Competence in professional practice: A practice theory analysis of police and doctors

Conceptual ambiguities surrounding professional competence

In the research literature within the domains of HR and professional learning, the concept of professional competence is contested and has been used in a variety of different ways (Delamare le Deist and Winterton, 2005). With the wealth of available definitions, several attempts at typologies of competence have been offered. Following Håland and Tjora (2006), Sandberg and Pinnington (2009), Velde (1999) and Winterton et al. (2006), theoretical conceptualizations of individual competence can be broadly identified as either entity-based (rationalistic, positivist) or interpretative-relational (pragmatic, constructionist, phenomenological).

Within literature building on an entity-based paradigm, a dominant way to denote competence is through what can be referred to as an employee-oriented ‘attribute view’ (Gonczi and Hager, 2010; Mulder et al., 2007). From this frame of reference, competences can be defined as individual resources that include motives, traits, skills, aspects of self-image or bodies of knowledge that are applied during work and that generate a certain level of performance. A longstanding discussion has regarded if and how certain aspects of individual competence can be viewed as transferrable between domains and, hence, generic in nature (Linstead, 1993). Meta-competencies that have been put forth as generic are, for instance, critical thinking, problem solving, communication skills and so forth. (Parry, 1998; see also Garavan and McGuire, 2001, for an overview). These characteristics are, in essence, viewed as underlying characteristics of individuals that are transferable, as they are independent of social and task environments (Winterton et al., 2006).

In contrast to entity-based perspectives on professional competence, the interpretative-relational paradigm includes recent relational and processual perspectives based in interpretative, pragmatic and constructionist theories wherein professional competence is defined as an unstable and open-ended construct (Kosmala, 2013). Velde (1999), for instance, conceptualize competence as the relation between an individual and his/her context rather something that represents either end of a scale. From this viewpoint, concepts such as discursive competence (Rouleau and Balogun, 2011), holistic competence (Beckett, 2008) and competence as a way of being (Sandberg, 2000; Sandberg and Pinnington, 2009) have been promoted as paths forward from the overly myopic definitions of competence that underemphasize the impact of experience, understanding, action, sensemaking and the role of practice in the definition of the competent professional. One example of a pragmatically inspired view on professional competence is offered by Ellström and Kock (2008), who define action in specific contexts as the main determinant of competence. With the notion of ‘competence-in-use’, the authors promote an ‘interactive’ view (see also Ellström, 1997) on competence as a construct that contrasts both task and attribute perspectives:

[C]ompetence is neither primarily an attribute of an individual (or a collective), nor primarily an attribute of the job. Rather, the focus is on the interaction between the individual and the job, and on the competence that is actually used by the individual in performing the job. (Ellström and Kock, 2008: 7)

The presented view thus focuses on competence as a capacity; namely ‘the capacity of an individual (or a collective) to successfully (according to certain formal or informal criteria, set by oneself or by somebody else) handle certain situations or complete a certain task or job’ (Ellström and Kock, 2008: 6).

Interpretative-relational definitions of competence can be defined through the interaction of an individual with his/her context. However, this definition in itself is not very useful as a descriptor of, say, a competent professional, unless one possesses additional knowledge about the practice in question. In this sense, this definition of competence bears resemblance to evolutionary theories (survival of the fittest), where ‘fitness’ is not an innate quality of an organism nor is it determined solely by the habituated environment. We argue that it is the task of additional empirical research to describe the characteristics of relevant practices wherein assessments of competence are made. Ellström and Kock’s definition above provides several potential research questions, including: ‘what are the certain formal or informal criteria applicable in this particular context?’ and ‘are there ways of establishing organizing principles that are shared between contexts, thus laying the groundwork for a more general description of ‘the competent professional’? In the following section, we outline a practice theory approach for researching professional competence that contributes to the interpretative-relational outlook on competence.

Practice and action: Competence as inferred ability

Viewing human activities as ‘practice’ and observing the development of competence as ‘participation in practice’ has increasingly been seen as a fruitful perspective through which to conduct social inquiry (Boud and Hager, 2012; Sandberg and Tsoukas, 2011; Schatzki, 2005; Schatzki et al., 2001). Practice as a research object is difficult to access on account of the complexity of the elements that constitute daily practice and praxis (Campbell-Hunt, 2007). We engage in what might be termed a ‘translation effort’ (Chudzikowski and Mayrhofer, 2011: 31) in order to make a general theory of practice applicable to concrete, empirical research. In the following, we attempt to ‘translate’ Schatzki’s practice theory into concepts underpinning empirical analysis of competence in professional practices.

