In general, many companies use competency models in order to link corporate tasks and practical work with human resources through the unification of requirements for employees.
The most common reasons for which competencies are implemented are; the need for staff training and investment in its development, efficiency and quality of work performance, motivation of employees, remuneration of personnel, improvement of quality standards, competitiveness of the organization, definition overall strategy work with personnel.
However, the main way to use competencies today is personnel assessment. Since now the topic of assessment at enterprises is quite relevant, let's dwell on it in more detail.
It is important to note that competency-based assessment provides a number of benefits:
For organization
Possibility to develop uniform standards for describing the performance of work, which will help to establish mutual understanding between employees of different departments and levels. For example, a common understanding is being developed for all of what is " effective leadership and what "teamwork" means.
The possibility of assessing the competencies of employees and identifying their compliance with the required level.
Consistency in evaluating an employee: all assessors will be able to agree on an understanding of an employee's "values" and have an idea of what needs to be evaluated and what can be ignored.
The ability to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each employee and use this information for its development.
There are grounds for including employees in the personnel reserve of the enterprise, as well as planning their careers.
6. Possibility to justify compensation policy adjustments in relation to qualified employees (not managing people and resources), but who successfully passed the assessment.
For staff
A better understanding of what they do, what they are expected to do, and what qualities they need to be successful in their jobs.
Opportunity to get feedback, learn about your strengths and weaknesses ah, overall potential and career prospects.
It must be remembered that the introduction of competencies can strengthen the connection between all examples of their use. However, the introduction of competencies in itself does not guarantee that this innovation will have a high effect.
Therefore, when applying competencies, it is very important to clearly understand that they help effective personnel management only if they are used correctly.
The effectiveness of the application of the competency model depends on the perfection of organizational activities, on the availability of the necessary personnel management tools in it, and on the skill of experienced people. Most competency models, no matter how carefully and correctly developed, will not turn a bad process into a good one and will not compensate for poor training, poor technological equipment and inexperienced staff.
When organizing personnel management based on the proposed competencies, the actions of employees are determined by the standards of behavior expected from them and the requirements for the quality of work. Therefore, you should remember: the use of competencies will affect the internal culture of the company. In some cases, improving corporate culture is one of the main goals of introducing a competency system. If changes in the culture of activity are not provided for when describing the standards of behavior, then this means that the competencies are drawn up incorrectly and conflicts between what the company needs and the standards of behavior that are proposed to be adopted by employees are quite likely.
5. Approximate scheme for developing competency models in an enterprise
In order to start work on creating competency models, first of all, you need to decide whether it will be corporate model, one for all employees of the company or a whole package special/technical models for use within the organization. It should also be taken into account that there is no universal model of competencies! It is very tempting, at first glance, to use "ready-made" models, but each company is unique and operates according to "its own" rules, so any organization needs to develop its own original competency models.
At the same time, it is important to remember that the structure of the competency model has a very important influence on the accuracy of assessments.
An effective competency model should meet the following standards:
be easy to understand;
have simple structure and be described in understandable language;
be relevant to all employees who will use it;
take into account possible changes in the organization;
be fair to all participants who will be judged on it.
It is important that each of the competencies have clear indicators of behavior so that it is easy to understand which competency a particular example of effective performance falls under.
Do not create models with a large set of competencies and try to cover all the information needed for all occasions and for all roles, including detailed descriptions tasks and results of activities and standards of behavior of employees. Most models can be described using 10-12 individual competencies. When developing models, we must remember that the more competencies a model contains, the more difficult it is to implement it in an enterprise. It is also necessary to strive to ensure that the standards of behavior included in the competencies are suitable for all users, and the intended forms of application of the model are consistent with corporate values.
The practice of consulting companies shows that before starting the preparation of a project for the development of competency models, HR specialists need to answer the following questions:
Why companies need competency models? The answer to this question must be carefully considered. Some companies develop competency models just because other companies are doing it, or because it's "trendy" at the moment.
How competency models will be used? Competences can only be used as a tool for assessing or selecting candidates, or they can become the "core" around which the entire system of work with personnel will be built.
To what extent are the top management and shareholders of the company interested in the project? It is important that the project to develop a competency model is supported by line managers and top managers.
