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Professions

The Professions section in the Oberon Team app enables organizations to create, manage, and standardize professional roles with defined skill levels and career progression paths. This powerful feature allows you to build structured profession definitions that can be used throughout the platform for resource allocation, skill matching, and career development.

Accessing Professions

You can access the Professions section from the Settings menu under the Customization category.

Understanding Professions

A profession in the Oberon Team app represents a structured role definition with multiple levels, each requiring specific skills at defined proficiency levels. For example, a "Software Developer" profession might have levels from Junior Developer to Principal Developer, each with progressively higher skill requirements. Professionals also support complex Boolean logic in constructing skill trees, as seen below

Professions

Key Components of Professions

  • Profession Metadata: Basic information about the profession, including name, family, owner, and tags
  • Profession Levels: Specific career stages within a profession (e.g., Junior, Mid-level, Senior)
  • Skills and Skill Levels: Required competencies and their proficiency levels for each profession level
  • Cost and Billing Rates: Internal cost and external billing rates associated with each level

Creating a New Profession

To create a new profession:

  1. Navigate to Settings > Customization > Professions
  2. Click the "Create New Profession" button
  3. Complete the profession creation process through the following steps

Step 1: Metadata Setup

Provide basic information about the profession:

  • Name: The profession title (e.g., "Software Developer", "Project Manager")
  • Family: The broader category the profession belongs to (e.g., "Technology", "Management")
  • Owner: The person or department responsible for maintaining this profession definition
  • Tags: Keywords to help categorize and find the profession

Step 2: Defining Skills

Select the core skills required for this profession:

  1. Browse or search for skills from the skill library
  2. Select primary skills that are essential to the profession
  3. Add related technologies or secondary skills as needed
  4. The system may suggest additional related skills based on your selections

Step 3: Setting Up Profession Levels

Define the different levels within the profession:

  1. Specify the number of levels (1-10) for your profession
  2. For each level, provide:
  3. Level Title: The specific job title for this level (e.g., "Junior Developer", "Senior Developer")
  4. Required Skills: The skills and proficiency levels required at this level
  5. Cost Rate: The internal cost rate for resources at this level
  6. Billing Rate: The external billing rate for resources at this level

Step 4: Setting Skill Requirements

For each skill in the profession, define the required proficiency level at each profession level:

  • Beginner (Level 1): In training, should not be allocated to projects
  • Novice (Levels 2-6): Basic understanding and limited practical experience
  • Intermediate (Levels 7-12): Practical working knowledge and independent application
  • Advanced (Levels 13-17): Deep understanding and ability to guide others
  • Expert (Levels 18-20): Comprehensive mastery and industry leadership

Note: The system enforces skill progression logic, ensuring that higher profession levels cannot require lower skill levels than lower profession levels.

Step 5: Review and Save

  1. Review all profession details across levels
  2. Save as a draft if you need to make further adjustments later
  3. Publish the profession when it's ready for use in the organization

Managing Existing Professions

Viewing Professions

All users can view profession definitions to understand the skills and requirements for different roles in the organization. This transparency helps with career planning and skill development.

Editing Professions

Users with appropriate permissions (typically Institution Administrators) can:

  • Edit existing professions
  • Update skill requirements
  • Add or remove profession levels
  • Modify cost and billing rates

Publishing and Draft States

Professions can exist in two states:

  • Draft: Still being developed, not visible for general use
  • Published: Finalized and available for use throughout the platform

Only users with appropriate permissions can move professions from draft to published state.

Best Practices for Profession Management

  • Start with Core Professions: Begin by defining the most common professions in your organization
  • Be Specific with Skill Requirements: Clearly define the skills needed at each level
  • Maintain Logical Progression: Ensure that skill requirements increase logically across profession levels
  • Review Regularly: Update profession definitions periodically to reflect changing industry standards and technologies
  • Involve Domain Experts: Get input from experienced practitioners when defining skill requirements
  • Use Consistent Naming: Maintain consistent naming conventions for profession levels across the organization