An internal modeling of competency, based on a systemic approach, with socio-technical systems management in view

Human-centered industrial engineering is probably the major challenge that both the industrial and academic communities have to take up. This interdisciplinary problem relies on organizational, technological, economic and human issues. Sociotechnical systems management has to define an appropriate organization to create synergy between competencies, processes, products and technologies, at different levels within the company (individual, group, company) or between companies. Competency and knowledge are becoming key notions that need to be integrated in systems management engineering. The point is that there exists no competency model, relevant to specify coherent socio-technical systems management. This paper contributes to clarify the notion of competency and presents a global cognitive model of competency working based on both a systemic approach and an action theory. This model represents the major cognitive resources and processes along with their interactions, according to an internal point of view of competency. The aims of this modeling are to understand how a complex system, i.e. competency, works and to focus on the articulation between knowledge and competency. An extension of this model concerns competency dynamics and will be published later. The validation of this model is achieved in the framework of a research contract with a French car enterprise, in a specific field of car engineering processes. The final aims of our research works are about the design of a management device of the engineering competency system.