Among the main stages of creating competency models, the following can be distinguished:
Clarification of the purpose of creating models;
planning a modeling project;
identification of project participants for the development of competency models;
choice of competency development methodology;
choice of method for collecting information;
collection of necessary information;
analysis of information and development of a competency model;
checking the validity of competency models;
running the models.
Understanding the purpose of creating models
The purpose of developing and implementing competency models has a huge impact on the models themselves. Therefore, it is very important for the units that will use the models at the initial stage of their development to discuss in detail the options for using the models and achieve a full understanding of the purpose. In addition, it should be discussed whether it is really necessary to collect and analyze complete information or, in the interests of saving time and resources, partial information can be dispensed with.
Project planning
The collection and analysis of information about the company's activities, necessary for the development of a competency model, can take a long time, on average from one to six months. Therefore, it is necessary from the very beginning to determine the main milestones of the entire work and set the deadlines for each of the stages of the project, as well as select those responsible for individual activities. It is important that the planning is carried out by people who understand the task well and represent every step in the way of creating models.
Identification of project participants for the development of competency models
Project management
The experience of consulting companies shows that the project manager most often becomes either the HR director or one of the leading HR specialists.
Managing this project and coordinating all activities takes a lot of time, so the decision of operational tasks, as a rule, falls on the shoulders of the leading specialist of the personnel service, and the director of personnel takes on the solution of strategic tasks.
Composition and members of the working group
The development of a competency model should involve specialists who will use it in the future, and since modeling is a complex and specific process, it is important that they undergo appropriate training in special centers.
Of course, it is good when the group consists of full-time employees, which ensures the information security of the company. However, practice shows that the joint work of staff members and external experts is more effective, especially when it comes to developing models for senior company managers.
The optimal group size is 4 - 6 people. In cases where in short time it is necessary to collect and process a large amount of information; it is recommended to increase the group to 10 people.
Choosing a Competency Development Methodology
At this stage, the project team members need to agree on the use of a single methodology. In the case of involving external consultants, for the development of competencies, it would be more logical to use the methodology already tested by consultants.
The project manager should prepare a detailed training presentation for the project team members, which includes a definition of the main concepts and a step-by-step description of the upcoming activities.
Project participants will need to determine:
how many competencies should the model contain?
Will the competencies be simple or detailed?
how many levels will contain detailed competencies, are zero and negative levels allowed?
Choosing a method for collecting information
In order to highlight the standards of behavior that ensure top scores in the work it is necessary to collect as much information as possible about the work performed by employees. For this purpose, the following methods can be used:
strategic interview , it is also a predictive, in-depth structured interview with an official for which competencies are modeled. The purpose of the interview is to predict and take into account the requirements for the position and, accordingly, the general focus of the competency model.
Brainstorm . It can be carried out in each structural unit. It is necessary to involve leading, authoritative specialists to participate in the brainstorming.
Investigation of critical incidents. Critical incidents are successful or unsuccessful cases from real working practice that meet certain criteria. On the material of this case (incident) are formulated at the beginning of the action, and then the characteristics and abilities of the individual that were needed for the incident to take place and have a successful or unsuccessful completion.
Repertory grid method- allows you to determine the criteria that guide the employees of the organization (managers, colleagues, subordinates) when evaluating the success or slowness of the employee who occupies the analyzed position and get its structural assessment.
Direct attribution method- involves the use of ready-made sets of competencies. The interviewee determines which of the competencies are more relevant to the position under study. The selected competencies are used to build the model.
When choosing methods, it must be remembered that none of them by itself is sufficient to collect all the necessary information, therefore, a combination of methods that complement each other is most often used.
Gathering the necessary information
At this stage, it is necessary: - to collect examples of standards of conduct that ensure the effective performance of work; - define the standards of conduct that may be required for the effective performance of work in the future.
The nature of the information to be collected depends on the purpose of the models. For a general (corporate) model, a description is required a wide range standards of behavior based on examples of effective work performance. Competency models for specific jobs will require specific information. But in both cases, you need: information about the direction of the company's business and a variety of examples of effective work.
The main sources of this kind of information are:
Company strategy documents (goals, values);
job descriptions;
Training materials;
Information about the governing bodies;
Employees of key specialties who know their job well. The actual number of employees who should be involved in the development of a competency model at the stage of information gathering depends on how different or similar are the roles and job functions that exist in the company. The more differences there are between the roles, the larger the sample of participants will be needed.
