running head: needs assessment project · 2018. 9. 9. · needs assessment project 3& all of...

Running Head: NEEDS ASSESSMENT PROJECT

Needs Assessment Project

Meganne Downy, Alex Wilcox

James Madison University

NEEDS ASSESSMENT PROJECT 2

Needs Assessment Project

Meganne Downey, Alex Wilcox

Background

James Madison University was founded in 1908 as an all girls school. Since then,

it has turned into a co-ed establishment and grown exponentially. When it opened its

doors to students in 1909, it had an enrollment of only 209 students. Now, over a century

later, it has approximately 20, 000 students. James Madison University is also home to a

number of faculty and staff, these range from housekeepers to the President of the

college. All of the faculty and staff must be trained on JMU policies as well as on

information pertinent to their job. The Department of Training and Development is

responsible for this.

Training and Development focuses on personal and professional development

within JMU. The department creates and coordinates workshops for a wide variety of

faculty and staff. They offer workshops from secretarial training, to training on dealing

with Alzheimers. The department attempts to address the needs of the university via

development and implementation of these courses.

Within the past two years, under the direction of Judy Rannow, Training and

Developments Professional Development specialist, the department has been attempting

to develop and implement a competency model for tracking the success of the workshops.

Up until recently, Training and Development did not have a way to measure the

effectiveness of their workshops. As this became a more apparent problem, they decided

to develop a list of key competencies. The idea was to develop these competencies and

subsequently assure that the workshops offered by Training and Development addressed


all of them. If there is a competency that exists, but does not align with a workshop, a

workshop should be created to address that. The competency model will be made

available to supervisors. Once it is implemented and in the supervisor’s hands, it will be

up to them to ensure that their employees are meeting all the competencies.

When developing the competency model for JMU, Ms. Rannow examined several

different key elements. She surveyed appropriate JMU groups, interviewed supervisors

and subject matter experts, and looked at the best practices of other organizations as well

as national organizations industry competencies. What she developed was a set of

competencies customized to JMU. Her conceptual framework is as follows.


Table 1, JMU Competency Development

Survey •  Appropriate JMU groups

Interview • Supervisors • People currently envolved in doing/activity/subject

Benchmark •  Best practices •  National/ Organization/

industry competencies

Custom JMU

Competencies


Based on these three elements, Ms. Rannow developed JMU’s competencies. The

conceptual framework for them is as follows.

Table 2, JMU Competencies

Leadership

Supervision/ Management

Facilitation Skills

Organizational Development

Teamwork

Work/Life Wellness

Administrative Skills

Customer Service

Communication


The hierarchical organizations of competencies that move from the most basic –

communication, to the most advanced – leadership, is reminiscent of Blooms Taxonomy

(Clark, 2010). Blooms Taxonomy states that there are three domains of learning,

cognitive, affective and psychomotor. Psychomotor is related to tasks and physical skills.

Cognitive refers to the development of knowledge and intellectual skills, and affective

has to do with people skills and attitudes. Within these areas, there are different levels of

mastery that build on each other.

The same can be said of JMU’s competency framework. Each competency builds

upon the next and within each competency it is broken down into different areas. Each of

these areas is then broken down into three levels of mastery detailed by Training and

Development. These different levels are described as fundamental, intermediate and

advanced. They are used to track the employee’s level of competency mastery. Ideally,

each employee in every position would master every level of the competency (SME –

Judy).

As previously stated, this is a process that is still being developed. The deadline

for its implementation is June of 2013. Training and Developments wants to have

finished developing the competencies by then and have matched them all with

workshops. The process that is being worked on currently is filling in the gaps. If a

competency does not have a workshop in the 2013 Training and Development course

catalog, then Ms. Rannow reviews previous courses offered to see if a suitable one can be

implemented. If previous workshops can be reused, it saves the department the time of

having to design and develop new ones. However, if a previous workshop cannot be used

to meet a competency a new one will have to be developed.


Initially, the team performing the Performance Improvement Plan was presented

with all the above information, except for how the competencies aligned with the

workshops. Training and Development requested they align these two, see where the gaps

lay, and then present the information to Ms. Rannow. Although this was not the typical

process for conducting a PIP, the client had distinct needs the wanted met.

