How to turn a job description into competencies

A competency-based job description lists not only what a role does but also the knowledge, skills and behaviors a person needs to do it well. To create one, you start from the tasks in an existing job description, group them into the role's main responsibilities, and translate each responsibility into a small number of competencies with observable indicators and a required level.

The result is a short competency profile, usually five to eight competencies, that you can use to design assessments, write interview questions and run 360 feedback against the same standard. This guide covers the standard sections of a job description card, a five-step method for turning tasks into competencies, a worked example for one hypothetical role, and the mistakes that make job descriptions hard to use.

What is a job description, and what makes it competency-based?

A job description is a written summary of a role: why it exists, where it sits in the organization, what the person is responsible for and what they need to bring. It serves several audiences at once. Candidates use it to decide whether to apply. Managers use it to set expectations. HR uses it for grading, workforce planning, learning and performance management.

A traditional job description focuses on the work: tasks, responsibilities and conditions. A competency-based job description adds the worker requirements: the knowledge, skills and behaviors that predict good performance in that work. The distinction mirrors a long-standing discussion in the research. Sanchez and Levine (2009) compared traditional job analysis, which describes the work in detail, with competency modeling, which focuses on the behaviors an organization wants to encourage, and argued that each benefits from the strengths of the other. A good competency-based job description does exactly that: it keeps the task detail and adds a clear statement of what good performance requires.

Public occupational models make this split visible. The ONET Content Model, maintained for the U.S. Department of Labor, separates occupational requirements, such as work activities, from worker requirements, such as skills and knowledge, and worker characteristics, such as abilities and work styles. You can borrow that logic even if you never use ONET data.

The job description card: standard sections

In Saudi Arabia, many organizations use a structured job description card, a one- or two-page template with fixed sections. The exact layout varies, but the sections below are common practice.

For the job identification section, the General Authority for Statistics (GASTAT) publishes the Saudi Unified Classification of Occupations, which organizations can use as a reference when aligning job titles with standard occupations. Check which classification and codes apply to your organization and its systems.

Qualifications are not competencies

A common gap is a card that lists qualifications and years of experience but no competencies. Qualifications show that someone has studied or worked in a field. They do not show whether the person can, for example, resolve an escalated customer complaint or build an accurate forecast. Competencies describe that capability directly, which is why they are more useful for selection and development.

From tasks to competencies in 5 steps

The method below works for most roles. It takes a few hours for one role when the manager and an HR partner work on it together.

1. Collect and clean the task list. Start from the current job description, then check it with the manager and, ideally, one or two people doing the job. Remove tasks no longer performed and add those missing. Write each task as a verb plus an object, for example "prepare the weekly service-level report".
2. Group tasks into key responsibilities. Cluster related tasks into five to eight responsibilities, such as "manage team performance" or "handle escalated cases". Each responsibility should describe an outcome, not a list of activities.
3. Ask what each responsibility requires. For each responsibility, ask: what does someone need to know, to be able to do, and how do they need to behave to deliver this well? Separate the answers into technical competencies (knowledge and skills specific to the role) and behavioral competencies (ways of working, such as planning, communication or coaching). Where you have a competency framework, map the answers to its competencies instead of inventing new ones.
4. Prioritize and set the required level. Keep the competencies that are critical, differentiate strong from average performance and are needed from day one. Five to eight is usually enough. For each, set the required level using your framework's proficiency scale, and write two or three behavioral indicators that describe what that level looks like in this role.
5. Validate with the manager and job holders. Review the profile with the manager and people who do the job well. Ask whether a person who met every indicator would succeed, and whether anything critical is missing. Then record the profile in the job description card and agree when it will be reviewed.

Campion and colleagues (2011), in a widely cited review of best practices in competency modeling, recommend linking competency models to organizational goals, describing competencies in behavioral terms and defining how they change across levels. Steps 3 and 4 above apply those practices at the level of a single role.

Writing good behavioral indicators

• One behavior per indicator. "Plans and communicates priorities" is two indicators. Split it.
• Observable. "Explains the reason for a decision to the team" can be seen; "is a good leader" cannot.
• Role-specific. "Resolves escalated complaints within the agreed response time" is more useful than "provides good service".
• Level-appropriate. An indicator for a team leader should reflect team leader responsibilities, not those of a senior manager.

Worked example: one role mapped to competencies

The example below is hypothetical. It shows how a customer service team leader role in a retail company might move from tasks to a competency profile. Adapt the content to your context and framework.

Job purpose: Lead a team of customer service advisors to resolve customer requests accurately and on time, and to improve the customer experience.

Notice three things about this profile. Each competency links back to a responsibility, so nothing is included "just in case". Technical and behavioral competencies are balanced, reflecting that the role is both hands-on and supervisory. And each indicator describes something a manager, interviewer or assessor could observe.