An exploration of the relationships between the adoption of managerial competencies, organisational characteristics, human resource sophistication and performance in Irish organisations

This paper is developed from research conducted with the Irish Management Institute. A model is presented to illustrate the relationships between the adoption of competency‐based human resource management and a range of other variables. These include HRM sophistication and several organisational characteristics. The linkages to business performance are also explored. The empirical evidence to validate this model was derived from a 114‐company respondent survey. Key findings are that organisational characteristics impact on the adoption of competencies, particularly company size and length of time in operation. Another finding is the effect of HR sophistication on the incidence of competency frameworks at company level. Organisations which already have sophisticated and well resourced HR processes in place are more likely to use competencies. The final finding relates to organisational performance. Organisations which are performing well are more likely to adopt competencies. This might also be interpreted as meaning that organisations which adopt competencies are more superior performers, although the cross‐sectional evidence presented here does not allow us to make this assertion with full confidence.