In recent years, the environmental issue, and in general everything that it includes in its discourse prefixes associated with the terms eco and bio, is usually well seen and receives initial acceptance in the circles in which it intends to move.
The topic went from being a scientific concern, aimed at guaranteeing the living conditions on the planet, to traveling a polysemic path conquered by different discourses that have tried to capture or at least imprison the limits of its scope and impact.
The growing concern about the environmental crisis and the events that certify the destruction of natural resources on a daily basis, have led to a sensitivity towards the issue that is collective and has generated hundreds of initiatives aimed at contributing, even in the wrong way, to stop the destruction of the only planet we have to live in (Manifesto A Sustainable World is Possible !. 2002.).
From the political approaches, ideologized by different currents of thought, to the total instrumentalization of the term by governments that reduced it and led to a mandatory norm and in the worst case, to a seal that calms the conscience of those who they continue to consume and devour the environment for the benefit of an economic model that aims at the development of a society capable of maintaining the dangerous balance between the development of technology and the consumption of limited natural resources.
Since the 70s, where concern for the environmental issue is formalized and internationalized (Club of Rome, the limits of growth among others), multiple texts have been written with speeches, harangues, warnings, investigations and requests that are reaching the distressing, but sometimes ignored, called to intervene in this process of continuous and permanent degradation of an environment that is less and less like what we hope to inherit from future generations.
The flags of the environmental discourse have been passed by different exponents ranging from the most radical defenders of the earth (eg Greenpeace), who have raised the flags of urgency in a new way of approaching nature (Cumbre de Rio, our common future), even the deniers of climate change who assure that everything that happens is a product of natural development in the brief history of humanity on earth and that therefore nothing we do will prevent the final destination to which we inevitably approach.
However, the legitimate concern for the interests of the land has led to the emergence of documents from the different summits on environmental issues that have been slowly incorporated into the legislation of the different countries in order to contribute to what has been done. called “sustainable development” and which aim to establish action routes that guarantee management models that protect the different resources that remain (UN, UNEP eg).
Of special relevance in this reflection, the need to recognize the emphasis of some authors who speak of " environmental crisis as a crisis of rationality”* (Leff), which synthetically shows the ethical, epistemological and semantic reflections that show that the man-nature relationship is conditioned by a hermeneutical principle that leads us to consider ourselves as subjects in a world of objects, which means that everything that cannot be included in the so-called "community of thought" * (Kant), can have no other destiny than that of subordinate to human action. This model of thought is the one that circulates through all the components of the social and cultural systems and has been adequately addressed to show that from the "res cognitas" everything else was turned into "res extensive" and therefore subject to domination of a being whose existence is determined by his ability to think, in the famous "I think therefore I exist" (Descartes).
Returning to the topic of legislative and regulatory processes, it is worth mentioning all those that are governed by international and national agreements, including those contemplated in ISO standards and all those that address the need for companies and entrepreneurs to take responsibility for impact caused by your organization in terms of contamination, degradation, etc… and therefore that they take the different preventive or corrective actions that lead them to decrease, mitigate or eliminate the levels of impact in their management.
These topics have been adequately addressed by different authors and continue to be a matter of constant concern due to the responsibility of the control agencies in that it becomes essential to continue documenting the footprint that man has left in the different landscapes where he has traveled. in its history (Gachet, 2002); We find then, that for each of the horizons through which humanity has established itself, there have been many pioneers who have spent their lives generating knowledge about the multiple impacts that man has produced in these scenarios.
One of the components that crosses the different scenarios of social life is Environmental Education, which ranges from the efforts of teachers in schools and other formal education centers, to the initiatives carried out in companies and communities to literate in the subjects required so that social practices and behaviors are friendly to the environment that surrounds them. Environmental education is one of the axes around which rests the hope of achieving positive results in the search for actions that ensure that it is possible to transform the way of thinking and acting in the face of nature; In this sense, there are plans and programs designed for children, youth and adults that ensure experiences and knowledge that allow them to understand that nature is part of their vital development. Now, what the evidence says, after 40 years,is that this route does not seem to lead to the expected destination (Eschenhagen 2008).
For its part, business life, consolidated since the industrial revolution as a space for personal fulfillment, also understands that the environment, far from being a passing fad, is an urgency that must be included in all the processes in which people intervene, in such a way that the concern about these issues must go beyond the satisfactory compliance with the regulations expressed in the law and must go beyond the actions proposed by the auditors that safeguard the application of the ISO.
