Ironically, we are going through this very exercise ourselves. We also
currently have and EDP that people fill out at their PA time. We have
leadership competencies defined, and the employee and the manager
determine developmental needs and "list" them on the form. They also
register for their courses at that time as well.
We are evaluating a more formalized process. There are MANY skill
inventory programs available:
SkillQuest (contact the Gartner Group)
Learning Tree International
Interpersonal Technology Group (ITG)
Platinum Technologies
Ingeneum
Many of these are based on Information Systems skills, but some are
broadening their perspective to the enterprise level (e.g., ITG). Some
offer just a database of job roles and skills, others offer a client
server or web interface. Some of them link to or have a training database
built in, so they identify the skill gap and enroll in training in one
easy step.
As a word of caution (you may already know this, but )... you really need
to be very careful here - it is REALLY easy to do this wrong, and
demoralize people. Also, all of these companies suggest that this process
does NOT happen during the evaluation process. The point of a skills
inventory program is that you want to "look bad", so that you can qualify
for training. The performance appraisal process, obviously, has the
opposite intent (to "look good").
We found that with a survey approach, it assumes that if you do not sign
up for training, you 1) don't need the skill or 2) can't afford it. Poor
assumptions.
Please let me know if you have any other questions. Good luck!
Marijo Werner
Kraft Foods NF 63
Three Lakes Drive
Northfield, IL 60093
(847) 646-7080 voice
(847) 646-7299 fax
mwerner@kraft.com email
--"Werner, Marijo J." <mwerner@kraft.com>
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