The team was able to align competencies with workshops where ever possible,

and was able to provide Ms. Rannow with pertinent information regarding where the gaps

lay. When performing this alignment, the team was allowed to use certain workshops to

meet several competencies. If a workshop addressed communication and teamwork, it

could be listed under both of them. Based on this, the team believed it could be possible

for one workshop to meet every level of a specific competency. However, Ms. Rannow

requested that this not happen. Each level needed to be addressed by a different

workshop, one could not meet all the levels.

Organization

Training and Development, as previously stated, exists within James Madison

University and provides personal and professional development to faculty and staff. Due

to the comprehensive nature of their mission, vision and values, the authors believed it

was relevant to include the information. The mission, vision and values of T&D give a

comprehensive overview of who the department is, and of what they do.

Mission: “The Training and Development Department supports the Madison

mission and assists in job performance improvement by offering learning opportunities

that enhance the knowledge, skills and talents of AP Faculty, Classified staff and Wage

employees.” (JMU Training and Development, 2013).


Vision: “To be known by managers and supervisors as a professional

development resource.” (JMU Training and Development, 2013).

Values:

• “We believe learning is a life-long process. The knowledge gained in each

professional development endeavor is critical to achieving and maintaining

excellence.

• We serve others. Our jobs exist because university employees need services. When we

make decisions, it is primarily for their benefit, not our own or our convenience.

• We are deeply committed to integrity, doing the right thing, behaving honestly, and

making sacrifices to act ethically.

• Relationships are what we’re all about. Therefore, terms such as respect, friendliness,

emotional intelligence, caring, and truth telling are core parts of our job

descriptions.

• We are leaders. We know that every minute of every day we are influencing someone.

We love the fact that our jobs enable us to make a difference and we are

committed to that ideal.

• We tell other people, and each other, the truth compassionately. We don’t avoid

conflict and we are always sensitive to others in our truth telling.” (JMU Training

and Development, 2013).

Literature Review

Because of the comprehensive nature of this project, the authors thought it would

be useful and informative to conduct a short literature review regarding competencies. It

was thought that a review of the literature could help to better analyze the problem as


well as provide background information and knowledge that was not immediately on

hand. The relevant information found is addressed in the following literature review.

The term “competency” was first used and defined in 1973. It referred to those

characteristics of an individual that correlated with excellency, high performance and

motivation (Konigova and Fejfar, 2011). Since then the definition of competencies has

developed and changed. Currently, it has several different definitions and is used in

numerous ways. According to Konigova and Fejfar (2011), it specifically has two

definitions. The first one relates to the power and scope of authority a specific person

holds. The second relates to the capacity of a person to perform a certain activity and the

extent to which that person has knowledge, skills and abilities to perform the activity. In

a general sense, the term competency refers to the set of KSAs a person has that is

relevant to their performance within the organization. Competencies help organizations

analyze their employee’s positions and define the expected performance. They can

generally be broken down into the specific KSAs an employee has or must have to be

successful at their job (Goffin and Woycheshin, 2006).

Another article discussed the history and definition of competencies, as well as

the recent surge in their use. Markus, Cooper-Thomas and Allpress (2005) cited the

importance of competencies to Human Resource Professionals, calling them a “key tool”.

They later went on to describe the development of competencies as well as the different

types. According to them, there has been a huge increase in competency use over the past

ten years, however, this surge is not empirically founded. Although competencies have

become increasingly popular, the authors state that there is research lacking in the area of

their effectiveness. The authors address major issues with competencies, and conclude by


saying that they believe competencies are misused in the work place. The authors say that

although beneficial, competencies tend to lead to over simplification of jobs and tasks.

Rather than support employee and organizational development and diversity,

competencies standardize information and in many ways limit employees and

organizations in what they do. The authors suggest that I/O psychologists take a larger

role in the redefinition of what competencies should be.

This article is particularly interesting because it is one of the few found that

actually questions the current model of competencies. Organizations use primarily a

reductionistic way of developing competencies, breaking jobs down via task analysis and

defining a specific positions KSAs (Goffin and Woycheshin, 2006). Although this is the

common currently used model, perhaps this is not always the best way?