Analysis of information and development of a competency model
One of the effective approaches in the analysis is the division of the project team into several subgroups, each of which develops and justifies its own list of competencies. Thus, the analytical work is duplicated, which in turn allows avoiding possible errors.
At the stage of analyzing the collected information, the participants of the subgroups will have to answer the following questions:
1. What qualities should an employee have to be successful in each specific position?
2. How will the chosen competencies manifest themselves at the behavioral level?
3. Are the chosen competencies really important for this position?
4. Can we receive information for evaluating an employee according to selected criteria during appraisal activities?
It should be noted that the development of even a very modest competency model takes up to 3 days on average.
Typically, the analysis of information in the development of a project of a competency model includes the following steps:
Selection of a name for competencies and grouping data into clusters.
Each group, working with one set of standards of conduct, considers examples assigned to specific categories (single-named competencies). AT in full force the command decides only what examples are needed:
Move to another, more appropriate competency
Remove completely due to nebula and obvious uselessness
Simplify because they are overcomplicated
Generalize because they are too specific
Separate because they are too different from each other in content.
Elimination of duplication in standards of behavior: all examples that describe the same behavior are replaced by one. Competency models based on information from multiple job roles may require tiering. Tiering can be done in two ways.
- First: competency levels include only those examples of behavior that clearly correspond to specific levels of activity..
This approach is correct and applicable to activities that really become more difficult from position to position; at the same time, the levels of required competencies increase accordingly. This method is suitable for structures in which activity grades remain unchanged.
- The second way: competency levels are "derived" directly from the content of information about the job.
In clusters of standards of behavior there will be clearly distinguishable signs of different situations that arise in the course of activity, which are manifested by examples of behavior.
For example: in the Decision Making Cluster, some standards of behavior may relate to daily decision making and others to strategic decision making. it different levels competencies. The division of competencies by levels applies to all ranks of employees. Using this approach creates an obvious picture: some competencies are divided into one or two levels, others - into several levels.
It is generally believed that the difficulty of competencies increases from grade to grade. That is, it is assumed that the examples of behavior collected for some level already exist at all previous levels. If the examples show something different, then this originality must be reflected in the competency model. A competency model built on levels that no longer increase in volume and complexity from a certain stage can cause misunderstanding, because a higher grade should cover all lower activity roles. This provision cannot but be reflected in competency models. A higher position naturally includes all levels of lower staff. To exclude the spontaneous emergence of "independent" levels, competencies should be broken down. Example. If working in a team does not require mandatory membership in a team, then it is better to include examples of behavior related to teamwork in a separate competency than to designate all related to team activities under one heading “Teamwork”.
After the appearance of the final list of competencies, it is necessary to conduct an additional analysis of it and determine which of the competencies are necessary and which are desirable. To do this, you need to answer the following questions:
1. How important is this competency?
2. What are the consequences if you ignore its application?
3. What results will its continued use lead to?
All the described steps should eventually lead to the creation of a draft of competency models that will need to be tested.
Checking the validity of competency models
Model validity can be assessed in two ways:
Receipt feedback from a wide range of employees of the company, which will testify to the understanding by each employee of the company of the language used in the competency models, and the demand for certain competencies for the effective performance of work.
Checking how competencies differentiate effective and ineffective work.
Launching the Model
Once the models have been verified and approved, they can be put to work. At the same time, it is necessary to inform the staff about why the models were created, how they were compiled, how they will be implemented in different areas of management, what support will be provided to users when mastering competency models, how the models themselves will be maintained so that they do not become obsolete. It should also be taken into account that the more specific the model is, the more often it will be corrected.
The launch of the model and its availability to users does not yet guarantee the effective application of the model. Therefore, for effective application, it is necessary that users are trained in the interpretation and use of competencies.
Term "key competencies" became widely known after the publication of the works of G. Hamel and K. Prahalad. They give it two definitions.
The first is “the skills and abilities that enable a company to deliver fundamental benefits to consumers.”
The second is a set of skills and technologies, the knowledge and experience accumulated by the organization, which become the basis for successful competition.
