About SFIA
The Skills Framework for the Information Age (SFIA) has been adopted by the ACS, as well as other professional societies and organisations. This provides a foundation for the professional grades, accreditation and programs of the ACS.
SFIA is a common framework which allows an international understanding of what an ICT role actually involves and identifies the skills required.
What is SFIA?
The framework was derived from the SFIA Foundation, which is based in the UK. The ACS is an Accredited Partner of this foundation. SFIA was designed and is regularly updated by ICT practitioners, academics and professional associations. It is currently used in over 100 countries to support the ICT profession.
How it’s used
SFIA is a tool for aligning a workforce to deliver the needs of an organisation. It is the recognised international standard for ICT talent management. Using SFIA gives individuals and companies a common language to describe the capabilities required to deliver business outcomes – how to identify skills and knowledge to get the job done. SFIA can be applied to the context of the workforce, from a small start-up to a multinational company.
SFIA can be used:
- by companies to guide human resources practice and manage ICT staff performance
- by individuals for their own career planning.
Uses of SFIA: Mapping and Matching
SFIA contains a matrix of skills required for ICT roles, this allows you to map out elements of a job description and match these to an individual’s CV.
SFIA Generic Skills
SFIA outlines a set of four generic skills that cover the context of the working environment expected by an organisation. These generic skills are: Autonomy, Influence, Complexity, and Business skills.
SFIA Categories
The main SFIA matrix is divided into six categories of ICT practice: Strategy and architecture; Business change; Solutions development and implementation; Service management; Procurement and management support; and Client interface. From these categories, 96 skills with descriptors can be applied to a range of SFIA levels of responsibility.
SFIA drives professionalism within the ICT workforce. It enables clear definitions to be made of capabilities and behaviours required for the complex business solutions within the modern economy.
An individual can use SFIA as the starting point to build a more meaningful CV covering:
- SFIA defined professional skills
- Behavioural skills e.g. communication, team work
- Technical skills
- Knowledge areas
- Qualifications, awards and certifications
- Specific work experience: job roles, projects and consulting.
Benefits of SFIA
Employees:
- Identification of strengths in knowledge and skills
- Career pathway mapping
- Gaps identified for training plans
- Mobility across employers and countries
Employers:
- Recruitment and retention
- Job evaluation
- Identifies gaps and skills matching
- Performance management
- Builds personal development plans
- Improves staff value to firms
- Succession planning