If you're in the world of training and workplace learning and performance or HR, there's no doubt you've heard the words “competency” and “competency model” hundreds of times. Even so, speak to 25 learning or HR professionals and you might get 25 different definitions of a “competency model” and the role it plays in organizational development.
In the past, learning professionals were in the business of creating content to “train” people. Learners experienced a lot more “telling” and “showing,” and often the communication between the instructor and the learners was one way, i.e., instructor to learner. In today’s world of mega-information and sensory overload, most adult learners can’t be “told” everything they might need to know. Filtered quality content has much greater value than massive amounts of non-relevant information. It is more important to be able to access the needed information or content at the right time rather than getting “trained” in the classical sense. What implications does this have for today’s learning professional?