Qualified vs. Competent - Bridging the Gap - Adam Donnelly, CRSP

Tune-in to our discussion with Adam Donnelly on the difference and importance 
between qualified versus competent as it applies to health & safety in the workplace.

Transcript

Perley Brewer (Guest)   0:59
Welcome to today's podcast. My name is Pearl Le Brewer and I will be your host. Today's podcast guest is Adam Donnelly. Adam is the area Regional Health and safety risk Superintendent for Canadian based projects for Redpath Mining. Adam joins us today with over 15 years experience in heavy mining and metals. Adam is also an employer based representative on the Worksafe and B Board of Directors.
Welcome Adam.

Donnelly, Adam   1:26
Hello Pearly, how are you this morning?

Perley Brewer (Guest)   1:28
Good. Today we want to talk to Adam about qualifies versus competency bridging the gap. And just to set the tone and and and perhaps explain what we want to talk about is this one day at a workshop. I I had a gentleman asked me the following question. He said when does health and safety start in an organisation? Does it start at orientation or?
Onboarding as as a lot of folks call it.
And my answer to him was no. It actually starts with hiring the right the right person.
If you don't get it right in hiring the right person with the right skills and the right background.
You're going to have difficulties. So today we want to talk about again qualifies versus competency, how you bridge the gap and it's a problem in a whole lot of industries today and especially today where we have in a lot of cases shortage of of of good skilled workers and it's always difficult to find that perfect match with someone that has exactly what you're looking for you're looking for.
Someone that not only qualifies for the job, but is also competent. So let's start with you, Adam.
What is the difference between qualified versus competent?

Donnelly, Adam   2:49
First and foremost, Pearlie thank you for having me on your show. I believe this is the third time I've I've been a guest speaker and I'm honoured to be speaking with you fine folks today it is. You know, we're going to bridge. Let's break down the gap. First and foremost, you know, what does the terms qualified and competent mean and what we need to understand as recruitment and selection as human resource professionals, but also as.
Operations management, they both relate to someone's ability to perform a task or job.
But they focus on different aspects of that ability. And for an example, qualifications, they often refer to having the necessary education, the necessary certifications, training or credentials required for a particular role or task that you are applying for. Being qualified means meeting those formal requirements, whether that's provincial or regulatory.
Standards set by an organisation or an industry or a regulatory body.
It often indicates that a person has the right qualifications to suit that role, pearly for being an example, they have the degree, they have the certificate, they have the designation, or they have the proper licencing in relation to the province that they're working in to do that job. Qualifications is often also seen as a prerequisite for a roller task, but it doesn't necessarily reflect a person's actual ability to perform.
Form effectively in that role. Now this is where we'll have a little chat early in terms of competency.
Competency refers to the ability to perform the tasks or duties effectively and efficiently in real world situations without.
Supervisor presence. It means that that individual OK is competent by the means that the person has the adequate skill, knowledge and experience.
Necessary to perform a job or a task safely and successfully with minimal supervision.
Competency goes far beyond meeting the formal requirements. It involves applying what you've learned and demonstrated in your life in your lifetime, in your life achievement in real time, and in a snapshot in time throughout the many years of you performing that job. Competence is also often associated with practical performance.
And can be developed through experience and ongoing development. So in a nutshell, in short, Pearly qualification shows that you are eligible to do something, while competence illustrates that you can do it very well in the field without minimal supervision and with the utmost safety. At the heart of what they do.
If that makes any sense.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   5:53
So how important is it?
In the hiring process for the folks that actually are going to be supervisor overseeing the work, that's to be done.
To have a good relationship and to have a good discussion with the folks in HR to ensure that they not only understand it, but they're on board for helping you do it.

