Embed with SFIA Secrets from the missing Framework

Transcription

1 the missing Framework Simon Roller Reviewed January 2016 Why is value so hard to sustain? What is the secret to making best practice stick? How do you make process improvement and good governance last when the consultants leave? Most process consultants talk volumes about Adopt and Adapt ; the importance of adopting best practice frameworks and then adapting them to suit the business and organisation. The problem is that when most consultants leave the building, the value leaves with them. In order to preserve the value in best practice, we need to embed best practice into the organisation. SFIA, the Skills Framework for the Information Age is a people framework. It focuses on the skills and the capabilities required in supporting good governance, and it is the missing link in governance adoption. Prince2 and ITIL are registered trademarks of the Cabinet Office. COBIT is a trademark of the Information Systems Audit and Control Association and the IT Governance Institute. Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA) is owned by The SFIA Foundation: Copyright BSMimpact unless stated otherwise.

2 Contents Setting the Scene the role of SFIA... 2 The History of SFIA... 2 The Value of SFIA... 3 A SFIA Case Study... 4 Conclusion... 9 About the author

3 Setting the Scene the role of SFIA It is well known in the Process Consulting world, that the best way to implement a process framework is to adopt the framework and then adapt it to your needs. It is widely understood that not all processes are always required for an organisation, and different organisations will need different levels of maturity. This applies to all the major process frameworks, including ITIL (IT Infrastructure Library), Prince2, the project management guidance and COBIT (control objectives for IT). The same can be said for the adoption of the various standards we use in IT, for example ISO/IEC 20000, ISO/IEC 27002, ISO/IEC and ISO/IEC Defining a set of processes and creating a bunch of artefacts, aligned to the needs of the organisation, is only part of the picture. We all acknowledge the importance of Management of Organisational Change (MoC), helping people transition to a new world or paradigm; but once the MoC programme has been rolled out, the copies of Who Moved My Cheese (published in 1998 by Dr. Spencer Johnston) are gathering dust on the shelf, and we are faced with that scary reality of BAU, we very quickly fall back into bad habits and the old ways. SFIA, the Skills Framework for the Information Age ( helps us address this issue in a number of ways, some of which will have hidden but substantial benefits. It is always amazing to me how many people in our industry have not heard of SFIA, or understand many of the benefits a Skills framework can provide, This white paper will look more deeply at the role of SFIA in the adoption of IT Governance, and how implementing SFIA can change the way you manage IT in the future. The History of SFIA The Skills Framework for the Information Age is a model for describing and managing competencies for ICT professionals, and is intended to help match the skills of the workforce to the needs of the business. It maps out the range of skills as a two-dimensional table, by tagging each skill with a category and 7 levels of responsibility level. It defines levels of responsibility generically in terms of Autonomy, Influence, Complexity and Business Skills. The SFIA framework is owned by the SFIA Foundation, which has been in existence since The framework has had a recent update for version 6 in late 2015 and is used globally by both private and public sectors. It is freely available for individual use and access can be granted by contacting the SFIA foundation at In Australia, SFIA is used by private sector organisations as well as the public sector. The recent Whole-of-government ICT strategic workforce plan is underpinned by SFIA, and the framework is an essential component for the APS career structure, and is used for both people orientated process and ICT career development. SFIA is also used extensively by the Queensland Government who has made excellent progress in integrating SFIA into the workplace

4 The Value of SFIA Figure 1 below shows how SFIA can be used in all aspects of people management supply chain. Figure 1: SFIA & the Supply Chain We can use SFIA to build standard role descriptions and organisational designs aligned to best practice. Having standard role descriptions will assist in removing the ambiguity of peoples roles, define the skills and qualifications required to perform those roles, and help IT define the levels of skills required for each role. Once we have standard roles, we can recruit against these roles.. This task is made very difficult due to the lack of standard definitions used in the market. The biggest issue is that there are usually a number of different role descriptions with the same organisation for the same role, with different skills and different remuneration. Many organisations have little to no idea as to the skills contained by individuals within the company, especially when it comes to IT. We have found that on average, an IT role have between 4-6 skills required to perform that role. On average, an individual may have between 4-10 skills at various levels. Through our discussions with recruiters, a common frustration is seeing an individual leave an organisation one day, only to re-join the same organisation the following day performing a different role using different skills! If the organisation had an inventory of skills present in their staff, it would reduce the amount of employee churn in the organisation. If an individual understands their skills, and has an understanding of the skills required by the organisation or the market, they can grow and develop their skills aligned to the roles that the organisation or the market values. It may be the case that an individual has reached the maximum potential earning capacity for a given role, but if they develop or acquire new skills, they can perform a more valuable role. This will also aid in the ROI for training and development, creating the link between the cost of skills acquisition and the value the skill provides. Lastly, by linking remuneration and reward to the skills that are valued by the organisation, there is a transparent and accountable link between salaries and roles. If an individual wishes to increase their salary, they simply need to acquire more skills that are valued by the organisation. This white paper focuses predominantly on the Define and Supply aspects of the Supply Chain, as illustrated in Figure 1 above. There is so much more that can be done with SFIA in the areas of Growing and Managing Skills, but this will have to form the subject of another paper! 3

