Measure competence of the company on different technology areas

The name of the pictureThe name of the pictureThe name of the pictureClash Royale CLAN TAG#URR8PPP





.everyoneloves__top-leaderboard:empty,.everyoneloves__mid-leaderboard:empty margin-bottom:0;







up vote
2
down vote

favorite












We are trying to measure competencies of the people in the company for different kinds of technologies. The ultimate goal is to identify areas that we need to have some competency improvement programs. What we need to make sure to do is to let people to know that this is not an evaluation which will affect their appraisals, therefore we need to be careful here.



We are not sure of the way we are going to measure it. Our ideas are:



  1. We could have an interview with each person and ask interview questions on different topics

  2. We could prepare a question paper and give everyone an exam

  3. We could ask everyone about their weaknesses

Which would be the best way to get an accurate measurement without making people uncomfortable?




software-industry management employees




share|improve this question


















  • 4




    Be weary of the Dunning-Kruger effect. In order to accurately judge competence in yourself and others you need to actually be competent in that area.
    – Philipp
    Apr 4 '14 at 7:57







  • 2




    Also be aware that what may or may not make people uncomfortable is very individual to them. Some might not mind any of those approaches while others will take offense to the smallest insinuation that they might not be very competent in their area. The only people who can tell you ways to measure these things without making anybody uncomfortable are those that you want to interview/test/measure.
    – CMW
    Apr 4 '14 at 9:57










  • How about option 4: Create a side-project that employees could perform using the different technologies you want to test. Make it something fun and exciting and you will see who not only contains the skills but who has the passion for using those skills.
    – Paul Muir
    Apr 4 '14 at 14:32

















up vote
2
down vote

favorite












We are trying to measure competencies of the people in the company for different kinds of technologies. The ultimate goal is to identify areas that we need to have some competency improvement programs. What we need to make sure to do is to let people to know that this is not an evaluation which will affect their appraisals, therefore we need to be careful here.



We are not sure of the way we are going to measure it. Our ideas are:



  1. We could have an interview with each person and ask interview questions on different topics

  2. We could prepare a question paper and give everyone an exam

  3. We could ask everyone about their weaknesses

Which would be the best way to get an accurate measurement without making people uncomfortable?




software-industry management employees




share|improve this question


















  • 4




    Be weary of the Dunning-Kruger effect. In order to accurately judge competence in yourself and others you need to actually be competent in that area.
    – Philipp
    Apr 4 '14 at 7:57







  • 2




    Also be aware that what may or may not make people uncomfortable is very individual to them. Some might not mind any of those approaches while others will take offense to the smallest insinuation that they might not be very competent in their area. The only people who can tell you ways to measure these things without making anybody uncomfortable are those that you want to interview/test/measure.
    – CMW
    Apr 4 '14 at 9:57










  • How about option 4: Create a side-project that employees could perform using the different technologies you want to test. Make it something fun and exciting and you will see who not only contains the skills but who has the passion for using those skills.
    – Paul Muir
    Apr 4 '14 at 14:32













up vote
2
down vote

favorite









up vote
2
down vote

favorite











We are trying to measure competencies of the people in the company for different kinds of technologies. The ultimate goal is to identify areas that we need to have some competency improvement programs. What we need to make sure to do is to let people to know that this is not an evaluation which will affect their appraisals, therefore we need to be careful here.



We are not sure of the way we are going to measure it. Our ideas are:



  1. We could have an interview with each person and ask interview questions on different topics

  2. We could prepare a question paper and give everyone an exam

  3. We could ask everyone about their weaknesses

Which would be the best way to get an accurate measurement without making people uncomfortable?




software-industry management employees




share|improve this question














We are trying to measure competencies of the people in the company for different kinds of technologies. The ultimate goal is to identify areas that we need to have some competency improvement programs. What we need to make sure to do is to let people to know that this is not an evaluation which will affect their appraisals, therefore we need to be careful here.



