Greater insight into the skills of employees is a powerful tool for organizations in their strategic personnel planning. After all, we are looking for employees with skills that mesh perfectly with the strategy of the organization, not just today but also in the longer term. If you start planning this way you can find out which skills need to be developed or brought into the organization for the future.
That starts with taking an inventory of the current skills of existing employees. This gives employees insight into their own development and for the organization it is the starting point to plan the further development of skills. For example, if a specific skill for a certain job is missing this skill can possibly be developed with an appropriate training course, on-the-job training or the acquisition of specific experience.
Hard skills and soft skills
Determining someone’s skills requires a sound approach. It’s not only about determining whether someone has a certain skill and is able to competently perform certain tasks. The level of competence must also be determined. In this context we often distinguish between hard (technical) skills and soft skills. Hard skills are measurable and relate to specific, professional knowledge and skills. An example of a hard skill is programming. Soft skills, in contrast, relate more to personal skills and are generally more difficult to measure. An example of a soft skill is creativity.
Microsoft Dynamics 365 Human Resources
When it comes to professional skill management a good HR system is essential. Dynamics 365 Human Resources offers all the necessary skill management functionalities, including effective skill analyzes and insights. This allows both the existing skills of each employee and the required skills for each position to be documented. HR becomes much more manageable because employees and managers can personally register skills in the Self-Service module of the system, by means of a workflow if desired. The HR team can subsequently focus fully on skill analytics; the system provides a comprehensive set of analysis options for this purpose.
Skill gap analysis
First of all there is the option to conduct a Skill gap analysis. This is an analysis that provides insight into the discrepancies between the skills of the employee and the required skills for a specific position. You can use this analysis to determine whether an employee is suitable for a certain job, but also to clarify the areas where further development is required within someone’s current position. An added benefit is that it’s not just the HR department that can conduct this analysis; using the Self-Service module individual managers can also perform this analysis for the employees in the team.
Skill mapping
The Skill mapping profiles functionality also offers a lot of added value. This analysis is used to obtain suitable profiles for a certain position or role. You formulate a specific profile containing a number of job requirements. Subsequently you perform the analysis and the result provides a clear overview of the employees within the organization who match the profile. It is also possible to zoom in at detail level for individual employees, making it clear which aspects of the profile apply to the employee and which ones don’t.
Employee development
The system also provides a number of standard Power BI reports, for example the number of employees who possess a certain skill. HR can access these reports via the Employee development module in the system. This gives you direct access to the reports without necessarily having to compile them yourself. Should a certain report be missing it’s possible to customize reports via Power BI.
Documenting, assessing and evaluating
Finally, it’s worth emphasizing that high-quality skill management can also contribute to effective performance management. Within performance management it is increasingly common to assess and evaluate the professional development of individuals. The proper documentation of the development is essential for this purpose.