Donnelly, Adam   6:19
Well, that's a that's a great question too pearly and and often our a human resource subject matter experts. They don't just screen resumes, they definitely do a deep dive. They look at resumes, they look at past work experience. Some employers do see pic criminal background cheques. Some employers also do credit cheques and they do what's called character reference cheques. But they also do.
You know, work related cheques and should I say character reference.
And also direct reporting reference cheques.
So why work experience? I would say is so crucial in developing competency. It's for a new a new a new plethora of reasons. First and foremost, the practical application of knowledge.
You know, in academic settings people learn theoretical concepts, but work experience allows individuals to actually apply those concepts in a snapshot in time. In real world situations.
Problem solving and critical thinking for an example in the workplace, individuals are often faced with challenges and unexpected situations. Work experience helps people develop problem solving skills, learning to adapt and think critically in ways that potentially the textbooks and those beautiful classrooms that we sit in. It simply cannot replace.
I must, I believe in education. Pearly, I know it's a bill. It's the founding blocks. But I know that.
It cannot. The classroom will never replace or replicate what we take out of the field.
Building confidence is another great experience. Great example.
Experience builds confidence pearly, but the more you perform a task and overcome challenges in the workplace, the more confident you become in your abilities. If this is almost a form of self assurance and it's essential for taking on more complex responsibilities and contributing meaningly to the organisation.
You know what? Understanding the organisational context in a job setting, individuals learn not only about their specific role, but also about the broader organisation, structure, culture and the workflow, and that relates back to what you said, Pearly about. Where does safety start in an organisation? It starts most definitely on the interview process.
It starts by our fantastic human resource team outlining who we are as a company.
What are guidelines and philosophies for success here and what we believe in in order in terms of my company would be Redpath, somebody else's company could be, you know, NB Power, but it's what their key cardinal rules, guidelines and philosophies for success are, and this understands the big picture, which is crucial for effective collaboration and achieving results.
Within that team member or that organisation that you are potentially looking at high?

Perley Brewer (Guest)   9:27
Now I'm gonna put you on the spot here from the point of view of the interview process.
Can you think of an example that perhaps you've been involved with that?
You and how you used the interview to help you determine fuel experience, how how you played it out, how you would go about if you were recommending today to someone, how would you go about to suggest to them approaches that they might use to determine?

Donnelly, Adam   9:48
Yeah.
Sure.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   10:04
Field experience. Do they have?

Donnelly, Adam   10:07
Sure. So let's be honest, that's a group. And by the way, pearly, such a great question because I know for a fact that, OK, I look at their, first and foremost, I look at their years experience, I want to see on their resume or on their CV where have they worked and also for myself with who does. I do have a human resource background and I have a diploma in many human resource designations. So what I've been taught was.
I need to look at their longevity of work. I like to look at the organisations that they work for. Also, I like to look at the look at the length of time Pearly.
I would be very hesitant and to tell you that if you only work three months, four months, five months and that seems to be the trend of your resume, it does bring questions up to the recruiter in terms of what your what, maybe what your commitment is or also what? Why is that right? Was it contract end 'cause we all understand that in contract mining it's very transient and we understand.
That contracts can end quickly, but what I look at, what I look at is to be honest.
How long the individual has been working in that field or or craft? How long on average is their job and I look for key points. Oh great. I look at the references. I know Pearly Brewer, I know that I trust his character and it says here that this individual has worked for Pearly Brewer as a direct report.
It's hard to determine the visibility felt leadership. It's a buzzword in safety, right? It refers to a leadership approach focused on ensuring that employees feel safe.
Value and supported while also making leadership presence known in a way that promotes trust and engagement. But how do you get visibility? Felt leadership when you're looking at a resume, you're relying on somebody else's visibility. Felt leadership of that individual. So essentially you're trying to break down the CV in the resume and you're looking for credible organisations that potentially even yourself work for.
Where you may be able to make a call on that individual's behalf.
Especially for a character reference of the choosing that those employees have provided, right?
Because the truth is, I want to throw something else.
I often see and by the way pearlie. These are just my views, right? I'm not speaking for for all of Redpath, and all of NB Power and all of work safe, I'm just giving my my humble labelling opinion of of of my experience in in the past 16 years.
What I will say is that when I look at an individual that graduated from a high school in 2003.
And you know, he he has four degrees.
Numerous designations, and lo and behold, it's only 2007, and I see that individual with one job.
I do sometimes I don't want to say I'm stereotypical, but I often say to myself he is very qualified. I go back to qualified. I don't know if I can guarantee his 18 months in the field as competence.
I need to verify that confident that confidence through my own visibility or through somebody that I trust that has directly reported for that gentleman and says, you know what, he is a fantastic server. He hits the ground running, he's motivated, he's passionate and he knows the systems to which they operate.
Seeing a bunch of.
And I'm trying to be very I want to be diplomatic about this pearly seeing.
Loads of designations and AB, CS and EFGS besides someone's name. It's a great thing. I do believe it. It proves qualifications. It's I need to prove competence. Sometimes in the field and for other people's advocating on behalf of those employees because of the work that they did for that it for that organisation, if that makes any sense.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   14:23
Now a a couple things I want to talk about here.
When we talk about determining competence.
Folks have been known not to be necessarily the most honest when they put a resume together.
IE an awful lot of people fabricate information they put in their resume that presents a challenge. The second challenge, what if you don't know the person that the individual has indicated they want a reference check from?