We are not sure of the way we are going to measure it. Our ideas are:



  1. We could have an interview with each person and ask interview questions on different topics

  2. We could prepare a question paper and give everyone an exam

  3. We could ask everyone about their weaknesses

Which would be the best way to get an accurate measurement without making people uncomfortable?





software-industry management employees





share|improve this question













share|improve this question




share|improve this question








edited Apr 4 '14 at 14:27









starsplusplus

1,2741220




1,2741220










asked Apr 4 '14 at 6:27









Jayantha Lal Sirisena

1143




1143







  • 4




    Be weary of the Dunning-Kruger effect. In order to accurately judge competence in yourself and others you need to actually be competent in that area.
    – Philipp
    Apr 4 '14 at 7:57







  • 2




    Also be aware that what may or may not make people uncomfortable is very individual to them. Some might not mind any of those approaches while others will take offense to the smallest insinuation that they might not be very competent in their area. The only people who can tell you ways to measure these things without making anybody uncomfortable are those that you want to interview/test/measure.
    – CMW
    Apr 4 '14 at 9:57










  • How about option 4: Create a side-project that employees could perform using the different technologies you want to test. Make it something fun and exciting and you will see who not only contains the skills but who has the passion for using those skills.
    – Paul Muir
    Apr 4 '14 at 14:32













  • 4




    Be weary of the Dunning-Kruger effect. In order to accurately judge competence in yourself and others you need to actually be competent in that area.
    – Philipp
    Apr 4 '14 at 7:57







  • 2




    Also be aware that what may or may not make people uncomfortable is very individual to them. Some might not mind any of those approaches while others will take offense to the smallest insinuation that they might not be very competent in their area. The only people who can tell you ways to measure these things without making anybody uncomfortable are those that you want to interview/test/measure.
    – CMW
    Apr 4 '14 at 9:57










  • How about option 4: Create a side-project that employees could perform using the different technologies you want to test. Make it something fun and exciting and you will see who not only contains the skills but who has the passion for using those skills.
    – Paul Muir
    Apr 4 '14 at 14:32








4




4




Be weary of the Dunning-Kruger effect. In order to accurately judge competence in yourself and others you need to actually be competent in that area.
– Philipp
Apr 4 '14 at 7:57





Be weary of the Dunning-Kruger effect. In order to accurately judge competence in yourself and others you need to actually be competent in that area.
– Philipp
Apr 4 '14 at 7:57





2




2




Also be aware that what may or may not make people uncomfortable is very individual to them. Some might not mind any of those approaches while others will take offense to the smallest insinuation that they might not be very competent in their area. The only people who can tell you ways to measure these things without making anybody uncomfortable are those that you want to interview/test/measure.
– CMW
Apr 4 '14 at 9:57




Also be aware that what may or may not make people uncomfortable is very individual to them. Some might not mind any of those approaches while others will take offense to the smallest insinuation that they might not be very competent in their area. The only people who can tell you ways to measure these things without making anybody uncomfortable are those that you want to interview/test/measure.
– CMW
Apr 4 '14 at 9:57












How about option 4: Create a side-project that employees could perform using the different technologies you want to test. Make it something fun and exciting and you will see who not only contains the skills but who has the passion for using those skills.
– Paul Muir
Apr 4 '14 at 14:32





How about option 4: Create a side-project that employees could perform using the different technologies you want to test. Make it something fun and exciting and you will see who not only contains the skills but who has the passion for using those skills.
– Paul Muir
Apr 4 '14 at 14:32











1 Answer
1






active

oldest

votes

















up vote
5
down vote













Your effort will be greatly hindered by the Dunning-Kruger effect. This theory of psychology says that:



  • Incompetent people tend to overestimate their own skill

  • Competent people tend to underestimate their own skill

  • Incompetent people fail at accurately estimating the skill of others

That means just asking people where they see their strengths and weaknesses will not give you any meaningful results, because people are notoriously bad at self-estimation of their skills.



Making an exam or interview to test the skill of people requires that the one who prepares that test is actually highly-skilled themself in that skill. Otherwise their questions and their rating of the answers will not accurately judge the skill of the people who are tested. Also keep in mind that such an exam will likely be rather unwelcome by your workforce: They are long out of school and university and likely feel that they grown up from the age where having such tests is expected from them.



So what can you do instead?



One way would be to look just at formal qualifications.



  • What level of education do they have

  • What certifications do they have

  • Which training did they receive

  • How many years of experience do they have with different technologies

This might give you a good estimate, but could still paint a wrong picture of certain people. There are people who are highly skilled in their field and never saw an university from inside, taught everything themself without having any official training and never bothered to get certified because they were too busy with getting real work done. On the other hand there are people who visited tons of training courses, somehow cheated their way through various certifications, have decades of experience and still don't know what they are doing.



