Know Who Can Do the Next Job Before You Have to Fill It
Competency and talent management is the practice of writing down what each role in your company requires, assessing people against that written standard, and using the result to decide who is developed, moved, promoted or held on to. It replaces impressions formed in corridors with a definition your managers apply the same way, and a review where the calls are made together.
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Share your requirementsCompetency and Talent Management in brief
Competency and talent management is the practice of writing down what each role in your company requires, assessing people against that written standard, and using the result to decide who is developed, moved, promoted or held on to. It replaces impressions formed in corridors with a definition your managers apply the same way, and a review where the calls are made together.
- GullyHR is an HR consulting, HR services, training and software company based in Bengaluru, working with Indian startups and small and medium businesses.
- The engagement covers the competency framework, role-wise mapping, potential assessment, development plans, career paths, internal mobility, the talent review and retention actions.
- Competency describes what a role requires. Potential describes capacity for a larger one. They are assessed separately and read together at the review.
- Your managers make the ratings and your leadership team decides the names. GullyHR supplies the framework, the forms, the facilitation and the record.
- The framework, the assessments and the development plans can sit in the GullyHR software or in the performance system you already run.
The starting point
Do You Know Who Could Do the Next Job Up?
Appraisal tells you how someone did this year. It rarely tells you what they are capable of next, because there is no written standard to measure against. So promotion goes to whoever is visible, and development money is spread evenly for want of a better rule.
We write what good looks like here, assess against it, and make the calls in a calibrated room.
You may be experiencing:
- A senior resignation with nobody inside the company you could reasonably ask to step up.
- A strong individual performer promoted into management, costing you a good specialist without gaining a good manager.
- Appraisal ratings coming back with almost everyone marked well, telling you nothing about where the training budget should go.
- Two managers describing the same employee in completely different terms, neither able to put a word to why.
- An employee asking where a role leads in a few years, and nobody having worked it out.
- Advertising outside for a position two people inside could have grown into.
- Hearing that someone was leaving only when the resignation arrived, and answering with a reflex counter-offer.
- A job description written at hiring and never revisited, so nobody can say what the role requires today.
- A high performer stalling because the next step has never been described to them.
- Pay or title requests argued on tenure alone, with no written standard to weigh them against.
- Training nominations decided by whoever asks first rather than by a named gap.
What we can help with
Our Competency and Talent Services
Competency Dictionary
A working set drawn from your own roles rather than a textbook: core behaviours, functional skills and managerial capabilities, each described as observable behaviour at defined proficiency levels.
Role Profiles
Each role in scope mapped to the level it actually requires, agreed in a session with its reporting manager, so a profile reflects the job rather than an aspiration about it.
Assessment Design
Assessment forms and a manager rating guide with worked examples from your business, showing what each level looks like here rather than in general, used before any rating is entered.
Potential Assessment
What potential means in your business, defined and judged separately from this year's performance, because a strong performer is not automatically ready for a bigger role.
Calibrated Talent Review
Criteria agreed before any name is spoken, leaders bringing nominations, evidence tested in the room and the decision recorded, so names come out of a calibrated session rather than from the loudest advocate.
Development Plans
An individual plan built from each person's own gaps, naming the stretch assignment, the support arranged, the reviewer and the review date, with a manager who owns it.
Career Paths and Internal Mobility
Routes drawn for your main role families, including a specialist track for people who do not want to manage, with a procedure for posting vacancies internally and a fair deal for releasing managers.
Retention Risk Register
Key roles assessed for impact of loss and likelihood of loss, with the real reasons people have left taken into account, and an agreed action and owner against each.
The scope
What the Consulting Covers
Talent decisions depend on a written standard, an honest assessment and a room where leaders compare notes. These are the parts of the work we can design or run with you. The scope is agreed with you and can take all twelve areas or only some.
Talent Decision Diagnostic
How promotions, transfers, development spend and retention calls have actually been made recently, and what your appraisal output can and cannot support.
Business-Critical Role Identification
The roles that carry the next phase of the plan, and those whose loss would hurt most, so the work starts where it matters.
Competency Dictionary
A short set of core, functional and managerial competencies written as observable behaviour at defined proficiency levels.
Role Competency Profiles
A one-page profile for each role in scope showing the competencies and levels it requires, agreed with the reporting manager.
Proficiency Level Definitions
Plain descriptions of what each level looks like in your business, so managers rate against the same picture.
Assessment Forms and Rating Guide
Forms for manager and self-assessment, with worked examples and guidance on common rating habits.
Manager Briefing and Moderation
A briefing before ratings are entered, and a review of ratings that look inconsistent across managers or departments.
Potential Criteria
A definition of potential for your business and the evidence a manager can reasonably bring to support a judgement.
Capability Gap Analysis
Gaps consolidated by role, team and department, with those that affect the growth plan marked.
Talent Review Facilitation
Preparation of the pack and facilitation of the leadership session where nominations are tested and decisions recorded.
Development, Career Path and Mobility Design
Individual plans, career routes for your main role families and a procedure for internal postings and releasing managers.