Donnelly, Adam   14:39
OK.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   14:56
Again, some people will give good, honest reference cheques. Some people will not.
How do you deal with those two issues?

Donnelly, Adam   15:05
Well, the first, let me try your first question. So your first question Pearly was that.
If individuals are elaborating on their resume, if I correct me if I'm wrong, if you find there's a little bit of a fluff.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   15:16
That's that's. Yeah. Yeah. That's putting it up lately, yes.

Donnelly, Adam   15:20
Well, you know what? In in general, here's what I will say. I think a lot of resumes do that. And you know what? I think we try to, you know, we use, we use buzzwords and we try to boast our skill sets. But at the end of the day, that type of those type of resumes put her this way in the interview process, which nowadays there's a panel interview, there's often a three stage interview, right, I know myself. I'm very, very.
More pronounced. I hold two to three different interviews when I get interviewed from an executive leadership team.
And I think the reason for that, Pearly is because a it gives you a, it gives other people a chance to feel out your personality, to see if what you're saying is genuine and also on the other hand, those references that, let's say, they put three to four references on their resume, there is a good chance, especially in the world of mining, believe it or not, we are such a large but small.
Organisation. Pearly. We I would. I would be hard pressed if I went to any mine in Canada.
If I didn't know at least one person on that mine, it's that we're such. We're such a close knit group, but the answer is you would you would call those references. Somebody hopefully are on your recruitment and selection team would have an idea. Oh, I know that person. I worked for them when it was, you know, valet extra so on so forth. I trust that person because a lot of the times too.
This whole big thing on safety, health, Wellness and risk, and even recruitment.
It's all about trust. In the end, Pearly, we want it. We want it, we we want to make sure that just because we don't know somebody that's on that on that reference check, we still want to give the benefit of the doubt to our interviewee and we want to make sure, especially if they interviewed well, I mean right when they when people interview well and they show passion and they have that qualifications and you know they have some some great experience.
We're almost excited for them, right. So we want to go through that final process.
Your second question Pearly, what? Say that again? That was surrounding the.
Was it? Can you repeat the second, Sir? Sorry about that.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   17:35
Well the I guess the two questions you've answered really both of them. The first one was around people being dishonest in regards to actually the factual information on the resume. There's been a fair bit of research done in that regards. And then the second one you just answered from the point of view of you know, what, if you don't necessarily know the person or or or one or two names that they have put on the resume?

Donnelly, Adam   17:44
Yeah.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   18:01
How do you go about to verify?
Their competence.

Donnelly, Adam   18:05
Yeah, well, you would. You would definitely still contact the you would contact the character reference, see see how they speak and how they and and if their duties align with what the interviewer said, right and if his position or her position entitled, you know, if it'll if it aligns right. But the the other part is is the truth is in in mining I've experienced that people do place sometimes.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   18:09
Yeah.
Mm hmm.

