The development of an organization depends on how skillful and experienced its staff is. The qualities, behaviors, and character of the candidates can determine how well they can perform and contribute to organizational progress. At times choosing the right candidates for the corporation can be a challenging task. You might have plenty of resumes filled with years of work experience and skill sets, which can make it difficult for you to choose the best one. In this situation, evaluating behavioral Competency can be your powerful asset.
Pondering what they are?
Behavioral competencies are the characteristics of candidates beyond their resumes. It’s the Candidates’ personality that can greatly enhance or inhibit individual as well as organizational progress.
While hiring, understanding whether aspirants possess leadership qualities, good communication skills, or whether they are open to relationship building and more can help you choose the best among all.
Want to learn more about it? Let’s move on to the details of behavioral Competency at work and discover why organizations must evaluate these qualities while hiring candidates.
Let us start it off.
# What is behavioral Competency at work?
Behavioral competencies also referred to as general competencies, are the personality characteristics, behaviors, and attitudes that distinguish a candidate from other candidates. These might include some special skills, knowledge, work style, or capabilities of a candidate that can add value to his performance and, ultimately, to organizational advancement.
These special traits determine or predict how well a candidate can perform and fulfill the job role he is on board and what contribution the organization can expect from him.
# Behavioral Competency Vs. Other competencies. What’s the difference?
In general, Competency is the ability to perform any task with efficiency. Besides behavioral competencies, Competencies can be of a variety of types. Let’s help you understand each one in brief to prevent any confusion.
1. Behavioral Competency
These are also called soft skills or candidate’s attributes such as communication skills, adaptability, relationship building, and more that influence the candidate’s performance and relationship with the organizational members.
2. Core Competency
These are the characteristics or special features of the organization, such as the unique techniques, strategic approaches, or tools that distinguish it from its competitors and help it get ahead of the competition.
3. Functional Competency
These are also called technical competencies, which are job-specific technical abilities that are required to perform well and deliver high-quality outputs.
4. Managerial Competency
These are the special characteristics such as orientation skills, leadership skills, decision-making, and problem-solving that are required to perform management roles.
# Major types of behavioral Competency at work.
Now that you might have got an idea of what behavioral competencies are and how they differ from others, it’s time to go over the different types of behavioral competencies at work.
The ones we are going to discuss are not the only behavioral competencies you may encounter. This is because different people might have different perceptions of behavioral competencies, and we have covered the major ones that are required in the majority of workplaces.
The following are the eight different types of behavioral competencies at work. Let’s learn each, one by one.
1. Good Communication Skills
Communication is a necessity of every organization regardless of the position and profession of employees. The effectiveness of information fades away if not communicated appropriately. Therefore, good communication skills are essential skills a candidate must possess to communicate effectively in workplaces.
Effective communication allows employees to correctly communicate information and ideas, as well as interact with other employees, which is necessary for creating a healthy work culture.
2. Interpersonal skills
The workplace requires effective collaboration among employees to produce more profitable results. A candidate’s character is based on his interpersonal skills and the way he collaborates and maintains relationships at the workplace.
How effectively a candidate can communicate and work with other employees, individually as well as in groups, can significantly impact the effectiveness of the work. Therefore, candidates must possess sound interpersonal skills to manage personal as well as professional relationships to perform better and bring more favorable outcomes for the organization.
3. Leadership skills
Leadership is an art. Organizations seek leadership competencies in candidates so that they can proficiently and proactively work with teams as and when required. Therefore, a leader must possess great management skills and strong traits such as problem-solving, decision-making, creativity, and orientation skills, which allow them to work effectively with their team and produce more profitable results.
4. Ethics and values
Smart decisions taken at the right time can bring in more fruitful outcomes at workplaces.
A candidate’s perspective of work-life can significantly impact productivity at the workplace. Employees with a good understanding and balance of ethics and values can make strong and factual decisions. Therefore, organizations seek people with high morals and values to maintain and foster a healthy work setting.
5. Analytical skills
At the workplace, analytical skills are problem-solving skills that enable employees to collect, observe, and evaluate data in order to develop effective solutions. These analytical skills allow employees to properly understand the situation thoroughly and make better judgments, resulting in better results and, ultimately, higher production.
Candidates with analytical skills are preferred by organizations to enhance the quality of work power for organizational success.
6. Decision-making skills
Business acumen or decision-making is the capability of making sound business decisions by weighing all factors. Candidates with sharp judgmental skills can make the suited decisions and help businesses to grow and advance strategically.
7. Cultural skills
Cultural Competency is how effectively employees connect, interact, and work with people of different backgrounds and develop meaningful relations. Candidates with cultural skills can better engage and coordinate with organizational members, creating a healthy work environment, and bringing more productivity.
8. Flexibility and Adaptability
Flexibility and adaptability are great skills that enable individuals to adjust to the changing environment. This resilience competency enables people to learn from experience, adapt new abilities, and improve work effectiveness in the workplace.
A candidate who possesses these attributes can effectively improve his skills and flourish both personally and professionally.