The competence of the company appears as a result of long-term work, careful selection of personnel, accumulation necessary knowledge and skills, organization of collective labor to achieve high productivity.
When all these indicators reach a sufficiently high degree, we can say that the company has moved to a more high level quality, because at the same cost, knowledge and experience have been transformed into true competence, turned into a competitive opportunity that consumers have noticed.
Features of key competencies
A specific key competency is always individual, because is present only within the framework of one business system with its own individual set of resources and abilities.
Key competencies for the company can be:
Knowledge of the needs of the market and the ability to regularly receive this knowledge;
The ability to put into practice the proposals required by the market;
The ability to continuously build and develop their core competencies.
Key competencies are created through the quality management of human resources, knowledge bases and intellectual capital, as well as through the coordination and unification of the efforts of working groups, departments and external partners. At the same time, the competencies of the company must be flexible to ensure compliance with any market requirements.
Competitive advantage
Today, most companies have standard competencies, so they cannot become a guarantee of successful activity.
For successful competition, it is necessary to formulate a key unique competence that will allow the company, firstly, to solve problems that are inaccessible to most other market players, and secondly, to set a new standard of activity in the industry and thereby ensure competitive advantage.
Competitive advantage is understood as a set of company characteristics that allow, at lower costs than competitors, to produce goods that are of greater value to the consumer. There are many ways to achieve a competitive advantage, including offering quality products or services at low prices, high quality products at high prices, goods with an optimal combination of price, quality, consumer properties, level of service, etc.
Factors that form a competitive advantage
Factors capable of providing a competitive advantage are divided into internal and external.
Internals include:
scale effect;
- experience effect;
- concentration effect;
- the effect of resource-saving technologies;
- synergy effect;
- effect of vertical integration.
The external ones are:
Improving the components of the value chain according to Porter;
- improvement of market segmentation;
- improvement of the components of the extended product concept.
Benefits of core competencies
A core competency has the following benefits:
Significant for consumers who are willing to pay for the competency as for the bulk of the acquired value;
- able to change and adapt to new market requirements;
- unique, it is unlikely that competitors will be able to repeat it;
- based on knowledge, not on coincidence;
- linked to several activities or products;
- relevant, because corresponds to the strategic aspirations of the market and the company;
- provides an opportunity for partnership to create a new core competency;
- clarity and accessibility of the wording of the competence allows for an unambiguous interpretation.
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a) know-how, unique technologies, the ability to create competitive products;
b) well-performed and efficient business processes(project management, quality management, sales, marketing, planning, budgeting, staff motivation, etc.);
c) the availability of qualified personnel, which is quite difficult to find in the labor market and takes a long time to train;
d) the possibility of lobbying their interests.
23. Functional cost analysis, used in the process of choosing one of several alternative strategies, is ...
a) analysis of several alternative strategies for their integral effectiveness, i.e. taking into account the time factor;
b) bringing the costs of the options at different times into comparable conditions;
c) extrapolation of the curve of dependence of the quantity of interest on time from the past to the future;
d) discounting profit as an integral indicator of the production and economic activities of the organization.
24. Which of the following statements are correct? List all correct answers.
a) strategic planning is a narrower concept than strategic management;
b) strategic management is focused on making optimal strategic decisions, and strategic planning is associated with the achievement of strategic results;
c) strategic planning is a tool for managing plans, and strategic management is an organizational tool;
d) strategic planning is an organizational tool, strategic management is an analytical process;
e) in strategic planning, economic and technological variables are used, and in strategic management, in addition, psychological, sociological and political factors are taken into account.
25. Highlight Characteristics strategic planning. List all correct answers.
a) does not determine the study of the external and internal business environment;
b) contains a set of global ideas for the development of the company;
c) focused on the short term;
d) serves as the basis for any other type of planning;
e) provides for alternative actions for the long term.
26. What are the building blocks of the strategic planning process? List all correct answers.
a) analysis and assessment of the external and internal environment;
b) analysis of types of strategy;
c) definition of the mission of the enterprise;
d) formation of goals and objectives of the enterprise;
e) drafting strategic plan.
27. In what section of the strategic plan are the issues of planning the cost, income, profit, profitability?
a) basic strategy;
b) strategic organizational plan;
c) strategic production plan;
d) strategic financial plan.