Schatzki (2005) argues that practice theories are ‘site ontologies’, taking as their starting point neither individual nor structure, but rather activity. The concept of practice describes a manifold of activity, a ‘nexus of doings and sayings’ (Schatzki, 1997: 3). In Schatzki’s theory, a practice is defined as an organized, open-ended, spatial–temporal manifold of actions (e.g. cooking, farming, policing, doctoring). The organization of actions is comprised of: (i) understandings of how to do things; (ii) rules and (iii) a teleoaffective structure. ‘Teleo-’ signifies that the actions are goal-oriented; ‘-affective’ indicates that these actions matter to humans and that humans are invested in them. Combined, these three theoretical constructs describe a ‘practical intelligibility’, meaning that people do what ‘makes sense’ to them. Any professional practitioner, in Schatzki’s line of thinking, acts with practical intelligibility as he/she draws on past meaning, rules and future goals when acting. However, a competent professional can be argued to do so in ways that are recognized and favoured (by self, peers, superiors, interest groups, patients, the public or other relevant evaluators) as correct. Thus, there is also a dimension of shared, normative views on what is practically intelligible. This normativity is the essence of the concept of teleoaffective structure:

Taking teleology and affectivity as a clue, the third dimension of the organization of a practice can be specified as a normative ‘teleoaffective structure’, a range of acceptable or correct ends, acceptable or correct tasks to carry out for these ends, acceptable or correct beliefs (etc.) given which specific tasks are carried out for the sake of these ends, and even acceptable or correct emotion out of which to do so … So practices establish social order, first, because they help mold the practical intelligibility that governs their practitioners’ actions and thereby help determine which arrangements people bring about. (Schatzki, 2001: 53–54)

In our view, Schatzki’s theory on this point does have room for an analysis of ‘social order’ within practices. It is reasonable to assume that activity is not only either ‘correct’ or ‘incorrect’. Instead, activities are on a continuum of approval and disapproval; their position thereupon is determined through various evaluations made by the individuals carrying out the practice (the ‘carriers of practice’ in Schatzki’s terminology). In the present study, we define ‘evaluations of competence’ as inferences of suitable activity that define a given individual’s ability to carry out actions in a given professional practice. Competence is, then, a question of perceived contextual suitability: being a competent professional is being able to anticipate what is regarded as a good and favourable activity in a certain practice and to act accordingly. Equally, a highly competent or excellent individual can, from this perspective, be said to have a well-developed sense of what actions qualify as correct, suitable and approved. As a result, we arrive at the following operational definition of professional competence: the inferred potential for desirable activity within a professional practice. This definition also entails that desirability of any activity is a continuum, where excellence is relationally constructed against what is merely approved or suitable.

To expand upon and operationalize the definition presented above, professional competence can be viewed as comprised of qualities and symbols (Lindberg, 2013). A symbol is defined as the concrete manifestation in practice (an activity), from which qualities are inferred through evaluations of competence. ‘Qualities’ are, in a methodological sense, more of a first-order than a second-order construction (Schütz, 1953), that is, they reflect how respondents talk about competence instead of what we, in this study, define as competence. In normal conversation, talk about competent co-workers tends to focus on personal attributes (relating to the attribute view of competence discussed in the introduction). Qualities are defined as traits, skills and dispositions of character as discussed by respondents. Qualities can be viewed as desirable, thus generating appeal, or undesirable, generating distance. An example of a symbol is a ‘firm handshake’. This activity is considered to be a symbol if it leads to inference of a quality that describes a person. A firm handshake could lead to inference of qualities such as ‘integrity’ or ‘energetic’, but also ‘cocky’ or ‘insensitive’, depending in which practice the handshake was performed. By categorizing symbols and qualities, components of professional competence can be established. In the present article, this approach is used to construct what we call generalized constituents of teleoaffective structure, understood as meta-categories of qualities that show the directions of normativity in the professional practices included in the study. These generalized constituents will be developed and constructed with the aid of our empirical material in the findings section.