5 A SFIA Case Study In early 2013 we were asked to perform some analysis against a set of roles within a large organisation. We used SFIA (version 5) to both analyse the roles required by the organisation, and then used SFIA to rate the individuals currently performing those roles. We wanted to explore the hidden value of SFIA in tangible terms. We selected three types of roles that were common within the organisation. These roles were Analyst Programmers, Business Analysts and Project Managers. In total we assessed 23 individuals who were employed for those roles, and the assessment was conducted by reviewing their resumes by 2 independent Accredited SFIA consultants. Once the assessments were complete, we analysed the SFIA alignment between the individuals and the roles, and the financial impact on any misalignment. Step 1: Role/Position Definition For each of the roles (both Standard and Senior), we built a SFIA aligned role description. The role description was based on the organisations existing roles they would use for candidate selection, so we understood what skills the organisations valued. Each role definition was divided into 4 parts. Part 1 detailed the Levels of Responsibility, and included the SFIA description around Autonomy, Influence, Complexity and Business Skills. There is a different description for each of the 4 attributes at each of the 7 SFIA levels, and this gives a good indication as to the overall responsibility of the role. Part 2 of the role description focused on the SFIA skill codes required for the role. In general, each role required between 4-8 skills at varying levels. The skill levels (again 1-7) would cluster at the similar level, and could easily be grouped into Foundation (1-3), Practitioner (4,5) and Expert (6,7). Figure 2: SFIA aligned role description. Part 3 of the role definition detailed some of the behaviour, or soft skills, required by the role. This part of the role definition is usually supplied by HR, and is often termed a capability leadership framework. For our examples we used one of the capability frameworks in the public domain. Part 4 included the qualifications and certification used to support the skills in part 2. We used a simple calculation to create a concept of skill points for each role, with a skill point be attributed to the incremental level of each skill within the role. Therefore the skill points for a Business Analyst would be as follows: BA Skill Points = BPRE (5) + BUAN (5) + RLMT (5) + DTAN (4) = 19. Therefore skill points for a role are derived from the amount of skills required to perform the role and the level of each skill. An organisation could attribute a higher skill value for different skills or skill families. We also found that senior roles were made up of both similar skills to their basic counterparts but at higher levels, and in some cases, had additional skills (example Snr Business Analyst). The allocation of skills to roles would obviously be unique to different organisations, but would generally be aligned in a similar way. 4

6 Table 1 below details the SFIA skill codes for each role and the associated skill points. Table 1: SFIA skill codes for the roles assessed. Obviously there could be sections in the position/role description for reporting lines, KPI s etc., but this was superfluous to our requirements. Step 2: Skills Assessment Once we had a good understanding of the roles and skills required, we were able to assess each resume for indications of these skills. We checked for relevant experience, qualifications, use of tools and methods, as well as the length of engagements and levels of responsibility. Figures 2 and 3 below illustrate a subset of the roles assessed, and the skills identified. Where the individual has a skill present at the required level, this is shown in green. Where the skill was present at either a lower or higher level, this was shown in either tan or purple. If the skill was not present at all, it is shown in red. It is often the case that an individual has additional skills required to perform a role. Whether there is a value attributed to these non-core skills is up to the organisation. Whilst it is valuable to know these skills exist, and at what level these are at, it is doubtful that the role will value these skills from a financial perspective. It can also be said that knowing these skills exist may add a level of differentiation to a candidate selection if 2 or more candidates are suitable for a role and have similar core skill profiles. Figure 2: Analyst Programmers Skill levels identified. 5

7 The figure below illustrated the concept of skill profiles in more detail. Figure 3: Individual Competencies and Skill Match. Step 3: Value Definition The next stage was to attribute a value to each role and the associated skill with that role. We consulted the organisations recruitment firm who had an excellent understanding as to the market value of these roles, as it was a relatively simple exercise to divide the average value of the role by the associated skill points for that role, and get an average value for each skill point. This approach was then applied to the other roles and a table of role values created. The financial value for each skill point was $4,100, and table 2 below shows the relative value of each role. We did perform a sensitively test on the skill value amount, but this had a minimal effect on the overall findings. We also tested these salaries with both the hiring managers within the organisation and the recruitment firm, and for this particular organisation, these values were in line with current expectations. All salaries used are Full Time Equivalents (FTE) including super, permanent positions. Table 2: Relative Value of Each Role. Step 4: Value Alignment Finally we could align the value of the role, the skills within each role and the skills with each individual, and check for discrepancies. Not all the positions were filled by the recruiter, but we were privy to the salaries of each individual. If a role was filled by a contractor, then their salary was converted to an equivalent permanent value. Table 3 overleaf shows the results. 6