28. In what sequence should the stages of the strategic planning process be reflected?
a) the mission of the enterprise, the goals of the enterprise, strategic analysis, concept of overall strategy, planning;
b) the concept of the overall strategy, planning, enterprise goals, mission of the enterprise, strategic analysis;
c) planning, enterprise goals, strategic analysis, the concept of the overall strategy, the mission of the enterprise.
29. Which of the statements are correct? List all correct answers.
a) the business plan gives a holistic systemic assessment of the prospects of the project;
b) a business plan is an integral element of strategic planning;
c) a business plan is by its nature a narrower and more specific document than a feasibility study;
d) business plan - a plan for the production and economic activities of the enterprise, taking into account both internal and external goals of the enterprise.
30. Highlight the distinctive features of the business plan of the investment project. List all correct answers.
a) unlike the strategic plan, the business plan does not include the entire set of general goals of the organization, but only one of them related to the creation and development of a certain new business;
b) the business plan differs from the plan of production and economic activity not only structurally, but also in that it takes into account, in addition to the internal and external goals of the organization;
c) the business plan covers a longer period than the strategic plan;
d) a business plan is narrower and more specific in nature than a feasibility study;
e) a business plan is drawn up when it is required to evaluate the implementation of an investment decision.
31. Who can prepare a business plan for an investment project? List all correct answers.
a) a manager
b) an entrepreneur;
c) a company
d) a consulting organization;
e) financial intermediary.
32. What section of the business plan are we talking about: “This section includes a description of the stages of work to prepare the enterprise for the production of products, works, services, calendar plan works on organizing the production plan, the list of required investments and sources of financing”?
a) resume;
b) production plan;
c) financial plan;
d) description of the offered products;
e) investment plan.
33. What indicators characterize the effectiveness of investments in investment project? List all correct answers.
a) flow real money;
b) the balance of real money;
c) profitability of the project;
d) the effect of financial activities;
e) indicators of commercial efficiency.
34. Choose two main processes for implementing the strategy…
a) carrying out strategic changes in the organization;
b) performing the main functions of managing the implementation of the strategy;
c) operational management of the implementation of the strategy;
d) strategic management of the implementation of the strategic plan;
e) personnel management.
35. What are the main functions of strategy implementation management? List all correct answers.
a) developing a basic strategy;
b) development of a strategic program or plan;
c) strategic control;
d) staff motivation to implement the strategy;
e) strategy analysis.
36. What are the approaches to managing the process of implementing strategic changes? List all correct answers.
b) controlling;
c) a collaborative approach;
d) championship.
37. When implementing strategic changes, it is preferable ...
a) administrative, rigid management style;
b) participatory management style;
c) democratic style of management;
d) a combination of styles depending on the importance and nature of strategic changes.
38. Indicators of strategy implementation and achievement of strategic goals at the corporate level include…
a) return on assets and sales;
b) the level of production costs;
c) sales volume;
d) shipment of goods;
e) return on invested capital.
39. Which of the following applies to the main functions of strategic controlling? List all correct answers.
a) strategy planning;
b) control over the implementation of the overall strategy;
c) coordination of all stages strategic management;
d) monitoring the system of strategic indicators;
e) motivation of personnel to implement the strategy.
A useful action at the stage of determining key competencies is the control comparison of the company's key competencies with the key competencies of other firms. The purpose of defining core competencies is to form a comprehensive understanding of the skills that currently provide the strategic success of the enterprise, move on to the search for new opportunities and create a basis for actively managing the most valuable resources of the enterprise.
One of the directions for searching for the foundations of the strategic success of an enterprise is the resource approach to strategy formation, which is considered as an alternative to the market-oriented strategy development scheme.
According to the supporters of the resource approach (E. Ryuli, R. Hall), a clear focus on sales markets is not in itself a guarantee of success and long-term best position of the enterprise in the market. The market-oriented approach does not sufficiently take into account the organizational, scientific, psychological and social factors of the enterprise's behavior in a strategic sense. For example, an intracompany structure, social aspects management, resource provision and behavior of personnel directly involved in the implementation of the strategy.