Aim and research questions

The aim of this study is to describe the logic of competence differentiation in professional practice, separating professionals along a continuum that ranges from ‘competent’ to ‘less competent’. Specifically, this study targets three research questions:

The NI

As a part of the Swedish police, the NI functions as a national counter-terrorism task force, engaging in police interventions nationwide either as an enforcement resource or as a task force specialized in counter-terrorism operations (Flyghed, 2000). Within the police system, the NI has a high status, officially being mentioned as civil society’s ‘utmost resource’ in the management of high-risk situations where confrontational tactics are called for (National Police Board, 2009). Organizationally, the unit is considered a prestigious workplace that attracts and recruits highly competent police officers (Rantatalo, 2013; Weibull, 2002). Recruitment to the NI is made internally within the Swedish police force; officers need spotless service experience to be considered for a position. The recruiting process is meticulous and includes testing procedures where physical (e.g. strength, endurance), psychological (e.g. phobia, personality traits, cooperative abilities) and professional (e.g. shooting) traits are tested. The recruitment procedures ensure that all members have equal formal qualifications. No women have yet managed to pass the physical requirements, meaning that the operational parts of the unit consist only of men (Rantatalo, 2013). Organizationally, the unit has five work groups (sniping, repelling, vehicle tactics, bomb tactics and diving); each member has to have basic knowledge and training in all areas and have at least one specialization. Because of this, training takes up about 50 per cent of the unit’s working hours and is structured in two ways: realistic scenario training, which includes the use of actors; and more elaborate training activities, including practising tactical concepts and approaches to different situations (National Police Board, 2007; Weibull, 2002).

The doctors

In our case study of doctors, we targeted a career stage where all involved practitioners possessed the same formal credential: a diploma from medical school. Each year, about 900 students graduate from Swedish medical programmes. All members of this group of graduates have received top marks from secondary school and have successfully undertaken a demanding five-and-a-half year graduate programme. Therefore, they fit the description of a highly capable (select) group. This select group is, nevertheless, subject to differentiation. After completing the medical programme, all graduates must take part in a supervised internship that mainly consists of a number of work placements in medicine, surgery, psychiatry and general practice wherein graduates are expected to work as doctors with support from their senior colleagues. There are 66 hospitals and healthcare organizations throughout the country, each with individual recruitment procedures, that recruit medical interns. Interviews with recruiters (mostly senior doctors) at 21 of the most popular hospitals among internship applicants are the contribution from the medical profession to this comparative analysis.

Comparing cases

As is indicated above, our case selection was motivated by obvious differences as well as by key similarities, which allowed for theoretical generalization regarding competence in professional practice. We argue the cases to be similar in the following respects:

These observations indicate that both cases can be expected to reveal insights regarding what counts as competence in each setting. Arguably, the content of competence and competent behaviour will vary considerably, depending on the case. Despite these differences, there is the potential for similarities. This study will investigate if similarities can be identified in terms of how inferences of competent behaviour are manifested and how such inferences indicate social differentiation.

Sampling within cases

To answer the research questions, semi-structured interviews were conducted in both settings. Eighteen interviews were conducted with police and 21 interviews with doctors, making the total sample size 39 interviews. The respondents were, as indicated above, chosen based on the presumption that they (as employees within prestigious, high-status organizations with extensive recruitment procedures) had been defined as highly competent in their respective professional communities and, as such, would be able to articulate contextually defined criteria for desirable, undesirable and excellent performance. As such, the basic rationale in our sample was to interview individuals who within their respective professional context could be expected to be ‘competent to talk about competence’. Because of differences in each professional practice, recruitment of respondents in each case was made using different rationales:

Although our selected respondent groups differ, in that NI members were interviewed about their own acquired competence and the physicians were interviewed about their potential competence, both respondent groups are viewed as established and renowned ‘carriers of practice’ (Schatzki, 2001) who, owing to their positions within their respective professional contexts, were expected to have the ability to contribute to the study.