Retention Risk and Review Calendar
A register of key roles with agreed actions and owners, and a yearly calendar so the review recurs without a reminder.
Working together
Ways to Work With Us
Talent Diagnostic
A short assessment of how talent decisions get made today: what your appraisal actually produces, how recent promotions were decided and where the gaps sit.
Competency Framework Project
The dictionary and the role-wise mapping built, tested and signed off, with assessment forms and a manager briefing.
Talent Management Programme
The complete method in sequence: framework, role mapping, assessment cycle, calibrated review, development plans, career paths and retention actions.
Monthly Talent Advisory
Continuing support for a leadership team running the cycle itself: facilitating each review and moderating ratings across managers.
Whether to tell people they have been identified, and what to say, is a decision we work through with you. Both approaches have consequences and neither is automatically right.
The deliverables
What You Receive
Depending on the scope of your engagement, deliverables can include:
- A competency dictionary written for your company, described as observable behaviour at each proficiency level.
- A one-page competency profile for every role in scope, mapped to the job description and signed off by the reporting manager.
- Assessment forms and a manager rating guide, with worked examples from your business.
- A consolidated capability gap picture by role, team and department, with the gaps affecting the growth plan marked.
- Potential-assessment criteria and the completed talent review grid, with the leadership decision recorded against each name.
- Individual development plans naming the assignment, the support arranged, the reviewer and the review date.
- A career path map for your main role families, with the internal posting and mobility procedure.
- A retention risk register for key roles with agreed actions and owners, plus a review calendar and meeting pack template.
- A one-page summary of how talent decisions are made today, with the gaps found in the diagnostic marked.
- A manager briefing deck and a short guide on common rating errors, with examples drawn from your business.
- A talent review calendar and a decisions log, so each cycle starts from what was agreed in the last.
Step by step
How We Work
Start From the Business Plan
We begin with which roles carry the next phase, where you expect to add teams or locations, and whose departure would hurt most, rather than with an HR framework looking for an application.
Draft the Framework
We interview managers, read whatever descriptions exist, and work out what actually separates your strong performers from the rest. Managers then work through their own roles until each has a signed profile.
Brief, Then Assess
Before any rating is entered, managers are taken through the levels with worked examples from your business. Managers then rate their teams, employees rate themselves, and clear outliers are moderated.
Calibrate and Decide
We prepare the pack and facilitate the session where leadership compares ratings across departments, tests the evidence behind each name and records the decision made against it.
Plan Development and Hand Over
Individual plans are written with each manager, career routes drawn and retention actions agreed. We then train your HR team and managers to run the next cycle themselves and fix the calendar. Where it is included in the engagement, we sit in the first review cycle your team runs and refine the forms and calendar from what your managers tell us.
The difference
What a Written Standard Gives You
A competency framework and talent review help you:
We do not promise outcomes. We record a baseline before work starts, covering the current capability picture by role and how recent promotion decisions were actually made, and report against it, so you can see what changed and what did not.
- Have two managers describe the same employee in the same terms, because they work from one definition.
- Explain a promotion to the person who did not get it, with reference to something written down.
- Direct training and coaching money to named gaps instead of spreading it evenly.
- Produce a shortlist from inside the company before an advertisement is drafted.
- Answer an employee's growth question with criteria rather than reassurance.
- Discuss people on a fixed date each cycle, not only when somebody resigns.
- Brief managers on one rating scale before they assess anyone, instead of correcting inconsistencies afterwards.
- Separate the question of who performed well from the question of who could do a larger job.
- See which gaps affect the growth plan and which are only a matter of preference.
- Review the same set of key roles each cycle, with a named owner for every action.
Find your fit
Who This Service Is For
Founder-Run Companies
Businesses grown past the point where the owner personally knows how every employee is doing.
Companies With Promoted Managers
Businesses whose first layer of managers came from within, where nobody ever defined what the manager's job requires.
Companies Growing Faster Than Hiring
Businesses whose plan needs more senior people next year than the market will supply in time.
Businesses That Lost a Key Person
Companies that discovered, after a departure, that there was no second name for the role.
Companies Where Appraisal Stops at the Rating
Businesses where ratings are collected competently and nothing happens afterwards.
Family-Owned Businesses
Companies bringing professional managers in alongside family members, where movement and promotion need a stated basis.
Companies With Mostly Informal Role Descriptions
Businesses where roles grew around people and the written description no longer matches the work.
Companies Opening New Teams or Locations
Businesses that need to know which internal people could lead a new team before looking outside.
Leadership Teams Reviewing Pay and Promotion Requests
Teams that want a stated basis for deciding who is ready before the compensation conversation begins.
Good to know
A Clear Talent Cycle Each Year
Build the standard
- Define: agree the competencies and the levels for the roles in scope.
- Map: record the level each role requires, with the reporting manager.
- Brief: take managers through the levels and rating guide before any rating is entered.
Run the cycle
- Assess: managers rate their teams, and employees rate themselves.
- Calibrate: leadership compares ratings, tests evidence and records decisions.