Another more accurate way is to measure peoples skill is by measuring their success through benchmarking. Measure how successful they are at different projects and how productive they are at certain tasks. Important criteria for benchmarking are:



  • Total time taken

  • Resources used

  • Number and criticality of defects

  • Customer satisfaction

Then compare these numbers to those of similar projects and tasks at other companies. Depending on what your company is actually doing, accurately measuring performance in a meaningful way can be quite challenging. But it's the only way to objectively measure skill. There are business consulting companies which specialize in this kind of benchmarking. The advantage of hiring an external company is that they have access to the numbers of all other companies where they did the same and can compare you to them to give you a good estimate how well you do compared to others in the same business.






share|improve this answer






















    Your Answer







    StackExchange.ready(function()
    var channelOptions =
    tags: "".split(" "),
    id: "423"
    ;
    initTagRenderer("".split(" "), "".split(" "), channelOptions);

    StackExchange.using("externalEditor", function()
    // Have to fire editor after snippets, if snippets enabled
    if (StackExchange.settings.snippets.snippetsEnabled)
    StackExchange.using("snippets", function()
    createEditor();
    );

    else
    createEditor();

    );

    function createEditor()
    StackExchange.prepareEditor(
    heartbeatType: 'answer',
    convertImagesToLinks: false,
    noModals: false,
    showLowRepImageUploadWarning: true,
    reputationToPostImages: null,
    bindNavPrevention: true,
    postfix: "",
    noCode: true, onDemand: true,
    discardSelector: ".discard-answer"
    ,immediatelyShowMarkdownHelp:true
    );



    );








     

    draft saved


    draft discarded


















    StackExchange.ready(
    function ()
    StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2fworkplace.stackexchange.com%2fquestions%2f22087%2fmeasure-competence-of-the-company-on-different-technology-areas%23new-answer', 'question_page');

    );

    Post as a guest

















    1 Answer
    1






    active

    oldest

    votes








    1 Answer
    1






    active

    oldest

    votes









    active

    oldest

    votes






    active

    oldest

    votes








    up vote
    5
    down vote













    Your effort will be greatly hindered by the Dunning-Kruger effect. This theory of psychology says that:



    • Incompetent people tend to overestimate their own skill

    • Competent people tend to underestimate their own skill

    • Incompetent people fail at accurately estimating the skill of others

    That means just asking people where they see their strengths and weaknesses will not give you any meaningful results, because people are notoriously bad at self-estimation of their skills.



    Making an exam or interview to test the skill of people requires that the one who prepares that test is actually highly-skilled themself in that skill. Otherwise their questions and their rating of the answers will not accurately judge the skill of the people who are tested. Also keep in mind that such an exam will likely be rather unwelcome by your workforce: They are long out of school and university and likely feel that they grown up from the age where having such tests is expected from them.



    So what can you do instead?



    One way would be to look just at formal qualifications.



    • What level of education do they have

    • What certifications do they have

    • Which training did they receive

    • How many years of experience do they have with different technologies

    This might give you a good estimate, but could still paint a wrong picture of certain people. There are people who are highly skilled in their field and never saw an university from inside, taught everything themself without having any official training and never bothered to get certified because they were too busy with getting real work done. On the other hand there are people who visited tons of training courses, somehow cheated their way through various certifications, have decades of experience and still don't know what they are doing.



    Another more accurate way is to measure peoples skill is by measuring their success through benchmarking. Measure how successful they are at different projects and how productive they are at certain tasks. Important criteria for benchmarking are:



    • Total time taken

    • Resources used

    • Number and criticality of defects

    • Customer satisfaction

    Then compare these numbers to those of similar projects and tasks at other companies. Depending on what your company is actually doing, accurately measuring performance in a meaningful way can be quite challenging. But it's the only way to objectively measure skill. There are business consulting companies which specialize in this kind of benchmarking. The advantage of hiring an external company is that they have access to the numbers of all other companies where they did the same and can compare you to them to give you a good estimate how well you do compared to others in the same business.






    share|improve this answer


























      up vote
      5
      down vote













      Your effort will be greatly hindered by the Dunning-Kruger effect. This theory of psychology says that:



      • Incompetent people tend to overestimate their own skill

      • Competent people tend to underestimate their own skill

      • Incompetent people fail at accurately estimating the skill of others

      That means just asking people where they see their strengths and weaknesses will not give you any meaningful results, because people are notoriously bad at self-estimation of their skills.



      Making an exam or interview to test the skill of people requires that the one who prepares that test is actually highly-skilled themself in that skill. Otherwise their questions and their rating of the answers will not accurately judge the skill of the people who are tested. Also keep in mind that such an exam will likely be rather unwelcome by your workforce: They are long out of school and university and likely feel that they grown up from the age where having such tests is expected from them.



      So what can you do instead?



