Learning Technology: The Big Picture

Ecosystem of competency management

This diagram is an attempt to show how learning management, training management and performance support systems can be aligned with business goals as part of an "ecosystem of competencies".
- Claude Ostyn, Last updated: 6 September 2005
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Competency Data for Training Automation

Competitive performance in today's organization requires a good handle on how to acquire, recognize and use competencies within the organizations. Automated competency tracking and management in the context of performance support, training and adaptive online learning requires a systematic way to define and track competencies for individuals and teams. However, the competency data may come from a variety of sources and in many different formats.

This paper proposes a simplified framework that uses simple, standard data formats and services to help automate the collection and adaptive assessment of individual and group competencies. The framework also supports the automation of skill gap analysis as well as the automation of adaptive performance support.

The framework supports not only the automation of various processes, but also well informed decisions by humans. By keeping the data and processes as simple and transparent as possible, humans can apply common sense, priorities and policies with a full understanding of what is going on. The he framework supports a variety of enterprise policies. It also provides for auditing, general security, confidentiality and privacy requirements. It takes into account credibility issues and the sanity measures necessary to avoid corruption by unreliable data.

The main goal, however, is to enable this functionality with the simplest possible model while taking advantage of standards that already exist. This white paper may result in specific proposals for new standards or for inclusion in existing standards projects.
- Claude Ostyn, Last updated: 12 May 2005
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