The Shift From Jobs To Skills-Based Organizations

In the last two and a half years, the workplace has changed dramatically. One of them begs the question: are we witnessing the great shift towards a competency-based organization? Are jobs essentially “dead”? If you ask Michael Griffiths, senior partner, principal and lead in Deloitte’s workforce transformation practice, he believes we’re moving in exactly that direction.

Griffiths says, “The boundaries for the organization—both how you treat your workforce and who your workforce is—are kind of disappearing.” There are several elements to this movement. One of them has to do with the fact that organizations use their employees in a much more agile way.

“We find that people can bring their skills to bear [to work] and then identify adjacent skills for life and work as part of the conversation about how to adapt their skills to their work,” he says. The other facet of Griffiths’ point is our need to understand how we use skills across the organization In the future, organizations should better match employee skills with jobs or ideally with projects and opportunities Ultimately, the organization must use the composite skills data of its team members to develop an entirely new mechanism for the talent process.

I wanted to know how organizations might reorganize their work when we are stuck in our current and archaic era of job descriptions. Michael shared, “You can’t change skills unless you’ve made your work more agile. Work products need to be defined and broken down into this structure, rather than driving old orchestrations around job architecture into roles, projects, etc. You need to bring your data into work at the lowest possible democratized level and then you can match skills to that. This allows you to move to a skills-based organization.

Have we reached the point in our organizations where skills and talents are no longer employee-centric and defined solely on their resumes, but employer-centric?

“I think it’s a cultural shift that we’re moving towards,” Griffiths says. “I think the world has shifted to push organizations to turn around.”

My analysis would suggest that we are in the midst of a chicken and egg scenario. Do we need to define skills first or do we need to formulate the people strategy of how skills are translated into jobs, gigs or opportunities within the organization itself?

“Your talent strategy needs to have a line of business and metrics that you can track,” says Griffiths. He also constructed my metaphor quite skillfully. “You must build the chicken while the egg is being made. The first egg probably won’t be great, but you’ll learn how the chicken can make better eggs,” he added.

Based on his research and insights, we could call the egg “research” and the chicken

‘Infrastructure.’ So what does the transformation to a competency-based organization look like and how is it taking place?

“You have to create value for the individual and see the person by their ability, not their looks,” says Griffiths. “Remove prejudice and create a transparent marketplace where people can see opportunities as they arise and then be voted on.”

It reminded me of a recent one Forbes interview with author Ravin Jesuthasan. He said, “How do we envision our talent experience so that we meet people on their individual terms rather than forcing them to conform to our ‘one size fits all’ model?”

Second, Griffiths points out that while 98% of organizations say they want to transition to competency-based work, and 90% are actively experimenting with the eggs (competency-based approaches), only one in five are adopting competency-based practices to expand them around the world Organization. So the skills infrastructure (er, the chicken) isn’t exactly picking up steam.

Perhaps we need to first define skills as a concept. When I learned that Deloitte recommended setting up a Skills Hub, I asked him to explain more.

“We have a definition of ability in our research,” he said, “which I think is the starting point.” Griffiths pointed out that Deloitte defines it as technical skills, human skills, and professional or related skills. But he also mentioned the need for a taxonomy to keep things clear. “A taxonomy is as simple as your competencies, skills and attributes or capabilities.”

As I’ve noted several times in this column, it takes purpose inside and outside the organization. So how do skills help the concept of purpose and human centeredness? “Skills allow you to see the whole person,” Griffiths says. “Competency-based organizations are 79% more likely to experience a positive work environment.”

All the more reason to yell “aim for victory” from the mountaintops. In this case, purpose is directly related to a competency-based organizational culture.

Griffiths left me saying, “I think if you can get into that kind of work experience, you by definition serve a purpose.”

Time will tell how quickly organizations not only tie purpose to capability, but how seamlessly they make the transition to a capability-based organization as a systemic part of their culture.

Watch the full interview with Michael Griffiths and Dan Pontefract below or listen over Podcast of the Leadership NOW series.

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Check out my award-winning 4th book, “To lead. Care. Win. How to become a leader that matters.” Thinkers50 rated #1 thinker, Amy. C. Edmondson of Harvard Business School calls it “an invaluable roadmap.”