      One way would be to look just at formal qualifications.



      • What level of education do they have

      • What certifications do they have

      • Which training did they receive

      • How many years of experience do they have with different technologies

      This might give you a good estimate, but could still paint a wrong picture of certain people. There are people who are highly skilled in their field and never saw an university from inside, taught everything themself without having any official training and never bothered to get certified because they were too busy with getting real work done. On the other hand there are people who visited tons of training courses, somehow cheated their way through various certifications, have decades of experience and still don't know what they are doing.



      Another more accurate way is to measure peoples skill is by measuring their success through benchmarking. Measure how successful they are at different projects and how productive they are at certain tasks. Important criteria for benchmarking are:



      • Total time taken

      • Resources used

      • Number and criticality of defects

      • Customer satisfaction

      Then compare these numbers to those of similar projects and tasks at other companies. Depending on what your company is actually doing, accurately measuring performance in a meaningful way can be quite challenging. But it's the only way to objectively measure skill. There are business consulting companies which specialize in this kind of benchmarking. The advantage of hiring an external company is that they have access to the numbers of all other companies where they did the same and can compare you to them to give you a good estimate how well you do compared to others in the same business.






      share|improve this answer
























        up vote
        5
        down vote










        up vote
        5
        down vote









        Your effort will be greatly hindered by the Dunning-Kruger effect. This theory of psychology says that:



        • Incompetent people tend to overestimate their own skill

        • Competent people tend to underestimate their own skill

        • Incompetent people fail at accurately estimating the skill of others

        That means just asking people where they see their strengths and weaknesses will not give you any meaningful results, because people are notoriously bad at self-estimation of their skills.



        Making an exam or interview to test the skill of people requires that the one who prepares that test is actually highly-skilled themself in that skill. Otherwise their questions and their rating of the answers will not accurately judge the skill of the people who are tested. Also keep in mind that such an exam will likely be rather unwelcome by your workforce: They are long out of school and university and likely feel that they grown up from the age where having such tests is expected from them.



        So what can you do instead?



        One way would be to look just at formal qualifications.



        • What level of education do they have

        • What certifications do they have

        • Which training did they receive

        • How many years of experience do they have with different technologies

        This might give you a good estimate, but could still paint a wrong picture of certain people. There are people who are highly skilled in their field and never saw an university from inside, taught everything themself without having any official training and never bothered to get certified because they were too busy with getting real work done. On the other hand there are people who visited tons of training courses, somehow cheated their way through various certifications, have decades of experience and still don't know what they are doing.



        Another more accurate way is to measure peoples skill is by measuring their success through benchmarking. Measure how successful they are at different projects and how productive they are at certain tasks. Important criteria for benchmarking are:



        • Total time taken

        • Resources used

        • Number and criticality of defects

        • Customer satisfaction

        Then compare these numbers to those of similar projects and tasks at other companies. Depending on what your company is actually doing, accurately measuring performance in a meaningful way can be quite challenging. But it's the only way to objectively measure skill. There are business consulting companies which specialize in this kind of benchmarking. The advantage of hiring an external company is that they have access to the numbers of all other companies where they did the same and can compare you to them to give you a good estimate how well you do compared to others in the same business.






        share|improve this answer














        Your effort will be greatly hindered by the Dunning-Kruger effect. This theory of psychology says that:



        • Incompetent people tend to overestimate their own skill

        • Competent people tend to underestimate their own skill

        • Incompetent people fail at accurately estimating the skill of others

        That means just asking people where they see their strengths and weaknesses will not give you any meaningful results, because people are notoriously bad at self-estimation of their skills.



        Making an exam or interview to test the skill of people requires that the one who prepares that test is actually highly-skilled themself in that skill. Otherwise their questions and their rating of the answers will not accurately judge the skill of the people who are tested. Also keep in mind that such an exam will likely be rather unwelcome by your workforce: They are long out of school and university and likely feel that they grown up from the age where having such tests is expected from them.



        So what can you do instead?



        One way would be to look just at formal qualifications.



        • What level of education do they have

        • What certifications do they have

        • Which training did they receive

        • How many years of experience do they have with different technologies

        This might give you a good estimate, but could still paint a wrong picture of certain people. There are people who are highly skilled in their field and never saw an university from inside, taught everything themself without having any official training and never bothered to get certified because they were too busy with getting real work done. On the other hand there are people who visited tons of training courses, somehow cheated their way through various certifications, have decades of experience and still don't know what they are doing.