Donnelly, Adam   18:30
That they work for a certain company.
And potentially they just aren't working there anymore, so they might have.
Maybe indulge a little bit. It says they work from 2017 to 2021. Well, lo and behold, we've been there from 2017 to 221 and we don't remember that gentleman's name. So I think that what happens is you're catching a gap within their CV and they're a little embarrassed about that gap. Right. Pearly, I I think that they may see it as a weakness when often it might be a valuable, valuable answer. I know females that go on maternity leave.
It's, it's that that's not AI, don't at that as a gap. I looked that as a Call of Duty.
You know a privilege. So I think that's some of the challenges we do receive in not only mining in general in industry, right. They're embarrassed about that gap. So they essentially.
May just try to get by by putting it to the present day and often it may get caught, but on behalf of the recruiter which could show you know a little bit of dishonesty right off the right off the huff.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   19:42
So some things are pretty easy to determine in an interview, but how do you go about in your case to determine field experience at an interview? You're sitting in an interview room. Obviously it's, you know, a generic room. How do you go about it when you're questioning someone relative to their field experience? How do how do you, how do you sort of dig into that?

Donnelly, Adam   20:07
Yeah. And I think what you have is you have different subject matter experts that are in the room. So a good example if somebody's resume in mining is tailored to high speed rapid development, you know we would have a Superintendent in the room or should I say on that telephone that is asking questions about ground support and super swell X and split sets and MD bolts and cable bolts. And they're just questioning around their their knowledge and experience around working.
One Mclean's and working as a on split fee jumbos. So you have all these subject matter experts in the room. If it was a shaft sinking and refurbishment shaft person, not shaft men but a shaft person, right. We are an equal opportunity employer by whole we have shaft females we have shaft men but at the end of the day you would have that subject matter expert in the room.
Helping to conduct the interview and asking questions tailored towards OK are you cleaning catch pits in a in a shaft sinking job? What type of concrete were you pouring? Were you breaking a curb? What was the MPA strength of that Shock Creek? Were you using steel fibre and I think a lot of those.
Questions that get brought out, I think you you tend to find out based off their answers how much experience they have with that special craft in mining because mining is one word, pearly. But there's so many facets and so many different duties to mining the Common Core system is made-up of over 90 some individual modules. There's not one miner that I know.
That says I've done it all, it it it's a it's a lifetime achievement that you continue to move through the processes, but.
I think the answer in simplified form is have the right people in the room have the right subject, subject matter experts in the room, especially if you're interviewing a lead electrician that's working on high voltage 4165 KV cable, it would be very advantageous for us as an organisation to ensure that some of those questions were directed from the working side of those electricians and I'm happy to say that.
At Redpath, that is exactly what they do, Redpath when they do the interview, the interview selection, they involve the human resource department and many different subject matter experts.
In line with the with the interviewee and the position at hand.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   22:43
Now my next question, I had a senior executive at one of my sessions one day asking me this question. I'm doing an interview of an individual for a position and the individual says, look, I've worked in this area, the area that you're interviewing me for for the last 25 years.

Donnelly, Adam   23:03
Mm hmm mm hmm.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   23:04
I've been there. I've done this kind of work before and the executive was asking me, can I accept that person's word that in fact, yes, they have been doing that?
And that qualifies him. And that means that they actually do an.
Are competent.
Can I do that? Can I accept that?

Donnelly, Adam   23:23
Yeah.
So I'm going to. I just want you to repeat a bit. I. So I guess what you're sounding like is you get a verbal handshake, you get a resume, of course, and you get a verbal handshake that this individual has been doing that form of work for 30 years for 25 years. Sure.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   23:32
Yeah, yeah.
Yep.

Donnelly, Adam   23:43
Sure. I'll tell you what, the truth.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   23:45
So can you can you accept it?

