The incompetence of the competency matrix

So many words!

Twice or thrice in my career, I have been charged with either re-working or coming up with new competency matrices. I always embarked on such tasks with great gusto, believing that anything and everything can be systematized into a MECE framework. Even people. If we tried hard enough, it was possible to perfectly describe any given employee as the sum of her precisely calibrated attributes. Objectively.

Usually, by the third day slogging on such a task, I have found myself an emotional and physical wreck. In this moment, I question everything about myself, not least my command over the English language. I have written myself dry trying to find n number of ways of saying the same thing – “makes avoidable mistakes too often”, “is reliable but needs close supervision”, “takes ownership of her tasks and excels is certain areas” and “is mindblowingly good at her work and everyone wants to work with her”.
I revisited a competency matrix from a past life. It had 18 sub-competencies arranged in 6 categories. Each had four levels (resulting in a whopping 68.7 billion unique possible outcomes). This matrix was to be used for two of the junior-most levels in the organization, we had a separate similar matrix for the next two levels. Here are some of the adverbs and adjectives that populated just the first five attributes related to ‘problem solving’, across the four levels (so from a grid of 20 boxes): well, rapidly, quickly, timely, independently, effectively, fully, accurately, core, new, conventional, solid, heavy, basic, satisfactory, good quality, complex, little, high quality, time constrained, analytic, creative, insightful, complete, simple, accurate, significant, required, interdependent, potential, limited, own, actionable, good. This may be an extreme example of a matrix gone wild, but even as I look at it today, my mind actually goes “sounds reasonable” (maybe because I drafted it!).

Underlying assumptions

So let’s take a step back to unpack competency matrices – what are the assumptions upon which they are built?
Assumptions:

1. There is a perfect way of fulfilling a role.
2. There is a perfect path, with well established milestones that will lead to this perfect state.
3. Ratings are reflective of the truth of where an employee is on this path.
If you look at these individually, you can immediately see how each can be problematic.

Take the first assumption. Consider a management consulting firm in which the “role” at every stage of one’s career is well understood - starting as an analyst, who starts managing a workstream, then starts managing projects, then starts selling work and contributing to many projects at once, and then becomes a partner. Take a look at the partners in any firm – do they really have the same skills and attributes? Were they voted into partnership because they are like the other partners, or are they promoted precisely because of how different they are from the existing partnership? Ceterus paribus, is a more diverse partner group likely to be more or less successful than a less diverse one?

The second assumption is problematic in two ways. First, it assumes that everyone with a given title is playing exactly the same role at any given time. This is almost never the case. Everyone plays a unique role. This is especially true in young or growing organizations – each employee plays different roles in different contexts and are involved in many initiatives at once. On top of this, the role of an individual evolves over time, even from the beginning of the year. So which competency matrix is applicable? Should we continue to assess an employee using a very specific matrix that is no longer applicable to her? Or should we design a competency matrix to be vague enough to encompass all possible roles at a given ‘level’? Is such a matrix meaningful?

The second way in which it is problematic is more direct. No two employees develop in the same manner. They usually develop their abilities by playing on and developing their unique strengths to achieve outcomes. Their “weaknesses” do not disappear – rather, they matter less and less as they progress and find ways to achieve despite these “weaknesses”. They do not necessarily spend time at every stage trying to round themselves off into blemishless employees. Competency matrices dampen our confidence and effectiveness by training us to focus on our “weaknesses”. If I score well on three parameters but not so well on two, I will obsess on “what went wrong”, not what went right. The focus goes from being as effective as possible using the best in my arsenal to trying to eradicate, justify, read into, deflect from or rationalize my “weaknesses”.

The third assumption – of the inherent objectivity of a competency matrix-based ratings process – is also wrong. Research has shown that ratings reflect who the rater is. Some raters are conservative, and some are lenient. These inherent traits as raters reflects in their ratings. The outcomes of these ratings therefore depend largely on who is rating you rather than any “objective truth” of your competence. (Take a look again at all the adjectives and adverbs listed earlier – are any two raters likely to interpret all of these words in the same way?). This is why the “committee discussion override” in the performance evaluation process becomes so important – to adjust for different calibrations. Ratings are rapidly readjusted to fit the result determined by the committee. Bottom-up objectivity transforms to top-down subjectivity, but still cloaked in the ‘objectivity’ of the matrix.

Think also of how we would decide if a competency matrix is well calibrated. We would have several employees rated and see if the results make sense – does employee A do better than B and C, as expected. We already know intuitively (and subjectively) how different employees compare with each other. To drive home the point, consider two scenarios. In both scenarios, the employee X does exactly the same things and achieves exactly the same outcome. In both scenarios there are four other employees in similar roles. In the first scenario, the other four all perform exceedingly well - they achieve more, and more effectively than X. In the second, X is clearly better performing than the four others. Would the employee land at the same spot on the competency matrix in both scenarios? If not, how objective is the matrix?

What to do?

If competency matrices are incompetent, with what should they be replaced? To answer that, let’s consider the two main purposes of competency matrices:

Purpose:
1. To provide management with a way to objectively assess where an employee stands in her development journey, toward an ideal for her role.
2. To provide the employee with a ‘glide path’ to align himself for further success. If he knows what is expected of him at each stage, he can align his efforts to develop in the right direction.

First, reorient your employee assessment process. The traditional performance evaluation aims at assessing the relative performance of an employee and therefore requires a framework such as competency matrix-based ratings. This evaluation outcome in turn ties directly into compensation and promotion. In addition, the traditional evaluation process provides feedback to employees on past performance. Instead, focus the evaluation process resolutely on the future, and to answer the question “ What is the right role and development path for the employee in the organization, given the organization’s priorities and the employee’s strengths and capabilities?” We call this sort of an assessment a potential evaluation. It is a process that is plainly subjective, but also transparent. For more on potential evaluations, see this blogpost and listen to this podcast.

As for providing the employee guidance, let us acknowledge that we all learn what is required of us through observation, conversation and experience, not by referring to a competency matrix. We see activity all around us. We see successes and chat with their protagonists. We learn that certain behaviours lead to success and recognition and repeat them. When we’ve had a setback, we try and avoid the behaviours or conditions that led to it. When we need guidance, we find someone to chat with – a manager, a mentor or a peer. They in turn help us problem solve, unearthing for us mindsets and capabilities that could be useful in the situation. In real life, employees learn how they are doing and what they need to do not by looking up a matrix, but by having ongoing conversations with those around them.

Words are important, but in conversation, not in a matrix. Find ways to ensure that the right conversations are being had, in the right manner, as frequently as possible. Spend your energies in making this a part of your culture and training, rather than in feeding the myth of the matrix.

First published as a Ka Partners perspective.