Procedure

The conducted interviews, which varied in length between 30 and 60 minutes, aimed to examine what symbols and qualities practitioners articulated to define and differentiate among levels of suitability and approvable activities (what this study defines as competence) within each professional practice. With this objective, the interviews were structured to inquire how the competent professional in each respective case was constructed, how inferred competence was manifested symbolically within each practice, and what ‘logics’ such constructions were built upon. Following Søndergaard (2002), the responses to these overarching questions were examined by studying the respondents’ storylines, which described the activities of themselves and others. A storyline is, on a basic level, a narration of a course of events or a sequence of actions that manifests different meanings. A storyline can, as such, demonstrate symbols of competence manifested in practical activity. To emphasize this, we asked respondents to give examples of situations, behaviours and contexts in which they perceived differences between high competence and low competence (or even incompetence). In these narratives of self and others, symbols and qualities of competence and competent behaviour were described. Qualities of competency were further examined by asking questions regarding what meanings practitioners drew on (included) or respectively positioned themselves against (excluded) when discussing professional competence on a general level. Given the differing characteristics of each case setting, the interviews’ specific questions were structured differently.

Analytical strategy

The analysis of the empirical material was conducted with the aid of qualitative data analysis software (NVivo 8), which offers the capacity to conduct coding and categorization in ‘node’ structures. Using this feature, we conducted the analysis in three general steps. First, interview transcripts were analysed inductively with the aim of creating categories that described the qualities of the respective cases. This step of analysis was data-driven and based on respondents’ discussions of ‘good’ or ‘wanted’ (desirable) as well as ‘bad’ and ‘unwanted’ (undesirable) traits, abilities and dispositions of character. In instances in which respondents described a quality by identifying a concrete manifestation, the quality was noted as a symbol. For example, identifying someone as ‘driving fast’ (symbol) could lead to the conclusion of ‘recklessness’ (quality). Through open coding, qualities and symbols were constructed separately for each case.

In the second step of analysis, the symbols and qualities of the two empirical settings were assessed and compared. Comparing the symbols and qualities enabled us to note co-occurrences and cross-case similarities of qualities as well as case-specific differences regarding how qualities were talked about and inferred. In this way, the comparison enabled us to assess how seemingly similar symbolic examples of desirable and undesirable behaviour could point towards differing case-specific qualities; conversely, we were able to see how differing symbolic inferences could point to qualities that were similar or shared between the cases. In the findings section, co-occurring qualities are presented in terms of ‘shared qualities’; qualities that manifest in only one of the studied settings are referred to as ‘case-specific qualities’.

In the third and final step of the analysis, we centred on the establishment of a logic that governed the inferences of qualities in our findings, given the apparent differences and associated meanings between cases. This entailed a meta-analytical approach to our findings in which qualities of desirable behaviour were grouped and categorized in relationship to each other.

Using our elaboration of Schatzkian theory, we set out to construct a conceptualization of generalized constituents of teleoaffective structure – that is, the shared views of competence derived from our identified qualities. In constructing these meta-categories, we arranged and labelled qualities into exclusive dimensions. At this stage, our interest was directed at an examination of the links between different types of qualities. To achieve this, we conducted close examinations of symbols and qualities that expressed ‘excellent’ behaviour and set out to relate desirable qualities to excellence. In general, the third step of analysis entailed the arrangement of our qualities to form a more general theory that is our ‘first draft’ of understanding professional competence from a practice-oriented perspective. Schematically, the process of analysis consisted of the steps outlined in Table 1.

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Table 1.

Procedures and outcomes of the analysis.

	Step 1		Step 2	Step 3
Procedure	Case: PoliceData-driven coding (symbols) of desirable/undesirable activity	Case: DoctorsData-driven coding (symbols) of desirable/undesirable activity	Comparing qualities	Constructing shared categories from qualities.
				Close examination of ‘excellent activity’
Outcome	Qualities of desirable/undesirable activity		Relational structureVariation (case-specific qualities).Common denominators (shared qualities)	Constituents of teleoaffective structure.Hypothesis regarding a ‘logic of excellence’

Competence as balance

In nearly all interviews in both cases, a central theme was the view of the competent person as self-knowing and responsible. Typically, self-knowing was described as ‘knowing your own strengths and weaknesses’; responsible was described as having ‘responsibility for the task at hand as well as responsibility for co-workers’. This double-ended definition, or, as we henceforth will label it, balance, is what we chose to use as a starting point for the analysis. The balance between traits is described throughout the material. Examples include: having respect for the seriousness of the work without being too afraid; having autonomy without being selfish; working hard without burning out; being social without being obtrusive; and being dominant without overriding people. An inability to find a balance between the two categories was considered disadvantageous. Most, if not all, respondents touched on the desirable combination of being good at what one does and having a social capacity. The following examples illustrate this point:

