The Sustainably Competent Professional

Competent professionals

A competence: What is it, really? Or, to put it another way, what is a competent professional? Quite a few books have been written about these two questions: highly complex theories - now and then based on thorough scientific studies. But it does not have to be that difficult. Actually, it is very simple:

A competent professional is someone you will ask to do a job for you again.

This is because they recently did it in a way you liked. Have a look at a concrete example.

The competent plumber
Imagine a dramatic situation in your own house. A small catastrophe. An imaginary situation, by the way, hopefully not a real one. What has happened? Your son, three years old, has – just for fun – been hanging on the bathroom sink, which has completely broken off the wall and is now lying on the floor. Your son is all right, but the bathroom less so. The water pipe has shattered into pieces, and now you have a beautiful “fountain” right where you always dreamed of not having one. Water is gushing out! It has already flooded the bathroom floor and the landing and is starting to run down the stairs like a waterfall. The hall and living room are about to turn into a sea. What about you – what do you do? You can think of just one thing to do: panic!

“Call the plumber…” you sigh, and so you do. Later, the plumber arrives. So now, what do you expect he – if your plumber perhaps is a male - will do, as a competent professional?

The first thing he does is eliminate the immediate cause of the problem, making sure that it does not get any worse. That is to say: He needs to find the main water supply line and turn the shut-off valve handle. And he definitely should not ask you where this handle is, for you are panicking right now. All of a sudden, you don’t know anything anymore. So, the good man has to know, all on his own, where he has the biggest chance of finding the shut-off valve: in this case, downstairs under the doormat by the front door, right? Without hesitation, he lifts the mat, removes the wooden panel, and shuts off the main water line. Well, that is something.

The second thing he does is calm you down so that you can contribute something useful. So, he starts talking to you, telling you things like: “Look, it isn’t really so bad. It’s clean water after all. We will fix it. Now, if you could get me a couple of buckets and some towels, I will…” et cetera. It is reassuring when he does that. Your mind clears a little, and your sense returns.

Only after this has been done, the plumber will go upstairs, equipped with the necessary tools, where he will start doing the things you would expect primarily from a person like him. So, he will “plumb,” or whatever it may accurately be called, and start repairing the water pipe and replace the sink.

What the plumber actually did

Someone who acts in such a calm, competent way is definitely a professional. And, he did much more than just the technical stuff you might associate first when you think of his profession. In his first act in this horrible situation, his role was primarily that of a disaster fighter. His action, his achievement, was to shut off the main water line. In doing this, he made use of his architectural insight regarding how houses in your country are usually constructed. At that moment, the tool he used was his architectural insight. In his second achievement, calming you down and giving you some directions, he acted in a very different role, that of an aid worker. The tool he used this time was his knowledge of people.

Only in his third role, he performed as a technician when he started repairing. For this he probably used tools such as pipe wrenches and a soldering torch.

Context, roles, achievement, and tools
Context, roles, achievement, and tools – these together define competences. Here is a brief overview.

Context: Inundation in a bathroom

Role #1:                Disaster fighter
Achievement:        Find main water line and turn it off
Tool:                        Architectural insight

Role #2:                  Aid worker
Achievement:        Calm people down, give directions
Tool:                      Knowledge of people

Role #3:                  Technician
Achievement:        Repair broken sink
Tools:                      Pipe wrenches, soldering torch, etc.

In the bathroom catastrophe scenario, the plumber established three different competences, and at the right moment, he shifted fluently from one role to another. This wonderful example – it is almost a shame it did not really happen – provides answers for the two questions this section started with.

A competence is the ability to deliver, in a given context, in a certain role, solid achievements by making use of appropriate
tools.

A competent professional is someone who is able, in a range of contexts, to shift flexibly between the various roles that
are demanded, and who delivers solid achievements in each of them, using cleverly selected tools.

A person who has proved being able to do that – that is someone you will ask to do a job for you again.

Sustainably competent professionals

Usually, solutions to sustainability issues are complicated, because the systems are complex themselves. Therefore, we need a lot of competent professionals to wotk together in order to find those solutions and make them work.

At present, a number of companies – large ones and small ones – are contributing intensively to sustainable development, mainly because, by coincidence, they are managed by people who have decided to do so. The same is true for governments of countries. Some have a genuine sustainability policy, but only until the next election brings in another government. In other words, whether a company or a country strives to operate sustainably depends on who happens to be in the executive position, i.e. ultimately by coincidence.

However, sustainable development is far too essential to leave it up to chance. In order for it to become institutionalized, we need everybody, each professional, in lower and higher positions, in whatever enterprise, government, educational institution, or societal organization.

Sustainably competent professionals are what our society needs - in huge quantities, in all kinds of professions, and across every thinkable sector: industry, service, finance, government, healthcare, education, farming, fishing, and forestry. We need them in multinational companies, small and medium enterprises (SMEs), family-owned businesses, commercial companies, NGOs, and informal associations.

A person can be a sustainably competent professional at every level within an organization, regardless of whether they are a CEO or a CFO, a middle manager, a specialist, a salesperson, or an assembly line worker.

Every professional can contribute to sustainable development.

RESFIA+D was developed, with the purpose of defining and assessing professional competences for sustainable development.

> See also: the theoretical backgrounds of RESFIA+D.