Tasks And KSAs - Apples and Oranges?

When analyzing jobs and tasks, you can focus on two different outcomes. One is to develop task statements and procedural documents so you can design and develop training materials for that job. We can look deep into the tasks to see what someone does to achieve a specific outcome. We document the systems and tools someone uses. We can organize

Another focus works to derive the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSAs) required for someone to be either competent or above average in that position. KSAs are often used within a talent model for an organization. It’s beneficial when you look across multiple jobs and develop a comparison of job to job to help employees see what is necessary to move into a new position.

Are these two things apples and oranges? Which should we focus on? Which is better? Unfortunately there isn’t an easy answer. The truth is that they both serve a useful purpose depending on your goals. They offer benefit through training or through talent management.

For training needs, task statements get to the heart of what you want learners to do. They easily convert and break down into terminal and enabling objectives. They help instructional designers and trainers focus on observable behaviors. Task statements make it clear what success looks like. In some cases it’s more black and white and the learners can either do the task or not. Good task statements start off with a simple and observable action (verb). Good task statements aren’t overly complicated and simply state what someone does. A good designer can sit down and use that task statement to develop a training course or curriculum delivering what the learner needs to know.

KSAs aren’t as direct and specific. They are more generalized statements and measurements about more subjective characteristics. It does give us a language though. You can find a list of general knowledge, skills, and abilities. ONET offers a good library to use and is free. Knowledge is easy and focuses on what a person knows. Skills and abilities are a little more gray between them. The easiest way to think of them is that skills are things you learn through life while abilities are more innate. There is some overlap because you can find someone has a natural ability for mathematical reasoning but separate from that, there is a skill for mathematics. It makes sense though because some people do have a more natural ability to use math while others can still learn mathematical mechanics without it. When we look at an employee population they all have different jobs, roles, responsibilities, and complete different tasks. But, it is likely some of them across jobs share similar characteristics. It’s possible that some of the best performers share common. It’s also possible that others with those same characteristics would also be successful in specific jobs. But the question is, what characteristics, and to what degree?

So is there a way to get the value from both? Yes. There is but it takes some work.

When you look at a task statement, it’s possible to look at it and derive what kinds of KSAs may help someone perform that task well. It’s subjective but if you work with experts you can eventually pin down which KSAs are important and which are not for that task.

For example, let’s say we are looking at a job of customer service representative and they have a task, “Resolve error message 10a” which is where they could get an error in the CRM while performing another task and they must know why they got the error and be able to fix it and continue working. If you have a list of the KSAs used within your organization, you can likely eliminate some right away as being irrelevant. For example, it doesn’t seem the ability of “Speed of closure”, meaning a quick reflex action with your hand wouldn’t make a big difference in being able to perform this task well. So it’s easier to start with eliminating some irrelevant KSAs . Then some KSAs more obviously could affect the likelihood someone will perform this task well such as the skill of “troubleshooting” or an ability for “deductive reasoning”.

This can take a little time to go through all the tasks for a job or role but it can be worth it in the end. You should also consult with the experts and ask them to review your choices to include or exclude KSAs. Since they know the task better, they may see some KSAs you don’t. Furthermore, you should measure to what degree someone needs that KSA for that task. ONET offers measurement scales for all their main KSAs and other competency libraries offer similar tools.

Consider the real value of KSAs are through competencies. And the value of competencies come from having a consistent model and approach across several jobs within an organization. It helps to know what particular jobs need to be successful when compared to others. You can use this for managing talent or for helping employees with career planning. When you identify the competencies for Job A, you can look for other people who have similar competencies and identify them as potential successors. Or you can help other people know what competencies they may need to develop in order to eventually move into Job A later in their career. Deriving the KSAs from tasks isn’t the most direct way but it could be more accurate than just looking at a KSA for an entire job.