You need to be able to work on your own, show initiative, be dominant, showcase a spirit of go-ahead without anyone pushing you in the back; at the same time, you need to be able to discuss things and subordinate yourself to a chain of command; you need to be able to take orders and do stuff, really without hesitation. Of course, this is a hard combination, and most people have preferences in either direction. But here you need to have both. (Interview 12, Police)

You want something in between. I want to see that person having respect for being at a small hospital and working quite independently but at the same time being not unafraid of it. (Interview 12, Internship recruiter)

It’s the tone, I think, in this letter. And I know it sounds strange, but you don’t want it to sound too flashy but you don’t want it to sound too cautious either. (Interview 15, Internship recruiter)

Thus, we decided to structure our material as a balance of the two general constituents of competence. We labelled these constituents ‘performance orientation’ and ‘social orientation’. In the following sections, we describe and argue in favour of the importance of these constituents with the aid of findings from our interviews.

Performance orientation

Performance orientation as a constituent of competence is constructed from qualities regarding an active mind-set of on-the-job performance. It is also a dimension of inferred competence that exclusively deals with individual performance. Desirable qualities of performance orientation can be described as being good at what one does while displaying an active interest in development and striving for even better results. In both cases, the following qualities indicated performance orientation:

These two quotations illustrate how respondents talked about performance orientation:

This line of work is not actually an occupation; it is a way of living. People here dedicate their lives to work here. (Interview 13, Police)

That they are willing to work hard. That we get one who says they can put down a lot of effort and long hours without backing down. These who go to work willingly and happily, not nagging, complaining and seeking conflicts the entire time. (Interview 5, Internship recruiter)

Other qualities of performance orientation were case-specific. In the police case, this amounted to the quality called ‘showing initiative’, which entailed being able to make hard decisions, as well as not hesitating during the dynamic, critical moments that arise during police operations. Likewise, in the case of recruiters of medical interns, this applied to the quality of ‘not being afraid to be on call’, which was seen as a prerequisite for being able to complete the internship, particularly in smaller hospitals. In these instances, recruiters said that they needed to see that a person was confident enough to be alone on a ward without collapsing under pressure. Performance orientation was also inferred through contradistinctions and negative qualities signifying non-performance. One such quality, lack of initiative, was shared by both practices. Lack of initiative was defined as ‘not being one to count on’ when completing work-related duties. In the police case, this quality was, on a symbolic level, related to: having too many and/or too time-demanding non-work-related commitments (which took focus away from the job), being negative at work, or not pulling one’s part of the load. Among the recruiters of medical interns, this quality was best defined by one respondent as being a ‘traffic cone’ (Interview 16). This meant that the person was someone who, in times of stress or high workload, failed to take the initiative and stood in the middle of the ward whereas others had to pass around him or her. Additionally, a person who is considered to be too old was also expected not to last as long and not to be as ‘hungry’ for career advancement.

Other undesirable, performance-oriented qualities were closely related to practice-specific tasks. In the police case, one negative quality was a lack of perspective. This was defined as the tendency to have too narrow of a concept of one’s role in the organization as well as the organization’s relation to the outside world; it also indicated a person who seemed to forget the purpose of the organization or who sometimes had trouble prioritizing tasks. Lack of physique was another negative quality that was associated with not being able to meet the high standards of physical ability required by the professional position. Symbols of a lack of physique included being too old and being a woman. As one respondent described:

I have a hard time picturing the woman who could actually take part in an intervention. It is too physically demanding, to be frank. We have our gear, it weighs approximately 25–30 kg, and many times we climb up ladders a few floors, and you can’t be all messed up when you reach the top … what use do we have of you then? (Interview 13, Police)

In the doctor case, one inferred negative quality included being sloppy. Examples of this quality included not taking care of your equipment or repeatedly failing to be on time for appointments. Another category of negative qualities in the medical practice concerns self-effacement and fear. A typical description of an applicant failing in this respect is someone who lacks confidence and drive, who speaks poorly of him/herself, and who makes the recruiter unsure of whether he/she will cope under duress. As one recruiter said, ‘It’s a person that we think will collapse under the pressure they will face here. This person will come to our ER ward and will perish’ (Interview 20, Internship recruiter).