- Plan: write development plans, career moves and retention actions with owners and dates.
Each stage has an owner, a date and a record of what was decided.
Good to know
Track What the Talent Cycle Produces
Coverage and quality
- Role coverage: how many roles in scope have a signed profile.
- Assessment completion: whether managers and employees finish ratings by the agreed date.
- Rating spread: where ratings cluster and where a manager looks out of line.
Decisions and follow-through
- Development plan completion: whether plans have an owner, a date and a review.
- Internal fill: how many openings were considered for internal candidates first.
- Retention actions: whether agreed actions for key roles were carried out.
- Review recurrence: whether the cycle runs again on the planned date.
Measures use agreed definitions and reporting periods.
Good to know
Scope and Service Boundaries
Your engagement defines
The roles, employee groups, locations, number of managers, deliverables and cycles included.
Requires a separate agreement
- Salary, grade and promotion pay decisions, which belong to a compensation engagement.
- Psychometric or external assessment centres.
- Training delivery and coaching programmes.
- Recruitment for roles the review identifies.
- Succession planning for named critical positions.
- Software configuration or integrations.
Ratings are made by your managers and names are decided by your leadership team. Employment decisions remain with management. Specialist review is advised for policies and formal actions that follow from the review.
Good to know
Timeline and How to Prepare
Timeline
The schedule depends on how many roles and managers are in scope, whether job descriptions exist and how many locations are involved. We confirm it after agreeing the scope.
Useful inputs
- Organisation chart and role list.
- Existing job descriptions, where they exist.
- Last appraisal forms and a sample of ratings.
- Recent promotions, transfers and resignations in key roles.
- The business plan for the next one to two years.
- Names of the managers taking part.
Individual ratings can be shared in anonymised form for the diagnostic.
Good to know
Confidentiality and Talent Information
Handled by agreement
Potential ratings, review outcomes and retention concerns are sensitive. Before work begins we agree who sees which output, how papers are shared, the confidentiality terms and retention arrangements.
Access in the design
The talent grid, risk register and development plans are designed with restricted access, and interview comments are reported as themes rather than attributed to individuals.
Good to know
Frequently asked questions
Appraisal looks backwards at what someone delivered this year. This looks at capability against a written standard for the role, which is what tells you who could do the next job. The two use different criteria and are deliberately kept separate.
Performance is what somebody delivered in the role they hold. Potential is the likelihood they could succeed in a larger or different one. Treating them as the same thing is how a business loses a good specialist and gains a struggling manager.
Smaller than most businesses expect. A framework nobody can hold in mind does not get applied. We usually settle on a short list of core behaviours plus the functional and managerial ones that genuinely differ by role family.
Their own managers, after being briefed with worked examples, with employees rating themselves alongside. We moderate ratings that are clearly out of line and facilitate the calibration, but the judgements belong to your managers and leadership.
No, and there are arguments both ways. Telling people motivates and commits you; not telling avoids expectations you may not be able to meet. We work the decision through with you and make sure whichever you choose is applied consistently.
Assessment outputs and review discussions are restricted to leadership and the relevant manager. What an individual says in an interview is not attributed. Access to the talent grid and the risk register is agreed before the cycle begins.
Related but broader. Succession works role by role on who could take named critical positions. This builds the underlying standard and the assessment that succession decisions draw on, and it also covers development, career paths and retention.
No. It establishes who is ready and what they need. What a promotion does to pay is a compensation decision, handled through the grade and band structure, and the two are deliberately kept in separate conversations.
The role mapping sessions and the assessment cycle need genuine manager time, because the output is only as good as their input. The drafting, moderation and pack preparation are ours. The calibration session is a fixed leadership commitment each cycle.
It is writing down what each role requires, assessing people against that standard and using the result to decide who is developed, moved, promoted or retained. The framework gives managers one vocabulary and the talent review gives leadership a fixed occasion to use it.
No. Where they exist we use them as a starting point, and where they do not we draft the role profile with the reporting manager. The profile is the document that sits beside the job description from then on.
Not necessarily. Many businesses start with key roles and managers and extend the framework to other role families later. The scope states which roles and employee groups are included.
This is common, which is why managers are briefed with worked examples before rating and why the calibration session tests the evidence behind each rating. We help flag patterns, but the judgement stays with your managers and leadership.
Yes. Your HR team runs the cycle with us and takes it over at handover. Where you already use a performance system, we design the framework to fit it and say where part of the method needs to sit outside it.
The role profiles can inform interview questions and selection criteria. How they are used in your hiring process is agreed with your recruitment owner.
It depends on the number of roles, managers and locations, and how quickly profiles and ratings are signed off. We confirm the sequence and dates in the proposal.
Pricing depends on the number of roles and employees in scope, the number of managers and locations, and the support required. Share your requirements and we will send a tailored proposal.
Write Down What Good Looks Like, Then Measure Against It
Build a competency standard from your own roles, assess people against it, make the calls in a calibrated room, and leave each person named with a plan and an owner.
Prefer to talk first? Call +91 80958 58589 or write to hello@gullyhr.com.
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