Unlike the market approach, which involves determining the need for resources depending on the position of the enterprise in the market, the resource approach is based on the assertion that the market position of the enterprise is based on its resource potential, that is, the company's resources and their management are put at the heart of the choice of strategy. Accordingly, within the framework of this approach, it is determined that the competitiveness of an enterprise in the long term depends on right choice resources and the ability to combine resources better, more original and faster than its competitors. At the same time, special attention is paid to the time factor, which can play a decisive role in achieving competitive success, especially in high-tech industries.
The resource approach to the formation of a strategy is based on the fact that each company has a variety of resources acquired in the markets of production factors and "acquired" in the course of its activities, as well as the ability to combine them with its capabilities (qualified personnel, technical means etc.) and goals.
An original and effective combination of resources compared to competitors in foreign economic literature has been defined as the key competencies of an enterprise (competencies - translated from English means competencies, skills, abilities).
Core competence, in turn, is based on tangible and intangible competencies. As a material competence, the technical and technological capabilities of the enterprise (unique technology, highly specialized equipment, etc.) are considered, which serve as the basis for the development of key competencies in a strategic aspect. An example is Japanese companies (Honda, Canon, Sony, etc.), which had basic technologies in the field of precision mechanics and optics, microelectronics, internal combustion engines, miniaturization, etc., which provided them with key competencies in the manufacture of a number of high-tech products and components.
While the effect of having tangible core competencies is obvious, non-tangible competencies, which include functional competencies and organizational culture, are difficult to perceive, since they do not have a real form in the usual representation and, therefore, their role and significance in achieving success by an enterprise is not always clearly visible.
The ability of an enterprise to form key competencies is characterized by the concept of metoccompetence, including social interactions, in particular the reaction to criticism, the ability to respond to the challenge of rivals, the ability to learn and communicate. The presence of metocompetence determines the basis for the effective development of the enterprise, the formation, use and preservation of key tangible and intangible competencies.
The process of forming a resource-oriented competitive strategy includes: a reasonable assessment of resources, the company's capabilities in the formation of key competencies; means of protecting key competencies, as well as a multidimensional approach to the formation, development and use of key competencies.
The methodology for developing a competitive strategy focused on the resource potential of an enterprise should include answers to the following questions:
1. What key competencies, including metocompetencies, does the enterprise currently have, how long do they remain valid? 2. How can these competencies be protected, developed and used as part of a company-wide strategy? 3. How to provide sustainable means of their protection? 4. Can the enterprise, on the basis of existing resources, create new, original combinations of resources that can be transformed into key competencies in the future? 5. Does the enterprise need new tangible and intangible resources to achieve stable competitiveness in the future, and what investments are required for this? 6. How should new key competencies be created - based on the imperfection of the resource market, own original solutions or relationships with partners? 7. Are there imperfect markets for factors of production that the firm can better exploit? 8. What are the key competencies of the enterprise's competitors, which of them can it use or neutralize, and which cannot be reproduced? 9. What potential capabilities should a firm have to create new core competencies?
The protection of core competencies is carried out through various means, such as, for example, restricting access to certain resources, ensuring that they cannot be replaced and limited the ability to use the original combination of resources.
The effectiveness of such measures is achieved due to the imperfection of the resource market, in conditions of limited access to the necessary resources and the predominant position of individual firms in resource provision, which ensures their competitiveness.
In addition, core competencies can also be protected by: the complexity and longevity of core competencies (eg, complex technology, social networks, enterprise culture not easily replicated by competitors); secrecy or secrecy of resources; enterprise size (for example, small and medium-sized enterprises may be subject to financial, political and market sanctions from more large enterprises); high costs due to the transition of a competitor from one supplier to another; the time factor in relation to the speed of research and development and the promotion of the product to the market.
The protection of key competencies should be carried out using all available measures and taking into account the specific market situation, determined by the severity of competition in the industry, its specifics, the ability to overcome industry barriers, the situation in the resource markets, the position and abilities of competitors.
The resource-oriented approach to justifying the choice of a competitive strategy should not be considered as an alternative to the market one, since it cannot be separated from other structural components of a competitive advantage, including the scale of activity, specialization, the optimal degree of integration, etc.
The value of resources is manifested only in the context of the implementation of certain activities in order to achieve competitive advantages. The competitive value of resources can rise and fall through changes in technology, competitor behavior, or customer requirements. Thus, the value of a resource is related to the structure of the industry and the market situation.