Doctor case respondents also mentioned applicants whom they feared would work too much and would not be able to limit their efforts to what is required, rather than trying to please every patient or colleague. Failing to maintain an air of integrity by being too personal and too friendly was another undesirable characteristic. The symbolic inference of qualities was made mostly by how applicants appeared, rather than what they said during the interview. An applicant could appear too nervous, too eager to please or simply give an impression of fragility.

Social orientation

In contrast to the emphasis on tasks and work visible within the constituent performance orientation, social orientation was conceptualized as a constituent of competence dealing exclusively with traits, abilities and dispositions that were seen as important when interacting with others. These qualities were often described in relation to performance qualities, but also as stand-alone accounts of competent professionals. The shared qualities that were viewed as desirable in both practices include the following:

These qualities were also complemented with case-specific qualities concerning social orientation. In the police case, emphasis was placed on being trustworthy. This trustworthiness was primarily related to the organization, and included: having confidence, faith and trust in fellow co-workers; being honest when giving feedback; and being able to share and handle personal information with others. Generally, being flexible and sociable was felt to be important in police work as well. One respondent explained:

You need to be a good communicator. You must be good at adapting to different situations, for instance, what level of command you work at. If I work with a project of some sort; if I lead the whole unit at an operation; or if I’m having more of a mentoring role. (Interview 6, Police)

In the recruitment of medical interns, inferred case-specific qualities were daring to ask, being endearing/likeable, happy/positive, warm/emphatic and loyal. A certain likability as a desirable trait is apparent in many interviews:

That’s what I want to see, a person with social competence. Even if we may not be best friends, we could meet over coffee and discuss a patient in a nice manner, as colleagues. I mean, it does not need to be a colleague whom I spend time with outside work, but we can still enjoy each other’s company. That’s who I want. (Interview 12, Internship recruiter)

Doctors saw the social ability to meet patients and establish a doctor–patient relationship as positive; however, surprisingly few respondents addressed this quality.

In terms of undesirable qualities of social orientation, many respondents in both cases expressed negative comments about professionals they felt were ‘over the top’. As such, the following two shared qualities were constructed:

In the police case, this quality was described in terms of applying a ‘hard-ass’ attitude towards other police officers and the public as well as tying one’s own identity to the unit and to a professional identity as ‘elite police’:

Some of the individuals here have a very narrow view on the outside world … they have trouble in seeing the whole picture and that is a strain on the organization … people here are very, very good at what they do, but this can easily transform to depreciation of others’ efforts. (Interview 1, Police)

Similarly, many recruiters of medical interns discussed applicants who seemed to express an attitude of grandeur. These individuals are even described as ‘dangerous’; recruiters feared they would fail to ask for help in cases of uncertainty:

Those people I have really disqualified, when I have had an ‘Oh my god’-feeling, is those who really put themselves forward. We have had applicants that have said they will get the Nobel Prize, that they have great abilities and that I won’t find anyone better than them. Those people really have no insight. (Interview 15, Internship recruiter)

Other, case-specific, negative qualities in the police case were not being able to handle criticism, having strong opinions and being overambitious. These qualities were generally described as one individual having problems interacting with other members of the unit. The incapacity to take or give constructive feedback, expressing personal opinions that may threaten collective goals, and trying too hard to be ‘good’ to such an extent that it becomes something negative, were all undesirable qualities in the police case. Additionally, being ‘macho’ was a quality that was related to a tendency to overreach, as it was defined in terms of unnecessarily being dominant. Symbolic examples included having a bad attitude, being rude and behaving like an ‘alpha male’ in contacts with the public (in situations where this dominance was not called for).

Negative, case-specific qualities from the recruitment of medical interns included strange/unsocial, negative and prejudiced. A negative person was described as someone who was feared to have strong influence over the group of interns and/or over one hospital; these individuals were deliberately sorted out during recruitment out of fear that the hospital would lose favourable ratings in the national ranking by interns. Several recruiters also identified ‘strange’ individuals, basing their definition on the interns’ appearance and the recruiters’ general ‘gut feeling’ upon meeting them at interview: ‘We get those nut-cases as well, pardon my expression. We had someone who had changed their name to a computer game character. In that case we got really concerned’ (Interview 8, Internship recruiter).