        Another more accurate way is to measure peoples skill is by measuring their success through benchmarking. Measure how successful they are at different projects and how productive they are at certain tasks. Important criteria for benchmarking are:



        • Total time taken

        • Resources used

        • Number and criticality of defects

        • Customer satisfaction

        Then compare these numbers to those of similar projects and tasks at other companies. Depending on what your company is actually doing, accurately measuring performance in a meaningful way can be quite challenging. But it's the only way to objectively measure skill. There are business consulting companies which specialize in this kind of benchmarking. The advantage of hiring an external company is that they have access to the numbers of all other companies where they did the same and can compare you to them to give you a good estimate how well you do compared to others in the same business.







        share|improve this answer














        share|improve this answer



        share|improve this answer








        edited Apr 4 '14 at 8:29

























        answered Apr 4 '14 at 8:16









        Philipp

        20.3k34885




        20.3k34885






















             

            draft saved


            draft discarded


























             


            draft saved


            draft discarded














            StackExchange.ready(
            function ()
            StackExchange.openid.initPostLogin('.new-post-login', 'https%3a%2f%2fworkplace.stackexchange.com%2fquestions%2f22087%2fmeasure-competence-of-the-company-on-different-technology-areas%23new-answer', 'question_page');

            );

            Post as a guest
































































            Comments

            Post a Comment

            Popular posts from this blog

            What does second last employer means? [closed]

            Image
            Clash Royale CLAN TAG #URR8PPP .everyoneloves__top-leaderboard:empty,.everyoneloves__mid-leaderboard:empty margin-bottom:0; up vote -3 down vote favorite Say, for example I have worked in the following companies, Company A => 2010 - 2011 Company B => 2011 - 2012 Company C => 2012 - Till Date Company D => Have offer Now assume Company D is asking to submit documents from my second last employer. So from the list of companies given, which company would be qualified as second last employer? software-industry employer share | improve this question asked Aug 10 '14 at 5:16 Rajaprabhu Aravindasamy 559 1 6 13 closed as off-topic by Jim G., jmort253 ♦ Aug 11 '14 at 1:58 This question appears to be off-topic. The users who voted to close gave this specific reason: "Questions seeking advice on company-specific regulations, agreements, or policies should be directed to your manager or HR department. Questions that address...
            Read more

            List of Gilmore Girls characters

            Image
            The season three cast—(Back row): Lane, Michel, Paris, Emily, Richard, Sookie, Miss Patty, Kirk; Front row: Jess, Luke, Lorelai, Rory, Dean This is a list of characters for the comedy-drama television series Gilmore Girls . Contents 1 Main characters 1.1 Lorelai Gilmore 1.2 Rory Gilmore 1.3 Sookie St. James 1.4 Lane Kim 1.5 Michel Gerard 1.6 Luke Danes 1.7 Emily Gilmore 1.8 Richard Gilmore 1.9 Paris Geller 1.10 Dean Forester 1.11 Jess Mariano 1.12 Kirk Gleason 1.13 Jason Stiles 1.14 Logan Huntzberger 2 Major recurring characters 2.1 Christopher Hayden 2.2 Jackson Belleville 2.3 Mrs. Kim 2.4 Tristin DuGray 2.5 Max Medina 2.6 Taylor Doose 2.7 Dave Rygalski 2.8 Marty 3 Recurring characters 3.1 Stars Hollow 3.2 Chilton 3.3 Yale 3.4 Other 4 Notable guest stars 5 Unseen characters 6 Notes 7 References Main characters Actor Character Appearances Season 1 Season 2 Season 3 Season 4 Season 5 Season 6 Season 7 A Year in the Life Lauren Graham Lorelai Gilmore...
            Read more

            Confectionery

            Image
            Prepared foods made with a lot of sugar or other cabohydrates "Sweetmeat" redirects here. For the racehorse, see Sweetmeat (horse). Not to be confused with Sweetbread. This Kransekake is a traditional Scandinavian baker's confection. Confectionery is the art of making confections , which are food items that are rich in sugar and carbohydrates. Exact definitions are difficult. [1] In general, though, confectionery is divided into two broad and somewhat overlapping categories, bakers' confections and sugar confections. [2] Bakers' confectionery, also called flour confections , includes principally sweet pastries, cakes, and similar baked goods. Sugar confectionery includes candies ( sweets in British English), candied nuts, chocolates, chewing gum, bubble gum, pastillage, and other confections that are made primarily of sugar. In some cases, chocolate confections (confections made of chocolate) are treated as a separate category, as are sugar-free versions of ...
            Read more