When defining the KSAs of a specific position, it is common to conduct a task

analysis (Goffin and Woycheshin, 2006). A task analysis involves selecting a specific

position and sequentially breaking that position down into tasks. Based on the tasks that

are derived from the position, competencies are developed. If an employee is successfully

able to complete a task at different specified levels, they can be said to be “competent” at

that task. Although this is a traditional approach, and has been used successfully in the

past, it is not always realistic to conduct a task analysis for every position within an

organization, specifically one like JMU. Within JMU there are hundreds of different

positions, many of them cannot even be broken down into tasks. So how are

competencies developed for an organization this large, with massive diversity among it

employees?


Biemans, Niewenhuis, Poell, Mulder and Wesselink, 2004, suggest an integrated

approach to developing competencies. They hypothesize that a holistic approach to

developing competencies is more appropriate than breaking down a job into simple tasks

and behaviors. According to Beimans et al. “competencies are the integrated abilities to

cope with complex tasks”. This is very different from the idea that competencies are

simply the ability to perform pre-determined simplistic tasks (Goffin and Woycheshin,

2006). Biemens et al. proposed the idea of “work-process knowledge” in their article.

They describe this as the extent to which a worker has knowledge of their job and its

relationship to other jobs and tasks within the organization. Providing a worker or

employee with the context that their position operates within, in addition to providing the

components of their actual job, allows the employee to meet competencies without

actually needing a task analysis. The employee is provided with the basic information

they need to meet competencies, and provided the context in which they must perform

them. As a result of empowering the employee, the task analysis becomes obsolete. This

seems like a far more progressive way of implementing competencies. Although,

according to the author, this holistic approach to competencies is a recent development

and has yet to move outside of Europe.

Another relevant article discussed the difference between employee level

competencies and organizational level competencies. According to Cardy and Selvarajan

(2006), competencies are the “key to a competitive advantage” for organizations. To have

competencies successfully implemented, they must be aligned with the specific direction

of the organization. Because organizational competencies directly fuel the development

of employee competencies, it is important that the organization have a clear idea of the


direction they are going. If the organization does not have a firm basis for their own

competencies, employee competencies themselves will have no groundwork to be rooted

in.

When developing employee competencies, Cardy and Selvarajan (2006) suggest

four approaches: a job based approach, a future based approach, a person based approach

and a value based approach. The article then identifies the pros and cons related to each

framework. The authors suggest utilizing numerous different approaches when

developing employee competencies. They also remind the reader that not one approach is

right for all organizations. Based on the content of this article, it appears that the

development and implementation of competencies is similar to the process of designing

instructional materials based on learning theories.

Daughhetee, Puleo and Thrower (2004) proposed the idea of continuing

competencies in their article. They discussed competencies as being ongoing, and

suggested that for them to be effective supportive scaffolding should be in place. If

employees are going to be successful at their jobs they need to not only meet the

competencies set for them by the organization, but also be provided with continuing

education. When employees are offered no further training upon completing their

competencies, they will be less likely to retain the information and apply it at a later date.

By continuing to offer them education and professional development employees are

provided with the scaffolding they need to continually meet their competencies.

JMU’s Training and Development department provides the professional

development and continuing education that it’s employee’s need. It effectively

implements the scaffolding method discussed by Daughhette, Puleo and Thrower (2004)


by providing workshops and training through out the year. In an effort to continue this

and measure their success, T&D has decided to design and implement the competency

model previously discussed. Based on previous studies, the department appears to have

successfully aligned their competency development with the most current research and

methodology in the field.

Methodology

Qualitative research was the primary method of inquiry used. The authors

conducted interviews with a SME, Judy Rannow, and analyzed the different

competencies and how they aligned with the 2013 workshops. The data collection

process was lengthy due to the amount of workshops offered. Every workshop

description had to be read, and different competencies checked against it. Some

workshops had numerous competencies that fell under them.

The data was tracked in an excel spreadsheet. Each competency had it’s own page

with the different levels of achievement. The workshops that met the different

competencies were listed along side of them. Doing it in this way allowed the authors to

easily see where the gaps lay. In addition to this, it allowed them to show Ms. Rannow

the areas she needed to fill in with previous workshops or newly developed ones.