Organizations have become vital spaces for people and therefore develop in it a good part of what they want to be as related beings (Hegel). The organization, for its part, expresses in its being, the condition for which it exists and this has to do with the three pillars on which all its management is based: Profitability, growth and permanence * (Sallenave, 1994). These three pillars are constitutive of the reason and essence of the organization. In this sense, strategic thinking is also aimed at formulating the three key factors that allow us to ensure and consolidate the design of an organization capable of maintaining itself over time. They are: The strategy that anticipates or at least foresees the different activities that the organization must carry out and in this sense develops WHAT,which allows to identify thecompany success factors. The second factor has to do with the Structure of the company, that is, finding HOW to achieve these proposed objectives and last, but not least, CULTURE as a factor of business success, that is, WHO and this is where organizations mark the difference when you get your results.
On the other hand, the organizational culture manifests itself as a determining factor for the achievement of corporate objectives; The people who make up the organization develop a way of acting, a way of being, their own style that is determined by the traditions and customs that have become part of the identity of the organization. Culture then refers to the configuration of events that expresses the way people relate to each other in different work teams.
Culture is also determined by the history of the company by the relevant facts that have been built by the metalanguages that daily generate harmony and conflict, in such a way that their identity is capable of being reflected and interpreted by all those who do not belong to it. and they can even characterize it (Garzón, 2005).
Culture has a fundamental component and is the so-called " human talent ", a title that has been evolving or at least changing throughout the organizational history, refers to the people who are part of a company and are responsible for giving life to the proposed strategy through the available structure. I will not stop to comment on the role of people in the organization as a labor force or as a necessary resource in the exercise of the transformation of raw materials, etc., and I will not elaborate on the condition of the vertical relationship in the management of power. and its consequences in history, especially in the 20th century, but I will land, I hope not rudely, in the discussion about the human being as human capitalof the organization and as a subject of transformation through knowledge.
Returning then to the role of human talent in the organization, we find that when talking about talent, it is then necessary to disaggregate the term to find out what its components are, since on many occasions we consider that all the people who work in the organization They are talented, when in fact their performance shows otherwise. A talented person (Pilar Jericó) is a person who recognizes that her results are the product of the contribution she received from other people, that is, she accepts that others are necessary and are part of the management she carries out.
Human talent can be expressed, among others, through three components that together generate the outstanding and differentiated results that we expect for the organization. They are the commitment, the action and the capacity, in such a way that, later in this process, it will be necessary to return to each one of them in order to deepen and demonstrate their contribution in the consolidation of talent as the differentiator required for the results in the organization..
Once they are assured of establishing the framework for reflection in the organization and specifically in the culture, as a manifestation of the collective experience of those who participate in the same business structureNow, however, it is necessary to point out that people maintain a relationship governed by legal regulations that ensure that this contract is fulfilled in accordance with the mutual expectations set at the time of initiating the employment relationship. In this sense, the initial expectation has to do with the performance * (Cintefor) of the person, which can be basically divided into performance (which is related to the way she performs her task, that is, to management) and its results that Thus, performance is measured in terms of effectiveness, that is, by combining efficiency and effectiveness.
The proposal of a model of environmental competences is based on the conceptual models that David McClelland designed and developed for the subject of competences, which bases the model on three main components, from which the reflection that leads us to the formulation and characterization of environmental competencies as necessary and required for superior performance and that transcends the organizational sphere in its actions.
For his part, says S. Covey, that true and profound change occurs "from the inside out" and that therefore, what we are is already inside as a seed capable of developing and showing its full potential. Already in ancient times Plato also pointed out in his myth of the cave, that truth was a result that was reached after an effort that led us to overcome the shadows of opinion * (Plato, the republic). In such a way that the possibility of being, in this model of thought means that everything that we are was already contained within us, we are then able to develop our potential and make it manifest through our actions.
Competition, understood then, in one of its components, as the ability to deliver superior performance will have, in this reflection, three factors in which the term is disaggregated, they are: Being, knowing and doing. However, it is necessary to clarify that the competence of a person is evident in the action, which leads us to consolidate the opinion that a competent person is so in so far as he expresses it through his observable and evaluable behaviors in a given event liable to be repeated in similar situations (Alles).
