Development and Initial Validity Evidence of a Scale on Competency-Based Management

Abstract

This manuscript reports the development stages and initial validity evidence for a competency-based management scale. Two studies were conducted: one focused on scale development and the other on investigating validity evidence. In Study 1, six leaders from a public organization were interviewed; document analysis and content analysis by 14 expert judges were conducted, resulting in a preliminary version of the scale with 20 items. In Study 2, to obtain evidence based on internal structure and internal consistency, 1,041 workers from different sectors participated through an online survey and were randomly divided for exploratory (n = 521) and confirmatory (n = 520) factor analyses. The final model presented a bifactorial structure with 14 items distributed across the factors “structure/processes” and “effectiveness,” and satisfactory fit indices. The scale is considered promising for research on competency-based management in the public sector, and further studies are recommended to expand the validity evidence.