A Content-Oriented Approach to Setting Minimum Qualifications

Abstract

Minimum qualifications (MQ's) are typically estimated using a whole job, impressionistic approach. This article reports a series of quantitative job analysis studies using a decomposed approach with replication, and then extended to a comparison using a holistic approach for a sample of jobs. The results indicate that Subject Matter Experts (SME's) agree on the years of educational attainment scaling of GED scale interval definitions (replicated), that job analysts can reliably assign GED ratings to tasks (replicated) and that job analysts can reliably assign GED ratings using a holistic approach. The decomposed and the holistic approach differ slightly in their results, with the decomposed approach producing a more conservative estimate of MQ's and less differentiation among jobs. The conclusion drawn from these studies is that educational MQ's can be established for clerical jobs using either of these techniques.