First joint awards ceremony honors job competency bank and NCS best practices

Enernet cuts work errors and safety incidents from 31 to 23 cases

Kangwon Land replaces 62 hiring documents with 20 competency certificates

Cumulative competency certificates issued reach 147,382

[Courtesy of the Ministry of Employment and Labor]
[Courtesy of the Ministry of Employment and Labor]

Companies that applied the National Competency Standards (NCS) to hiring, education and evaluation saw new employee retention rates rise by 13.3 percentage points, the Ministry of Employment and Labor said. Workplace errors and safety incidents also fell by about 30 percent.

The ministry and the Human Resources Development Service of Korea held the "2026 Job Competency Bank and NCS Corporate Utilization Best Practices Awards" ceremony on Friday at COEX Magok in Gangseo-gu, Seoul.

This year's event combined, for the first time, the job competency bank best practice contest and the NCS corporate utilization competition into a single ceremony. A total of 20 cases, including both individuals and organizations, were selected as winners.

Enernet, which won the grand prize in the NCS corporate utilization category, adopted the NCS system in 2022. The company then overhauled its hiring, education, evaluation and wage structures based on job analysis. As its business expanded recently into interior construction and food and beverage services, the company analyzed about 30 job roles on its own, without outside consulting, to develop job descriptions.

As a result, the retention rate for new employees rose from 69.36 percent to 82.67 percent, an increase of 13.31 percentage points. Work errors and safety incidents dropped from 31 to 23 cases, a decline of about 30 percent.

Asung Plastic Valve used the NCS framework to shift its personnel system from one based on seniority to one centered on job competency and performance. After introducing competency-based hiring, education, evaluation and job-based pay, the company's turnover rate fell from 16.5 percent in 2022 to 8.7 percent last year.

In the job competency bank's group category, Kangwon Land took the grand prize. The company began using job competency certificates as proof of qualifications and experience starting with this year's new hire recruitment. In its first round of hiring, 20 applicants submitted 20 certificates that replaced 62 individual documents, such as licenses and employment certificates.

Applicants who submitted documents through the conventional method faced five requests for additional materials, while those who used the certificates completed the review process without any resubmissions. A survey of applicants found satisfaction with the hiring process rose from 4.27 to 4.49 out of 5 points.

The grand prize in the individual category went to Lee, who has worked as a cutting tool design researcher for more than 14 years. Lee consolidated career, qualification and training records scattered across multiple institutions into the job competency bank and filled gaps in competency through additional education and certifications. Lee also cut the time needed to prepare a promotion report, which previously took more than a week, to a single day.

The job competency bank system integrates and manages an individual's qualifications, education, training and career information, issuing certificates based on that data. Since the service launched in September 2023, a total of 110,761 job competency accounts and 147,382 certificates had been issued as of the end of last month.

Pyeon Do-in, director general of the Vocational Ability Policy Bureau at the Ministry of Employment and Labor, said, "We will support the field application of the job competency bank and NCS so that they can lead to career development for individuals and stronger competitiveness for companies."


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