Next, I will make a brief reflection on each of the terms, not intending to exhaust their scope and meaning but, on the contrary, leaving open all the options that lead us to integrate in each component the possibility of assimilating the need for an analysis that totality is not unknown as a horizon of meaning in the action experienced by the person.
to. Being. The first annotation has to do with the urgency of establishing that these comments do not intend to approach the term from an ontological and not even a psychological perspective, it is only a mention to point out that it is about the rescue of the individuality of the subject and its internal capacity to contain the possibility as power. When in the revision of the terms, which participate in the construction of competence, we speak of being, it refers specifically to the identity from which the attitude springs, that is, the interpretation it makes of the world and the condition it establishes to relate to it. In this sense, being is accompanied not only by attitude but also by intention understood as the "purpose or will of" * (DRAE). Baste us, in this first approach,with establishing that when we speak of the BEING we are referring to the internal and internal of the human being, the individual and own that configures the identity of the subject and therefore differentiates it from the other. However, it is worth mentioning, we are not talking here about a timeless being and without cultural references, quite the contrary, what is going to allow him to establish the link with the following factor is precisely his ability to link with social expectations.What is going to allow you to establish a link with the next factor is precisely your ability to connect with social expectations.What is going to allow you to establish a link with the next factor is precisely your ability to connect with social expectations.
b. Know: It is a condition of knowledge (Kant), it is the evidence that leads us to consolidate in the subject a differentiating characteristic, since although it is true that similar contents are given in the learning process, it is in the knowledge process as Knowledge is being created that allows expressing what I understand from what has been seen, read or learned. Knowing, in the competency model, is accompanied by knowledge and then allows the person, in their actions, to use them to define the type of action they need. In this sense, it is clear to recognize that there is coherence in the way in which being expresses itself through knowledge. Each news * (DRAE) that reaches the intellect is mediated and as we expand our horizon of concepts, theories and models. We are also configuringa hermeneutic design that allows us to get closer to reality in order to go to it with the paradigms we have built from the contexts in which we are immersed. An issue not addressed here has to do with emotion and feeling as a traveling companion in this process ofconstruction of the competition and that without a doubt then determines the judgment that we make on each one of the knowledge that we incorporate in our knowing.
c. Do: It is the external expression of being and knowing in a concrete action, it is the way in which the subject approaches a specific situation in the shared reality. Doing can be seen in different ways and one of them has to do with "transform", "convert" and "execute" * (DRAE) in a given context and with expected results. Doing is the practical manifestation of the subject's capacity and therefore aspects such as communication and language as drivers of action must be incorporated in this context. It is important then when talking about this component that the so-called ability integrates the skill to execute an action whose result is comparatively higher than the average (McClleland), in such a way that its performance makes a difference in the context of the work team.
However, competence as such does not correspond to the exercise (observed in some theoretical models and in real experiences) in seeing the three components in a linear way or coining each of them with a series of desirable behaviors. The competence can be named as such only if in an observable and evaluable behavior it can be predicated that simultaneously it is evident what the person is, knows and does, or her ability, knowledge and attitude. (Alles)
These three components that can be named in different ways, depending on the conceptual approach that is had of each of them, will then lead us to an observable and evaluable behavior that invites us to take another step in this reflection and the judgment that can be made about it. do.
The competences in general, and in particular the environmental one, refer then to an observable and measurable behavior that is present in the person and that undoubtedly impacts the organizational culture. It is therefore necessary to recognize the impact that these competencies can have when they are identified, developed and promoted within the organization. The environmental competition goes, no doubt, by educational processes that enable information on the subject and thus recognize actions able to maintain the required harmony with nature.
I consider that environmental competencies in the organization will be, in the not too distant future, a prerequisite and necessary when it comes to measuring people's job performance and will be a key component in business culture, in such a way that, surely, The organization will have to have a program that allows identifying, evaluating, developing and training this group of behaviors, taking advantage of environmental education as a component of knowledge training, developing environmental improvement programs that allow people to qualify and this sense strengthen the Being as a potentiality that is expressed in a culture in permanent transformation.
Finally, thinking strategically and assuming that the tool for measuring environmental competencies will be seen as a practical instrument capable of being included in the organization's management tools, it is possible that this model integrates a bank of observable behaviors that will lead to more Forward to a dictionary of environmental competences, some specific, others general but always (I anticipate) transversal, that is why all areas and departments must incorporate these competences as part of their differentiation management, which will be an added value that will be required of the people who work in the organization.
In later articles, I will present in a more specific and timely way the model of environmental competences that includes its respective dictionary of competences, the measuring instrument adjusted to the processes of human talent management and, of course, an approximation of what will be a training and development of environmental skills that transform the culture of the organization.
This topic will undoubtedly be integrated and included in the management management agenda in the near future and will be part of the pillars on which the corporate results will be based.
