by each position as an implicit variable.
The educational school considers that the level of mastery should always be the highest possible.
The managerial approach admits this, as a goal to be achieved, but does not qualify as “not competent” those who present gaps with respect to the maximum level of mastery; such cases, which are the majority, are considered as personnel in the process of developing their competencies.
In terms of curriculum design, the requirement must be 100% proficient, but a company is not an educational institution.
In a company, there is a set of positions, and each position is associated with between one and four technical or specific competences, depending on their level (there are technical positions, such as consultants or specialists, with five… and perhaps more? Specific competencies)). Additionally, each position has between three and six generic competences (from the personal, social and / or administrative area).
The staff, from their entry into a company, joins a continuous process of learning and developing their skills (or rather, their skills in the various technical, personal, social and administrative areas).
This situation of divergence between the three competency approaches, although not formally declared, but underlying in many published theoretical formulations, demands an epistemological work aimed at clarifying the definition and scope of the concept of competence, as well as its methodological implications, with the purpose to give it status as a universally accepted category of analysis, and to resolve so many existing disagreements early, avoid a probable methodological anarchy, and generate a uniform interpretation.
We propose an epistemic reasoning: if the ideal performance is the criterion or validity premise of the concept of competence, then in its definition it should be highlighted, starting the definition as follows: "it is the ideal performance of…".
Capacities, due to their condition as an element underlying competition, must be reflected as such in the definition, referring at the end of it: “… based on knowledge, abilities, skills and attitudes”.
This proposal is aligned with the paradigmatic figure of the iceberg, widely disseminated and accepted as a graphic representation of the competition, which presents the ideal performance at the tip of the iceberg, and the capabilities submerged at the bottom.
With a view to generating contributions that benefit all of us, who work in this interesting area of knowledge, based on our learning, we provoke an exchange of ideas and approaches, which allow the members of the three schools to integrate on the basis of agreements and definitions, on an epistemological basis.