All of these are the most important aptitudes that every organization looks for in applicants when hiring in order to improve their work power. Efficient employees may communicate and engage more effectively and work more proficiently to promote organizational growth. Behavioral competence evaluation throughout the recruiting process may ensure that the newly hired applicant can satisfy their roles and be a valuable addition to the corporation.
# Why behavioral competency matter for organizations?
The need for behavioral Competency can be different for different organizations. Understanding which behavioral competencies can meet your organization’s needs to satisfy your business objectives will assist you in hiring the most deserving applicant who can contribute to the organization’s growth and success.
- Behavioral competencies, in addition to work experience and skills, can be the cherry on the cake. These are crucial to assess because they can greatly influence the work efficiency of employees. For instance, examining the most fundamental yet vital communication abilities of applicants help employers to establish whether they can effectively connect and communicate with their coworkers and fit in the companies’ frame. This is critical because an ineffective addition to the company can have a significant impact on performance and, ultimately, organizational progress.
- Moreover, the candidate’s perspective on assessing things, their conduct, decision-making skills, and problem-solving approach can significantly impact the work culture and outputs at the individual as well as organizational level. Therefore, it’s essential to evaluate candidates’ soft skills along with assessing their hard skills during the hiring process.
- In addition to hiring, the behavioral competencies must be evaluated at the organization’s management level. Employers and executives can evaluate their employee’s capabilities, identify performance gaps and determine future action plans in order to improve their performance and overall outcomes.
# How to assess behavioral competency while hiring?
Evaluating behavioral competency at work necessitates great knowledge as well as sharp assessment abilities. HR or leaders with a great understanding of human behavior can effectively identify the behavioral competencies of the applicants to employ the best fit for the corporation’s needs.
1. Assess the company’s need for Behavioral Competency
Understanding the needs of the corporation is the first step in assessing behavioral competencies. Determine which behavioral competencies are required in an individual to perform day-to-day responsibilities in order to meet corporate objectives.
For example, if you need to hire a candidate for a leading position, it’s crucial to evaluate their leadership, interpersonal, analytical, problem-solving, and decision-making abilities. All of these characteristics are crucial and make up a fantastic leader who can effectively fulfill their key tasks.
2. Conduct a detailed assessment
Assessing candidates’ personality traits can help you predict their strengths and weaknesses and make a sound choice.
Evaluate their characteristics and behaviors and assess whether these behaviors are adaptable or not, how they can influence other team members when taken on board, and how effectively they can collaborate and perform in the workspace.
Moreover, in addition to undergoing their resumes, have an interactive conversation with the applicants. Put them in a hypothetical situation and ask situational and behavioral questions to evaluate their response. This will help you better understand their personality and employ the potential candidate for the organization.
# How to assess behavioral Competency at work?
Besides evaluating behavioral competencies during the hiring process, these can be assessed at the workplace. Understanding the behavioral competencies of employees allow you to assess their behavior and performance in order to plan future actions.
At work, we can evaluate behavioral competencies in three different ways:
1. Self-assessment
We know ourselves better than anyone else.
Employers can ask employees to self-evaluate themselves based on their personal beliefs and performances, parallel to organizational needs. Employees can reflect and rate their work performance based on their personal understanding, identify the performance gap, and figure out effective solutions that can help them develop and thrive personally as well as professionally.
Only make sure that personal evaluation must be conducted under the supervision of organizational members in order to provide true and meaningful outcomes.
2. Coworker assessment
Coworkers can provide a more accurate assessment of an employee’s personality. Individuals’ personalities are better reflected by how they think, feel, and behave with coworkers, as well as how they perceive and react to various professional scenarios. Employers can ask corporate members to rate their coworker’s skills in accordance with the company’s competency requirements in order to help the organizations to better assess their employees.
3. Managerial assessment
The third assessment must be done by the managers and team leaders to better understand employees’ behavioral competencies. They can evaluate employees’ behavior competencies based on their weekly and monthly performance as well as their personal observations. Additionally, the outcomes of self, coworker, and managerial assessment can be combined to derive better results and scrutinize employees’ behavioral competencies as per the organizational objectives.
All of these can help employers to know their employee’s personalities, devise their organizational goals accordingly, and help them improve and grow strategically.
# Behavioral Competencies – The organizational need.
Every organization must prioritize behavioral Competency at work. These behavioral competencies are as crucial as evaluating employees’ resumes, skills, and years of work experience.
It might be possible that an individual with a strong personality and sharp skills can perform better in critical situations than an individual with higher degrees and years of experience.
Organizational growth and success directly depend on the quality of its workforce. The problem-solving attitude, decision-making skills, effective communication, leadership qualities, and interpersonal skills all make up an individual a strong candidate.
This is because an individual’s perspective of work-life, actions, and reactions can have substantial impacts on individual and organizational performance and productivity. Therefore, it’s crucial for organizations to hire a candidate with sharp qualities and skills who is capable of handling every situation smartly. This will ensure that the company will be in safe hands, which can drive better results and help the organization to advance and prosper.
Prioritize behavior competencies at the workplace and make the right decisions.
