Engineering competencies are used to inform conversations about career progression between an engineer and their line manager. They define what an engineer is expected to be doing at a particular level. They are not a checklist, but a way to indicate what areas they may need to improve in.
We divide competencies into levels for different seniorities.
Each level represents the expectations and responsibilities of an engineer at a particular stage of their career at Obrizum:
At this time, we don’t define competencies for Junior Engineers.
Each competency has a summary which is designed to prompt a yes/no response. For each competency, an engineer should feel able to answer either “yes, I’m meeting this competency”, or “no, I’m not meeting this competency, yet”. An engineer and their line manager should keep a record of evidence for meeting each competency, for example:
| Competency | Meeting? | Evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Contributes to the personal development of more junior people | Yes | Has been mentoring a junior member of staff for six months. Ran a department-wide Git workshop |
| Leads hiring process for new Engineers | No | The team has not had to hire new engineers in the last year, and so this competency cannot be met |
In the second example the engineer is unable to meet the competency “Leads hiring process for new Engineers” because that opportunity hasn’t come up in their current role. This is fine: it’s not a requirement for the engineer to be meeting all of the competencies, however this may be an indication to that engineer’s line manager that opportunities need to be found or created.
A copy of the Engineering Progression Tracker (Google Sheet) is useful for keeping track of progress.
Some competencies have one or more examples. The examples are purely illustrative, and will not apply to everyone. When working towards a competency, an engineer does not need to be meeting any of the examples given if they can provide evidence that they are meeting the competency in another way.
Please find this article How do I give great feedback written by HR that has a helpful guide on how to deliver feedback on yourself or a colleague.