Desk research on existing VNFIL good practices and tools
COUNTRY – PORTUGAL
NAME OF THE PRACTICE OR TOOL – JOB PERFORMANCE OBSERVATION GRID
1. AIM
Professional certification in non-higher occupations/professions (information on professions available for certification is available at http://www.catalogo.anqep.gov.pt/Qualificacoes – for the moment around 157 professions).
2. OBJECTIVES
•To recognize and validate competences.
•To assess the performance of the tasks foreseen in a Professional Competence Standard by analyzing the candidate’s performance through his/her practical demonstration of tasks in his/her work context.
3. TARGET GROUP
- Adults (aged 18 or plus) who do not hold a professional certification.
- Adults up to 23 years old who do not hold a professional certification (but they must prove to have, at least, three years of professional certified experience to be eligible).
- Exceptionally to NEET.
4. SECTOR
The tool in itself its cross sectorial, and applicable to all the sectors of activity where there is professional certification available (for the moment 34).
The example used is from the commerce sector (see annex).
5. HOW TO USE
It consists of a grid of job performance observation, in which the candidate’s assessment is recorded during the practical demonstration of tasks in his/her work context.
The grid contains an analysis matrix that integrates the tasks per unit of competence (and their relative weigh within the unit), as well as 12 pre-defined assessment criteria which allow to assess the performance of the candidate, in the workplace, and for each one of the tasks of the different units of competence that are part of the Professional Competence Standard.
This number of criteria may vary according to the Professional Competence Standard, so, the trainer/assessor should only assess the tasks according to the criteria that are identified in the grid (the criteria that are not subject to assessment are marked with “NA”, that is, “Not Applicable”).
In this context, after prior identification of the tasks that need to be assessed using this on-the- job observation method, the trainer/assessor assesses each of the tasks based on the assessment criteria identified in the Grid.
The trainer/assessor marks with a Y (Yes) when the criterion is fulfilled or with an N (No) when the criterion is not fulfilled.
The validation of each task depends on the number of criteria that are met. A task is considered validated when at least half of its criteria have been marked with a Y (Yes).
The final assessment of a task is displayed in a 1 to 5 scale, depending on the degree of performance that the candidate is able to demonstrate:
5 – Performs the task very well
4 – Performs the task well
3 – Performs the task satisfactorily
2 – Perform the task unsatisfactorily
1 – Does not perform the task
In order for this tool to be used certain conditions need to be met:
•The employer authorizes the trainer’s presence in the workplace
•Spaces and equipment are available and adjusted to the profession/task under evaluation
•Ethical and deontological aspects (confidentiality, anonymity …) are assured
NB: This is a tool that is very convenient for professions such as the ones from the commerce sector, particularly the commercial technician/salesman/sales assistant (the one chosen for the example).
6. LINKS WITH OTHER TOOLS
All the tools used for the recognition and validation of competences are somehow linked, once they all explore and use the units of competence and the tasks identified for each unit of competence of a certain Professional Competence Standard.
An example can be the fact that the Job Performance Observation Grid explores elements and information already systematized in another tool – the Portfolio -, so there is a direct link between those 2 tools.
7. SOURCE OF INFORMATION (LINK TO A WEBSITE)
NQC – National Catalogue of Qualifications http://www.catalogo.anqep.gov.pt/Oualificacoes.
SIGO is the national integrated information system for the management of E&T offer, a platform used to register all training activity delivered within the NQC and also to manage the RVCC processes, here all tools, including the one described is available https://www.sigo.pt/Login.isp. It is only available for registered providers.