8 The definitions of each column are as follows: Skill Points: The amount of Skill Points required by either the role or attributed to the individual, relevant to that role. % Fit: the % of the Skill Points the individual possess for that role. Direct Cost: the Permanent FTE salary for that individual at time of placement with that role. Value: The Value the individual contributes to the role (Skill Points X $4,100), or Role 100% Cost Gap: The difference between the Direct Cost and the Value of the role (Direct Cost Value) Skill Gap: The difference in Skill Points between the role and the individual Value Gap: The cost of the Missing Value required for the role (Skill Gap X $4,100) Table 3: Value Alignment Total Cost: The Total Cost of the role by that individual (Direct Cost + Value Gap) Total Saving: The potential Saving if the Total Cost were to align with the Role Value ( Total Cost Role Value) Alignment: The % alignment of the role, calculated against the Savings and the Role Value. Green is greater than 80%, Yellow between 50% and 79%, Red below 50%. As can be seen, there is better alignment within the Analyst Programmer roles, both Basic and Senior, but poor alignment between Business Analysts and Project Managers. It is worth noting that the skill validation did not include a formal interview with the individuals focusing on these skills, so there may be some marginal error in the assessment. 7

9 Case Study Analysis When we look at the correlation between skills and salaries of the individual, there is poor alignment. There are many possible reasons for this poor alignment. One may be that the individual is a good negotiator, and was able to talk their way into the role. Another could be that the skills in the initial role description where not well identified or understood, and therefore poor value analysis was performed. A common reason is supply and demand. If there is a limited pool of resources within the market, this can create a misalignment in value. All these possibilities can be mitigated for with good positioning, planning and process. Figure 5: Analysis of Results On average, there is $28K worth of skills missing in each role and $73.3K worth of value being provided. The average salary for each role should be $101.3K, but the actual average remuneration is $118.4, a difference of $17.1K. Therefore the combined saving if a person was aligned to each role would be $45.1K. With an organisation of 1600 IT staff, the saving would be $72M per annum, or approximately 31%. The easiest saving would be the $17.1K of direct savings attributed to salary variations by role. The other saving is the cost associated with the skills not be present therefore activities not being performed. There are a number of scenarios that link to this cost. Scenario 1: Work being performed by another individual. In this case, the skills required to perform the work are present in another individual, and they are performing the activities associated with the role. In this case, there is a hidden cost which has been transferred to another person. 8

10 Scenario 2: The activities associated with the skill are not being performed adequately. This is most often the case, and in the case of the project managers in the case study, this would result in poor risk management with regards to the project, a lack of skill with benefits management and business case management, and poor change planning. This also becomes a risk issue, and there are a number of audit findings that could be applied. The COBIT 5 controls APO05 (Manage Benefits Achievement), APO07 (Manage Contract Staff) and EDM04 (Ensure Resource Optimisation) all relate to skills and capabilities. APO05 and APO07 reference SFIA directly as related guidance. Scenario 3: Skills were not really required in the first place. This is the most unlikely outcome, as why would an organisation include a requirement for a skill that was not really needed? If this is the case, then the role should be re-scoped and the skill removed. Conclusion There is great value in adopting frameworks like ITIL, Prince2, COBIT and the like to standardise on process and implement good governance. Unless we define the roles effectively that support these frameworks, then people will be challenged in performing their tasks and being effective in their roles. By implementing a Skills Framework like SFIA, we can better align the skills required for the roles we build, and justify the cost of skills development and career progression. If we understand the value of a skill or set of skills, we can choose whether to build the capability ourselves or buy it in. We can track where our human assets are, and calculate the return on our human capital. Finally, by aligning the roles people have to the skills they require, we are much more likely to get them to adhere to the processes they need to follow. SFIA is truly the missing or forgotten framework, and a critical component to both embedding and delivering IT Governance. 9

11 About the author Simon Roller s career started in the UK, where he worked in IT Operations and Data Centre management for Fortune 100 companies, focusing on the Financial Services industry and asset management in particular. On moving to Australia, Simon joined Hewlett Packard and continued to provide consulting services in IT Best Practice and Data Centre automation. Simon held a variety of country, regional and global roles during his time at Hewlett Packard, ranging from business management, marketing and strategy. All through his career, Simon has enjoyed working with people. His deep technical capabilities allow him to liaise between IT and the business, and many of his consulting activities focus on strategy, management of change and internal communications. Simon has been through a number of large and complex mergers (Digital, Compaq and HP), and is uniquely positioned to understand how large organisations adapt to change. Simon is a Chartered Fellow of the BCS, the Chartered Institute for IT. He has contributed to the on-going development of IT Service Management and holds an ITIL v3 Expert certification. He is a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA), and Certified in Governance Enterprise IT (CGEIT), a Prince 2 Practitioner, an Accredited SFIA consultant and trainer. He is also an accredited trainer for SIAM Foundation as well as being a member of the EXIN SIAM Expert Professional Group, responsible for the creation and quality assurance of SIAM Foundation questions. For more information, contact Simon Roller Director & Principal Consultant PO Box 1070 Darling VIC 3145 M: E: simon.roller@bsmimpact.com 10