The link between resources and activities is more fundamental, however, resources occupy their inherent intermediate position in the chain of causality that explains the strategic success of an enterprise. Resources arise either as a result of carrying out activities of the enterprise over time (intangible resources), or through acquisition in the market or some combination of these two methods. These methods reflect the priority of managerial choice.
Enterprises, therefore, accumulate external and internal resources due to different strategies implemented in the past and changes in the configuration of activities. Resources occupy an intermediate position between the activities of the enterprise and its competitive advantage. Thus, the resource concept of the enterprise should be present in all strategic developments, while the role and importance of intangible key competencies in achieving the stability of the enterprise's competitiveness should not be ignored.
Development strategy based on core competencies.
Numerous recent studies in the field strategic management show that the success of corporations in the competitive struggle depends on three basic groups of factors:
- · Internal competencies
- · External competencies
- · Dynamic abilities.
It is low dynamic abilities (low innovative potential, inability to quickly adapt to changes in the market and manage knowledge) that are one of the most significant reasons for a weak competitive position in Russian market. For success in the competition, it is not so important what assets your company has (products, equipment, technologies, buildings and structures ...) at a given time. What is important is the speed with which the company is able to create the necessary assets and develop them.
Internal and external competencies should be understood only as factors that provide corporations with significant, threshold competitive advantages. As a rule, these are factors that require a significant period of time and experience in a particular industry to create. For example, internal competencies include the following:
R&D (KNOW-HOW, technologies, ability to create competitive products);
Availability of proven and effective business processes (project management, sales, marketing, planning, budgeting, staff motivation…);
Availability of unique technologies that are not available to competitors;
Availability of qualified personnel, which is not easily found in the market and takes a considerable amount of time to train.
External competencies include:
- · Communication with suppliers and consumers (agents, dealers and distributors);
- · Opportunities for lobbying (communications with authorities government controlled);
- · Ability to provide financing in the required volume, in the shortest possible time and at an acceptable cost (links with financial institutions and investors).
Key success factors, i.e. factors that certainly affect competitive position corporation and its welfare in the future are:
- · Presence of own or strategically connected, market-leading scientific school;
- Availability of special production assets (special technologies) required for the production of special products;
- · Deep knowledge of the market, understanding of the changing needs of end users of products;
- Ability to quickly and flexibly respond to large-scale changes in demand, while maintaining resilience despite the absence of a defense order or the loss of an export contract
- · Ability to finance the enterprise, to attract capital, including private;
- · Ensuring the regime of preservation of state secrets.
Thus, a corporate development strategy aimed at achieving market leadership should be a set of measures aimed at strengthening key competencies, developing dynamic capabilities and neutralizing the weaknesses of the enterprise.
Strategic Approaches
In the 1980s, the dominant theory in the field of strategic management was the competitive forces approach, developed by Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter. The author argues that the company's actions should be aimed at creating external competencies through the capture of easily defended profitable market positions. As a result of such actions, the company can receive above-average profits. External competencies include sales systems closed to competitors, product differentiation for individual market niches and, as a result of the scale of production, -- low prices. According to Porter, the structure of industry has a strong influence on the rules of competition and the choice of strategies available to the firm. Typically, in such a practice of strategic management, the object of analysis and decision-making is a certain product or type of service. As a rule, with this method of management, corporate leaders at meetings and meetings discuss issues of positioning, pricing, production costs, and the like. Moreover, all these issues are considered within the framework of a specific product and similar products of competing firms.
Another approach focuses on creating a competitive advantage based on the firm's internal performance (resource-based view). The origin of this concept is the longstanding debate about the merits and demerits of organizations; now it assumes that firms achieve long-term competitive advantage through the strengthening of internal competencies: productivity and efficiency. The concept is the development of organizational economics and the study of technological and organizational change in relation to the strategy of firms. This approach considers, first of all, firm-specific capabilities and assets that determine the success of the firm: a highly effective sales system, efficient production, a strong business intelligence unit. Distinctive feature This strategic approach lies in the fact that a firm that has reached a high organizational and technological maturity will be able to compete in any markets. Since core competencies affect the success of a range of products or services, winning or losing leadership in a particular competency means much more to the future growth of a corporation than the mere failure of a product or service. The meaning of this is quite simple: in order to increase its potential for growth, a corporation must move from thinking about itself as a set of final products and services to understanding itself as a center for creating key competencies and their subsequent use in final products. Thus, competition is shifting from "product versus product" to "company versus company."
