Competency-based management in the brazilian public service

foundations, methodologies and impacts for public administration and civil servants

Abstract

Brazilian Public Administration has, in recent decades, sought people management models capable of overcoming the limits of traditional bureaucratic models, marked by normative rigidity and by a focus on the formal control of positions and careers. Against this backdrop, competency-based management emerges as an alternative aimed at making better use of human potential, improving institutional performance, and strengthening the State's capacity to respond to social demands. This article aims to review, in a narrative manner, the theoretical foundations of competency-based management, its historical evolution, its regulatory trajectory in the Brazilian federal public service – from the creation of the National Personnel Development Policy in 2006 to its 2019 reformulation –, the implementation methodologies described in the literature, and the effects associated with it. The research is bibliographic, qualitative and exploratory-descriptive in nature, developed from books, scientific articles and regulatory documents selected from academic databases and official repositories. The results indicate that the model is legally feasible in the public service, provided the particularities of the statutory regime and of competitive public examinations are observed, and that its implementation follows a path structured around strategic planning, competency mapping, performance evaluation and continuing training. It is concluded that, despite being widely disseminated in the descriptive literature, the effectiveness of the model still lacks robust empirical evidence, which recommends caution in generalizing its impacts and points to the need for future research based on longitudinal data.