Competence as balance

Drawing on earlier contributions from an interpretative-relational perspective on competence, this study’s main contribution to the discussion about professional competence is to present a model explaining how an individual is seen as a highly competent practitioner. In particular, we highlight the proposition that two disparate and, at times, conflicting constituents (performance orientation and social orientation) must be in balance in order for an individual to be seen as a most accomplished professional. Following Delamare le Deist and Winterton (2005), we conclude that competence is not a one-dimensional measure, but rather can be epitomized as successfully balancing practically defined constituents. This theory of competence helps draw the following conclusions.

First, our empirical findings indicate that ideas about the balance between social and performance orientation structure how specific inferences of professional competence are constructed. Although this finding might, to some extent, reflect on a Swedish culture of agreement and being lagom (just about right), similar concepts of balance have, in previous research, been noted as important in a variety of settings. For example, in research targeting group and team dynamics, the distinction between task- and maintenance-oriented interactions makes up two widely used measures balancing critical group behaviour (see Ancona and Caldwell, 1988; Schein, 2012). Similarly within the field of leadership studies, Blake and Mouton’s (1964) ‘managerial grid’, which contains a notion of balance between concern for people/employees and concern for production, is a widely espoused measure for variance and prominence in leadership (Goffee and Jones, 1998). Building on Blake and Mouton, the notion of balance has further been applied in research on organizational cultures (see Hofstede et al., 1990). We believe that a conceptualization of competence that has balance as a defining feature of excellence holds potential as an explanatory tool that can be used to reopen the somewhat ‘closed case’ of understanding professional competence.

Second, in relation to previous research on professional competence, a possible way to encircle the contribution of the present study is to ask what is not there. Instead of focusing on what qualities are constructed in the analysis, one could ask the question of what is missing – a construction of a counter-picture (see Alvesson and Kärreman, 2007). In every interview, the ‘person who gets results’ is absent from talk concerning the competent professionals, which we found to be rather surprising. Technical skills are downplayed, at least in descriptions of the most competent or admirable professionals in these exclusive practices. The absence of articulations of technical expertise in the respondents’ storylines of excellence may seem contradictory; however, the same tendency has been observed in previous interpretative examinations of competence in use. Examples include Kosmala’s (2013: 585) study of competence in a context of professional service firms (PSFs) in which it is concluded that technical ability, while being important, did not qualify as ‘sufficient for realization of competence’. Similarly, Dreyfus and Dreyfus (2005), in their taxonomy of skill acquisition and expertise, discuss the difficulties of getting experts to articulate the procedural or rule-based rationales for professional performance, as such techne are, in a sense, connected to detached, analytic approaches to professional performance, which is uncharacteristic of expertise. Our study aligns with these conclusions in a clear tendency of respondents to view technical or procedural expertise as matériel – that is, comprised of facts and basic skills that the professionals are required to have learnt. Put differently, although technical expertise is of utmost importance to these respondents, it is not what actually differentiates professional practitioners as more or less competent in these select groups. A police officer who gets results, ‘captures the bad guys’ and possesses a high level of technical skill is absent in the respondents’ stories. Likewise, talk of getting people well and providing them with the right treatment is not a part of the ideal concerning the excellent doctor. Rather, given the specific contextual characteristics of both cases, the notion of excellence becomes an endeavour of balancing traits. In conclusion, in descriptions of excellence as provided in our material, there are no arrogant experts nor are there socially competent duffers. This conceptualization of excellence allows for an important, but often overlooked, demarcation between excellence and expertise, where the latter has, in previous conceptualizations, largely been discussed in terms of domain-specific and task-oriented knowledge (Billett, 2001).

On a theoretical level, our departure point in practice theory allows for a perspective in which balance is seen theoretically as a function of the generalized constituents of a teleoaffective structure. As such, balance is seen as ‘the normatively good’ in both of our cases. Schatzki’s theory thus informs our analysis and contributes to the understanding of professional competence in two ways. By basing the analysis in a practice – a site ontology – competence as a concept rids itself of the problems entailed within the task view and the attribute view outlined in the introduction. Professional competence is, in our framework, viewed as an asset in specific professional practices, where assets are judged along a continuum of being desirable or undesirable. Such a reconceptualization of the competence construct, which draws on advances of practice theory, avoids the tendency to give competence the status of being an ‘either/or’ feature of the individual or context.