Donnelly, Adam   23:47
We can accept it, however, we have to perform on site in house skill competency verifications before that individual goes to work. Let's call it what it is, Pearly in the minds back in the day, I know people that had that got out at grade nine got out at grade 10 and they are fantastic miners. And let me tell you some of the most intelligent people that I have ever met in my life.
Does not have for. Does not have alphabet soup beside their name. They are fantastic miners and that's what they know.
But here's the difference we we cannot do golden handshakes as a proof of competency when that individual comes into our mindsight and he says he's been running the ad cat ad 45 hall truck for 35 years in an open pit. Our job as supervisors in, in terms of due diligence is to do model specific training with that individual that falls under.
Pre op cheques circle cheques, walk arounds, function tests, break tests.
And a skill competency verification and a ride along with that individual. After we do all of that, those field practical components, we may even do some theoretical training. Just you know, we understand that he's maybe, maybe that gentleman is 58 years old and we we we most definitely believe him, but we're going to go over some of the safety features of that piece of equipment that he's running.
And yes, lo and behold, after that, after we verify his references after we sign him off in house.
If we are in the province of Ontario, that individual will get the provincially regulated module for that piece of equipment that he has, quote, unquote, the 25 years experience on. So yes, there it's a yes with a grey area, pearly, we wouldn't just take them, shake his hand and go put them onto a haul truck because quite frankly, we don't want any reputational risks to red path and we practise active genuine care with our employees.
They're at the we don't have an ore body. Red path builds minds and we get to the ore bodies. Our ore bodies is our lovely people, the many women and men that work for our organisation. That's our ore body. So we take care of them. The answer to your question, simplest simplified is yes with the proper training within the onboarding package. Does that make sense Pearly?

Perley Brewer (Guest)   26:23
Yeah, it sure does. And that's basically what I explained to the individual that asked me the question. And I think in the end as as we talked, he started to better understand that the process well, the process you and I have talked about here today. So how important is understanding these terms and getting it right in the hiring process. What happens if you don't?

Donnelly, Adam   26:46
Well, it's a great bra. It's a great question. I mean, you know, one one thing about I find as as the world is evolving, human resources is is truly a valued asset to us, to us on the site level, right, they guide us and they mentor us on the proper process of recruiting. And what we have to remember once again I want to re let's circle back to qualified versus competent people. The key differences is first and foremost.
Scope qualifications is about meeting formal criteria.
That's the education and the certificates. While competence is about performing well and effectively in the role in that snapshot in time measurement qualifications are typically verified through exams, courses or assessments. While competence is often measured through performance or results on that job, what those performance metrics were, you know, process efficiency, time studies for an exam.
But then development a person can be qualified, but may still need to gain experience. Or, as in the mining as we like to call it, seek time.
Or to develop specific skills to become confident.
Competence usually improves over time with practise and experience and mentorship and guidance. And I always say we don't we, you know, ultimately the pressure to perform for those employees, the pressure shouldn't be on you pearly as a haul truck operator.
The pressure should be on us because we want to make sure that we're continually continuingly, you know, raising your skill set and ensuring to give you confidence, because my true belief is that as you gain experience, you gain confidence and confidence can equal competence. And you know what? Lastly, I will end by saying training is performance based.
It's never time based, so when we talk about this whole big facet of training, we need to understand folks.
We don't how how many people on this call, and I hope they're listening and I know this is a fact. Hey, can you sign off Pearly today? How long do you need them for? That's the first question that we're often getting in our safety. Probably. How long do you need them for? The truth is, is that we don't know how long we need them for because we have to assess his skill sets. Now, I promise you, we are going to get him to the level of a safe and competent operator. That's our job. The pressure isn't on him.
But I don't have a time frame for Pearly.
And it's often performance based, it's it's not tick inflict, it's not rubber stamped. And if we don't get to sign EM off today, lo and behold, we will continue to work with Pearly tomorrow until we're at a safe, safe understanding that this gentleman can then be released into the field with minimal equipment damage, minimal process interruption, and have confidence that he knows or she knows how to operate that piece of equipment.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   29:59
So my last question and and you partially answered it from the point of view of a company like yours or or really any company in the province?
You you put out a call, you advertise for a person for a certain position.
Folks are telling me generally across the board that it it can be very difficult to find someone who is competent. Yeah, you might find people that on on paper qualification wise they they seem to have it. But.
You're very concerned about competency. So what do you do if you cannot find during the interview process?
An individual that technically meets all your requirements and is not only qualified, but competent. What do you do then? How do you handle that particular scenario? And you partially answered it, but just maybe if you could expand on.