Figure 1: Structure of dynamic capabilities
In recent years, another theory has emerged, called the "dynamic capabilities paradigm" (dynamic capabilities paradigm). This concept is likely to become a holistic approach to understanding new sources of competitive advantage. A dynamic capability strategy determines in which direction the firm's existing internal and external competencies should be expanded to keep pace with changes in the world around it. As noted in Figure 1, company management uses dynamic opportunities to combine, build and reform internal and external competencies. The basis of dynamic capabilities is the company's focus on business processes, and not on markets and final products. Thanks to this approach, the company will be able to create competencies depending on the chosen strategy and the nature of competition.
It can be seen that the strategic approaches described above assume that competitive advantage is based on internal and external core competencies that enable the company to achieve and maintain above-average income.
The only known other way to achieve competitive advantage is to achieve a monopoly position through the complete suppression of competition. However, this approach can hardly be classified in the field of competitive strategy; it is more related to the sphere of political art.
Trying to control everything and the value chain. In the era of globalization, a developed system of cooperation allows you to focus only on those elements of the value chain that are the most important and require key competencies that form the basis of the enterprise's competitive advantages. An efficient corporation should seek to control only those operations that cannot be performed by competitors or are essential to maintaining market leadership. Everything that can be implemented by alternative suppliers should be transferred to cooperation partners. On the one hand, this will provide an opportunity to concentrate organizational and financial resources on the most important things, on the other hand, it will provide flexibility and stability, especially during periods of market downturn, that is, it will lead to an increase in the dynamic capabilities of the corporation.
The strategy of the enterprise is determined by the types of its activities and their interaction. The necessary composition and interaction of activities, in turn, is formed and changed based on the competitive capabilities of the enterprise.
The activities of an enterprise are schematically depicted as a value chain and a value system.
| Company | Competence |
| Sony | Miniaturization |
| Federal Express | Supply management; parcel routing and delivery |
| wal mart | Supply management |
| Motorola | Wireless, digital data compression, flat panel display and power supply technology, and fast cycle times |
| Merck | Drug Development |
| Marriott | Restaurant and building management |
| Honda | Manufacture of engines and electric trains |
| ZM | Production of adhesives, substrates and new materials |
| EDS | Systems Integration |
| Hewlett Packard | Measurement, computer data processing and communication |
| Nike | Procurement, Quality Design, Product Development, Athlete Support, Distribution Networks |
The most common is the division of competencies into tangible and intangible (by analogy with assets). Tangible and intangible assets serve as components of a firm's competency framework; and more intangible elements such as organizational processes and culture shape it when added coordinated asset and resource allocation function. The creation of competencies is called "organizational alchemy", as they are built on the intangible, difficult to buy and difficult to copy the abilities of organizations. It is much more difficult for a firm to create a new competency than it is to gain access to resources and assets. The complex human and behavioral aspects of an organization can be more difficult not only to imitate but also to manage and transform. There are three fundamental forms of competence: knowledge, know-how and attitudes.
According to experts, only those factors that provide it with significant competitive advantages and cannot be easily copied by competitors should be classified as internal and external competencies of a company. As a rule, these are factors that require significant experience in a particular industry to create. For example, to internal competencies can include the following:
- know-how, unique technologies, the ability to create competitive products;
- well-established and efficient business processes (project management, quality management, sales, marketing, planning, budgeting, staff motivation…);
- Availability of qualified personnel, which is quite difficult to find in the labor market and takes a lot of time to train.
To external competencies relate:
- the presence of stable relationships with suppliers and consumers (agents, dealers and distributors);
- the possibility of lobbying their interests (the presence of relations with government bodies);
- the ability to provide financing in the required amount, in the shortest possible time and according to reasonable price(presence of stable relations with financial institutions and investors).
Quality requirements
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Closed Joint Stock Company Transtelecom
Setting up Wi-Fi equipment
Pasteurization drawer for the selection of "heads" during rectification