We assert that this Schatzkian practice theory framework adds to previous attempts to conceptualize professional competence from non-dualistic perspectives (e.g. Rouleau and Balogun, 2011; Sandberg and Pinnington, 2009). However, while these existentialist, discursive and sense-making perspectives have merit, they are less parsimonious and, at least in the case of Sandberg and Pinnington, do not allow for a generalized view of what constitutes a competent professional across different practices. Furthermore, we also see through Schatzki’s theory how a teleoaffective structure establishes social order within these (excellent) practices. What we have done is attempt to describe empirically the constituents of such social order – that is, a description of the logic that differentiates and demarcates professionals into ‘more’ or ‘less’ competent practitioners. As the study targets what we argue to be excellent practices – exclusive and subject to prior selection of practitioners – this logic is also argued to be a logic of excellence.

The million-dollar question: Would a ‘socially competent’ doctor pass as a ‘socially competent’ police officer?

Our results (Figure 1) invite questions regarding aspects of professional competence that can be described in terms of generic qualities or meta-qualities (Linstead, 1993). As implied in the introduction, this has been a long-standing debate and is an on-going discussion within HR and research on professional competence. From a practice theory approach, generic competence as a concept is problematic. In our findings section, we demonstrated that – although the same quality was constructed in both cases (for instance, ambition and flexibility) – there were differences in the concrete manifestations reported by the respondents. On one hand, the differences could be viewed as self-evident, given the disparate nature of each professional field. On the other hand, we feel the need to question the alleged generic nature of the qualities defined in the present study.

In our analysis, we looked closely at the interview (lingual) statements. Although respondents in both cases gave statements about the symbolic and the quality level to help construct our definitions, we are hesitant to conclude that these labels connote the same thing in each respective practice. We suggest that the general model of competence differentiation in professional practices, as presented in this study, should be viewed as general on the constituent and quality level of abstraction. On the symbolic level (concrete manifestations of activity), there might be considerable contextual differences. For instance, in both cases, using a certain label, such as ‘socially competent’, does not necessarily mean that the term refers to the same set of actions or resources held and enacted by the practitioners. Based on the findings of the present article, we suggest two ways for future research to further discuss differences between quality and symbolic manifestations of professional competence.

First, general, societal forms of normative structures, such as cultural or economic capital (e.g. Bourdieu, 1984), could explain differences between how professional competence was inferred across cases in our study. This entails that the respective groups of practitioners are different concerning the habitus from which they arrive at their careers. In the case of doctors, for instance, several studies conclude that doctors generally have upper- or middle-class backgrounds – the choice of a career in medicine is strongly influenced by class (e.g. McHarg et al., 2007; Mathers and Parry, 2009; Seyan et al., 2004). In contrast, the police profession has historically and traditionally been practised by individuals from working- and lower- or middle-class backgrounds (Finstad, 2000; Reiner, 2010). A police officer regarded as socially competent by other police officers might not be regarded as socially competent by doctors, based on the grounds that they differ in appropriated cultural capital.

Second, the differing professional and societal roles of the studied practitioners also merits further discussion regarding how professional competence is inferred in each case. On the symbolic level, this difference could be seen as issues regarding profession-specific traits. These traits could relate to a monopoly on certain types of activities (e.g. prescribing drugs, using lethal force), as well as the ethical standards and codes of behaviour present in both professions. Such traits may have importance in how competence is conceived of in each case. The situations these professionals face in their respective practices are inherently different; therefore, what it means to be responsible, restrained, calm or simply ‘professional’ also differs. While our study briefly touches upon these issues, we believe that normative inferences connected both to societal and professional roles are important to consider in further research on professional competence.

In summary, it is our belief that the presented conceptual framework of professional competence holds the potential of highlighting how inferred directions of normativity in the studied professions follow similar patterns, although the symbolic manifestations of competence may differ considerably. In this respect, an understanding of professional competence via practice theory allows for an informative analysis of how competence is constructed in the ‘here-and-now’ of situated practice (see Nicolini, 2009) without losing sight of the translocal and boundary-spanning logics that underpin and inform the ways in which practices are socially differentiated.