Competency Management in Engineering Institutions: an Expert System based Knowledge Management Perspective

Competency is a key resource that all organizations possess. Proper channeling of organizational competencies leads to increased performance and better outcomes in order to meet the competitive edge. A crucial feature of engineering institutions (EIs) is that they consist of many processes, each requiring the combination of various skills at different proficiency levels. A robust competency management (CM) system must reflect the need for competency development in the institution and cater to methods to achieve these. This paper explores the need for CM in EIs and presents a conceptual framework for developing new competencies in the institution and refining the existing competencies for meeting the organizational goals. It focuses on enhancement of the competence of the human resource functions in the institutions through position fulfillment and career development mechanisms. It further proposes a layered architecture using Expert System for the implementation of the framework. The framework is based on the competency domains of knowledge, research, administrative, interpersonal relations and behaviour (KRAIB). If adopted in EIs, the authors feel that the framework will lead to a better way to use the data on institutional competencies as a knowledge asset and apply it towards effective planning and actions for competency management.