Interviews with Ms. Rannow were conducted at various stages through out the

project. She provided the information initially needed to begin the project and checked in

periodically through out it. Questions regarding how to process the data were addressed

to her and so were many others. She played an integral part in guiding the direction of the

project. When first spoken to as the client, she had a clear idea of what she wanted. She

communicated the performance gap and presented the data that needed to be processed.


Although the authors would have liked to gather more empirical data regarding

the relationship of workshops to competencies, this was not possible. The workshop

descriptions had to be trusted to convey information about the content it. It is possible

though, that a workshop said it covered information that it actually didn’t. It was outside

the scope of this project to verify that the workshop descriptions aligned with the

workshop content. That would be recommended as a future area to investigate. A

possible performance gap could exist there. This area was also recognized as a possible

confound. Since it could not be proved that the workshop descriptions aligned with their

content, the competencies that were aligned with the workshops could potentially be

wrong. It is possible that competencies were not being addressed when they were

supposed to be.

When examining the data, the authors also found that some competencies had

significantly more workshops aligned with them than others. This raised several

questions. First, why were there more workshops in certain areas? Second, for areas that

had numerous workshops, could some be cancelled and others implemented? Lastly, was

it possible that workshops were incorrectly aligned due to poor workshop descriptions,

and as a result more appeared to be offered in certain areas? These are all questions that

are outside the scope of this project but important to keep in mind for future research.


Data Collection Methodology

Data Analysis

Interpretations and Recommendations

Conclusion


References

ASTD. (2013). The ASTD Competency Model. Retrieved From

http://www.astd.org/Certification/Competency-Model

Biemans, H., Niewenhuis, L., Poell, R., Mulder, M., Wesselink, R. (2004). Competency-

Based

VET in the Netherlands: background and pitfalls, Journal of Vocational

Education and Training, Vol 56(4), 523 – 538.

Cardy, R.L, Selvarajan, T.T. (2006). Competencies: Alternative Framework for

Competitive Advantage, Business Horizons, Vol 49, 235 – 245.

Clark, D. (2010). Retrieved from

http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/bloom.html

Daughhetee, C., Puleo, S., Thrower, E. (2004). Scaffolding of Continuing Competency as

an Essential Element of Professionalism The Alabama Counseling Association

Journal, Vol 36(1), 15 – 22.

Gangani, N., McLean, G.N., Braden, R.A. (2006). A Competency Based Human

Resource Development Strategy, Performance Improvement Quarterly, Vol

19(1), 127 – 140.

Goffin, R. D., Woycheshin, D.E. (2006). An Empirical Method of Determining

Employee Competencies/KSAOs From Task Based Job Analysis. Military

Psychology, Vol 18(2), 121 – 130.

Konigova, M., Fejfar, J. (2011). Evaluation and Development of Managerial

Competencies. Czech Science Foundation, pg. 68-80.

Liles, R.T., Mustian, R.D. (2004). Core Competencies: A systems approach to training

and organizational development in extension, Journal of Agricultural Education

and Extension, Vol 10(2), 77 – 82.

Markus, L.H., Cooper-Thomas, H.D., Allpress, K.N. (2005). Confounded by

Competencies? An Evaluation of the Evolution and Use of Competency Models,

New Zealand Journal of Psychology, Vol 34(2), 117-126.

Marrelli, A.F., Tondora, J., Hoge, M.A. (2005) Strategies for Developing Competency

Models, Administration and Policy in Mental Health, Vol 32(5/6), 533 – 561.


SHRM. (2013). The SHRM HR Competency Initiative. Retrieved from

http://www.shrm.org/hrcompetencies/pages/default.aspx

Swanson, R. (2007). Analysis for improving performance. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler

Publishers Inc.

Sydanmaanlakka, P. (2003). Intelligent leadership and leadership competencies:

developing a leadership framework for intelligent organizations, Aalto University.

JMU Training and Development. (2013). Mission, Vision and Values. Retrieved from

http://www.jmu.edu/training/development/tdmission.shtml

Virginia Jobs. (2013). What are Competencies? Retrieved from

http://jobs.virginia.gov/cd_competencies.html

running head: needs assessment project · 2018. 9. 9. · needs assessment project 3& all of...

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