For Educators | Competency + Readiness
The Form Is Not The Competency.
Validation should tell you something about performance.
A signed competency form may document that an evaluation occurred.
Meaningful competency validation goes further. It asks whether the learner can demonstrate the knowledge, skill, and performance required to complete the work safely and correctly.
LOOK BEYOND THE CHECKBOX ↓
start with the purpose
Competency is demonstrated performance.
Training and competency validation serve different purposes.
Training
The learner receives instruction, practice, coaching, feedback, and opportunities to improve.
Develops performance.
Validation
Evaluates performance.
The learner demonstrates whether defined expectations can be met.
Training asks: “How do we help them learn this?”
Validation asks: “Can they demonstrate it?”
Those activities can support one another - but they shouldn’t be confused.
The validation Chain
Start with the performance. Not the form.
01
Expectation
What must the person be able to do?
02
Criteria
What would acceptable performance be like?
03
Evidence
What will allow you to observe or verify that performance?
04
Decision
Did the demonstrated performance meet the expectation?
Expectation → Criteria → Evidence → Decision
If those pieces aren’t clear, adding more initials, signature boxes, or checkmarks won’t fix the problem.
Make it observable
“Understands” is hard to watch.
This is one of the biggest practical problems with competency forms.
Criteria like:
Understands proper inspection.
Knows department policy.
Demonstrates awareness of safety.
sound lovely.
But what exactly does the evaluator observe?
Instead, competency criteria should point toward observable evidence of performance.
For example:
Less Observable
Understands instrument inspection.
MORE Observable
Inspects the device using appropriate lighting and magnification and identifies conditions requiring removal from service.
Less Observable
Knows what to do when a problem occurs.
MORE Observable
Stops the process and escalates when a condition could compromise safe processing.
If you can’t describe what success looks like, it’s hard to validate it consistently.
Follow the risk
Some performance matters more.
A competency may contain many criteria, but not every error carries the same consequence.
Missing a documentation preference isn’t necessarily equivalent to performing an action that could compromise device processing or patient safety.
Safety-critical criteria
Performance where failure could create significant risk to:
PATIENT SAFETY · DEVICE SAFETY · PROCESS INTEGRITY
A total score should never hide a critical safety failure.
Competency systems should make it clear which expectations are essential to safe performance and what happens when those expectations aren’t met.
Consistency matters
Even good criteria can fall apart when evaluators interpret them differently.
One preceptor may consider something acceptable.
Another may expect something completely different.
Another may simply initial the form because they've watched the technician do it before.
So meaningful validation requires more than a good document.
Would two evaluators recognize the same performance?
Clear criteria
Evaluators need to know what they’re looking for.
Shared expectations
Acceptable performance should not depend entirely on who happens to be observing
Direct Evidence
Validation should be based on the evidence required by the competency - not assumptions about what the learner probably knows
Consistent validation requires consistent expectations.
Know when to step back
If you have to talk them through it, what did you validate?
During training, coaching is expected.
During validation, excessive prompting can make it difficult to determine what the learner can actually perform independently.
That doesn't mean the evaluator watches silently while something unsafe happens.
It means the evaluator needs to distinguish between:
OBSERVING PERFORMANCE
and
CREATING THE PERFORMANCE THROUGH COACHING.
You can’t validate independent performance while supplying the decisions for the learner.
A gap is information
“Not Yet” Is a valid outcome.
Competency validation isn't useful if the only acceptable result is a signature.
When performance doesn't meet expectations, the response should address the specific gap that was observed.
observe the gap
↓
Identify what needs development
↓
Provide targeted support
↓
REvalidate
Remediation should respond to the performance gap - not simply repeat the entire training process.
Check the validation
What did this competency actually prove?
A technician is being validated on loading a steam sterilizer. During the observation, the evaluator repeatedly reminds the technician how to position packages, points out an incorrect item, and tells them which cycle to select.
At the end of the observation, every criterion is marked complete.
Has independent performance actually been demonstrated?
-
Not necessarily.
The technician completed the process, but some of the performance was produced with evaluator guidance.
The observation may have provided useful training evidence, but it provides weaker evidence that the technician can independently recognize and perform each required step.
THE QUESTION ISN’T ONLY: Was the task completed?
ASK: Who supplied the decisions required to complete it?
Before you sign
Before completing a competency validation, ask:
WHAT PERFORMANCE WAS EXPECTED?
Were the criteria clear?
WHAT DID I ACTUALLY OBSERVE?
Was the evidence sufficient?
HOW MUCH HELP DID I PROVIDE?
Did the learner demonstrate the performance?
WERE ANY SAFETY-CRITICAL EXPECTATIONS MISSED?
Should that change the outcome?
WHAT HAPPENS NEXT?
Validate, continue development, remediate, or revalidate?
What does your evidence actually show?
The form documents the decision.
The performance supports it.
The rie//PROCESS View
Validate performance. Not paperwork.
-
What successful performance looks like.
-
The learner actually performing it.
-
The evidence against defined expectations.
-
Appropriately to the result.
DEFINE → OBSERVE → EVALUATE → RESPOND
A competency form should support that process - not become the process.
Validation is one part of development.
Keep developing the professional
Competency vs. readiness
Competency can tell you whether someone demonstrated a defined performance. Readiness asks whether that performance supports greater independence.
For Educators
Explore more rie//PROCESS resources for competency, coaching, readiness, and education design.
rie//PROCESS works with sterile processing organizations to develop practical competency and readiness systems built around observable performance.