Importance of Developing the Internal Competencies

IMPORTANCE OF DEVELOPING THE INTERNAL COMPETENCIES

The overall competitive advantages of strategy to be implemented by Omantel discussed in previous reports. This paper outlines expanding the company through competency development plans. The developments of the internal competencies are very crucial to the organization to get the strategies executed in the right way and hence leading the company to a very competitive advantage over its competitors. This factor is getting more and more importance as the government of Oman is liberating more the telecom industry. For Omantel to continue to succeed, it must know that execution of the strategies is more important than just having best ideal strategy. The correct execution and actual operations are the only factors that really yield the results in the real market arena.

There are many ways to build and strengthen the competencies of the companies. Most used approaches and the three most common steps are (1) internal development plans, (2) acquiring competent capabilities through mergers and acquisitions, and (3) assessing and developing capabilities through collaborative partnership.

With the size of Omantel, it should be applying all these steps to build and strengthen its competencies that position Omantel in a competitive advantage status.

COMPETENCY DEVELOPMENTAL PLAN

With new telecom companies entering the Omani market and with more word-wide open telecom services being offered to the local market, Omantel has to give more importance to the competency of its internal resources. As being the first telecom company in Oman that led to its monopoly for a long time, its internal resources have become fat. Hence streamlining and developing new skills need to compete in the new competitive market have to convince the top management of the high importance of developing the internal resources.

Internal Development Plans:

Firstly, the selection process has to be based on the job-related competency of the new staff. The recruitment process has to be based on the competency test and evaluation for capabilities and skills needed to do the job. Omantel should recruit managers and employees who are capable of executing the strategy as intended. Omantel should establish a culture and process in the organization that help and support successful strategy execution. Sufficient budget is needed to be allocated to execute this plan of selecting the manager and employees through professional competency job. The HR & Admin. Department would be the sole responsible section to follow up that all related.

Acquiring Capabilities through Merger and Acquisition

Technology industry is a very fast growing and also very fast changing. The management and investment risks are very high. Hence, Omantel has acquired a number of companies to support its business operations. Omantel uses its acquired and subsidiaries resources to support its strategy execution. It has also acquired a leading telecom company in Pakistan, WorldCall. Omantel should have cross exchange program of employees among these companies. This would create new idea to execute the strategy and increase the loyalty and dedication to the company's vision achievement. These acquisitions continue to help Omantel to benefit from different cultures and skills.

Assessing Capabilities through Collaborative Partnerships

Competencies and capabilities can also be developed through external sources by collaborative partnerships with other services providers. The partnerships can be through (1) outsourcing some functions, (2) creating a strategic alliance to benefit from, and (3) establishing partnership with some companies to learn from how operations better.

PERFORMANCE TRACKING SYSTEM

The information technology is becoming the driving force for all modern time activities. It plays more critical role in the companies. Omantel, like other firms, uses the information systems to develop new services, new efficient procedures and also monitor and control the operations. These all help to achieve the competitive advantage in a very competitive industry such as telecom industry.

The information system should include tracking the performance of each employee, each activity, each customer, each market segmentation, each type of services and even the whole organization. Michael Porter summarizes it in this diagram:

Omantel should be utilizing the information systems to the fullest since the low-cost strategy is very difficult to apply in telecom industry. Therefore, Omantel should focus more on differentiation by maximizing the results of the internal resources. It should manage properly various resources and allocation of such resources that support the execution of the strategy. Omantel should monitor its various performances through benchmarking with best practices standards. These include but not limited to: time needed to register new customers, time needed to response to calls,