Building our people's competencies is one of our greatest competitive advantages.

Core competencies are the knowledge, skills, abilities, and technologies that people need to successfully fulfill their role/position. Strategies, tools, and technology help, but they don’t create lasting performance on their own. People do. When we invest in building skills and confidence in our workforce, we unlock better results, stronger teams, and a culture of improvement.

Everyone is unique, and every role requires specific capabilities. The good news: there is common set of core skills that benefit everyone, regardless of position. When time or workforce development budgets are limited, these skills are a great place to start. 

Below are the nine core skills that elevate individuals, teams, and organizations.

2. GOAL SETTING

Build skills in writing effective goal statements to help individuals, teams define what they aim to achieve in discussions, meetings, & projects. 

RESULTS: Clarity, focus, streamlined work, speed to completion & results. No goal, no meeting! More on this skill + A Goal setting guide

3. MEASURING PERFORMANCE 

Build skills in identifying meaningful measures, pulling data, visualizing, & using measures to guide performance, improvements, projects, teams. People like to know how they’re doing; measures answer: Are we working on the right things? How close are we to our goals? What can we celebrate? What should we improve / do next?

RESULTS: Measures provide the feedback needed to acknowledge, celebrate, learn, and continue growing. More on this skill + Webinar on this skill

4. DATA-BASED PROBLEM SOLVING & DECISION MAKING 

 High‑performing teams rely on data—not brainstorming—to evaluate situations. Build the skills to identify issues and wastes, prioritize them, & use root cause analysis to find solutions that prevent recurrence. 

RESULTS: More problems solved. Less recurring problems. Strengthened decision quality. Speed to changes.  More on Problem Solving + Problem solving blog +  Webinar on Decision Making 

5. VALUE & WASTE DETECTION 

Build skills in seeing value & waste in process & the environment. Once waste is visible, it becomes difficult to ignore, & leads to “How can we make this better or create more value?”

RESULTS: More focus on increasing what the customer values. More ideas, innovation, and opportunties to improve performance. Less personal attacks. Find the value and waste, use improvement methods to systematically increase value & eliminate waste

6. ACTION PLANNING 

Build consistent 'what next' thinking, acting, & communicating skills. Conversations include - What to do? By whom? By when? What does the output look like? Build this skill into discussions, meetings, & projects plans. 

RESULTS: Accountability, clarity, ownership, actions completed. Speed to change / improvement. 

7. TEACHING & COACHING OTHERS 

Build skills in effectively sharing & transferring knowledge from peers, supervisors, and trainers. Adults learn best by hands-on doing. Adopt the adult learning principles of tell, show, do, & be there to provide constructive feedback. 

RESULTS: Onboarding speed. consistent knowledge, skills, abilities locked in, and more confidence to perform. More on teaching skill + Webinar on coaching 

8. LEARNING FROM PERFORMANCE

Build the skills to capture & apply learnings to avoid repeating the same situations. Reflect with - How did we do? What was good or bad? What did we learn? What will we do differently next time? This can take a few minutes after a discussion, a meeting, during a project, or following an event.

RESULTS: Save time, resources, frustrations and preserve benefits and institutional knowledge gained. More on this skill 

9. OPERATIONALIZE SOLUTIONS & CONTINUALLY
The final skill is finishing strong—making changes stick. This means embedding changes into daily work by documenting the change, teaching others, measuring performance, providing ongoing feedback & coaching.
RESULTS: Good use of resources, benefits realized, a can-do mentality, & sustainable improvement becomes part of the culture. Webinar on this skill 

When we invest in people, we invest in performance. These nine skills create a consistent path to a stronger, more capable, higher-performing workforce. The results of these skills are clear: better results/outcomes, better teamwork, and a workplace where improvement is not just possible—it’s unstoppable.