Donnelly, Adam   30:48
Yeah. Well, I mean, I'll tell you the red path does a great job putting a, a, a, a global marketing team together in terms of having expressions of interest. If you were on Google right now for an example, it's going to be a large plethora of our marketing team and our recruitment and selection team at Corporate North Bay. And they put on lots of different positions that we're looking for. And I realise what you're saying, what you're saying is, what if?
You know the skill sets just we don't have maybe a lot of the miners are working. That has happened in our past where there's so many miners working.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   31:23
Yep.

Donnelly, Adam   31:24
It becomes a challenge gaining those miners. I what? I have seen Redpath do in the past is I've seen them do.
Recruitment and selection days, they've actually went around different parts of the province. Sudbury for an example, they've done Bathurst here at Saint John. They've done ccnd, they actually hold recruitment and selectance selection safety days and they're trying to, you know, advocate that we that we need you, we want these individuals.
At the end of the day, mining, quite frankly, it's competitive, there's no doubt a lot of great mining contractors out there right now, right. And in Redpath, we we feel we treat them with very much respect. They're they're top tier mining organisations that often perform some of the same services that we do. I think the difference with us is we've been around since 1962.
We do have a tried, tested and true.
Phenomenal safety management programme. We always try to invest in our people. I can tell you personally pearlie that Redpath invests in our people, even within the the third party training. I call it transferable skills. You won't just leave with two years experience, you're going to leave with transferable skills. That's the train, the trainer, the, the, the, the supervisory Common Core. If you're adopted into that programme.
Standard first aid.
I'm working at heights fall confined space. We try to give people transferable skills because, quite frankly, treat people well enough so they want to stay train people well enough so they stay but treat them well enough as well. So maybe if they want to leave they could we. We want to make sure that we're investing in our people. So in those times when, yes.
It's becoming pretty nip and tuck and it's challenging getting.
You know, finding the right candidates, the truth is we just continue to up our game. I believe we continue to reach out to our networks, we our recruitment team puts on fantastic, fantastic marketing, talent acquisition plans and they host them in different regions of Canada, so.
That would be. That would be all I could say around that.
But at the end of the day, definitely lots of jobs on red path, mining careers, expressions of interest right now, right? I I think mining kind of goes into booms, right, they.
You know when, when, when we gain more projects, we definitely need our people power so.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   34:10
But I think I also hear you saying from a point of view that if you hired two people, in essence, that technically may be doing the same job, the path that they're going to be put on the to learn and develop could be very different as well depending on their background.

Donnelly, Adam   34:29
It could be. I'm very well. So I mean it for an example. You know, the people that are hired, one person can be hired as a raise more operator. Another person could be hired as a shot creep sprayer. Another person could be hired as an alamac miner. So literally the many different facets. And I can I can tell you pearly many different facets. Somebody could be hired as a senior designer while another person could be hired as a split fee. Jumbo bouleter.
There's a numerous amount of different job scopes in mining.
Mining is turning into more mechanised I think we used to think of mining pearly as a lot, you know, a lot of rough and tough and and a lot of non mechanised heavy drills right, right, heavy body mechanics moving heavy equipment. But the truth is there's a shift in mining now there it's becoming automated and it's becoming mechanised to have less wear and tear on our bodies and to ensure that our posture and our ergonomics are.
Replaced 20 years down the road versus now.

Perley Brewer (Guest)   35:38
So a lot of good takeaways from our discussion today.
Qualifies versus competent.
Bridging the gap.
Was really the focus of our of our discussion. It's not as easy as it sounds. There's a lot of parts to it as as you've talked about, Adam, I'd like to thank you very much for joining us on today's podcast.
It's an important topic in all industries, not just mining. Obviously, mining is is very dear to you, but I know we look across the province, whether it's in construction, manufacturing, whatever.
Certainly these are very relevant topics for the our listeners today. Thank you very much for listening and stay safe. We will see you next week.