Essential Economics of Business
Key competencies in the Construction industry
While on-the-job, there are usually some desirable behaviours that an organization wishes to implement within its workforce; such critical practices are referred to as core competencies (Birkhead, 2000). They are crucial if an organization is to achieve its vision, mandate and business goals. My Organization being in the construction industry, there is a list of particular core competencies that employees must adhere to for the Organization to realize its vision and mission.
Our core competencies play a preeminent role when it comes to managing projects and serving our clients. At the very top is safety, this is a core competency (Biggs, 2013) and also the most critical value in our Organization. We do not compromise on the protection of both our on-site employees and the staff members behind the desk. Everyone working with us is trained on how to ensure safety on-site, and they are always keen to abide by this motto: “safety begins with you, safety is in your hands.’’
Risk management is another critical competency in our Organization, we invest in a lot of time searching on different methods to reduce risk although there’s always a certain amount of risk that is immanent in every construction project with our taken measures we try to limit it to the lowest degree possible. Our employees’ construction skills are also developed with the Organization ensuring that it only hires experienced workers in every sector. The Organization also has some of its local manufacturing facilities, thus ensuring quality is consistent in the whole construction process. Professionalism is also another significant competency that is important within the construction organization this is because any miscalculation or misevaluation could lead to a catastrophic event. Therefore our team is trained on maintaining their cool when faced by either a good thing or unfortunate, unexpected event.
Another primary competency within the Organization is the standards. Our team of highly qualified personnel ensure both the building standards and regulations are followed to the latter; this is a preeminent aspect since lack of achieving the required standards may lead to contract termination by a client.
The only sector of competency that the Organization needs to improve on is management skills. This includes both on cost and time management. This may be due to the lack of clear information flow (Baiden, 2006) from the top most representatives of the Organization to the employees of the Organization. Issuing instructions to the employees by different individuals from time to time eventually leads to miscommunication and confusion of the employees. This later results in time wastage which is equivalent to a loss of money.
To address this key competency issue, then I believe a transparent chain of command should be developed within the Organization and presented to the various parties within the Organization. Strict measures should also be put in place to whoever will not follow the guidelines to the latter.
References
Baiden, B. K., Price, A. D., & Dainty, A. R. (2006). The extent of team integration within construction projects. International journal of project management, 24(1), 13-23.
Biggs, H. C., & Biggs, S. E. (2013). Interlocked projects in safety competency and safety effectiveness indicators in the construction sector. Safety Science, 52, 37-42.
Birkhead, M., Sutherland, M., & Maxwell, T. (2000). Core competencies required of project managers. South African Journal of Business Management, 31(3), 99-105.