AHM
Frequently Asked Questions
1 MAS Capability Overview
1. What is Modern Apps Capability (MAS)?
Modern Apps Capability is the largest capability within DBS and is responsible for capability development in design, development, integration, modernization, testing, and management of next generation of applications across technologies, platforms, and customer engagements.
2. What is the objective of the MAS capability?
The objective is to build a future-ready talent by enabling continuous skill growth, personalized learning, industry standard certifications, technical mentoring, and validated capability progression.
3. How does the capability model benefit employees?
The model provides structured skill growth, access to learning opportunities, mentorship, certifications, visibility into career-paths, and alignment to future demand areas.
4. What are the major skill areas covered under MAS?
MAS supports multiple skill clusters and is classified into the following personas. The key skills supported in each persona is also given below.
| Persona | Key Skills |
|---|---|
| Full Stack |
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| Front-end |
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| Automation Testing |
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| Polyglot |
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| Cloud & DevOps-SRE |
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| Integration |
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| Mainframe |
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| Tech. Project Management |
|
5. How will I know to which persona I am mapped?
Your persona is displayed in GAL. When you enter your name in Outlook / Teams and view the details, you can see the persona you are mapped to. Example: If you are mapped to Full stack persona, you can find the mapping as "DBS CU-MAS-FULL STACK – FULL STACK". This mapping has been done based on the skills entered in Growth Portfolio.
6. What should I do if my persona is wrongly mapped?
Reach out to your capability manager and inform about the changes required in persona. Details of capability manager can be found in the next section of this document.
7. Can I change my persona if my role & skill cluster changes?
Yes. Reach out to your capability manager and inform about the changes required in persona. Details of capability manager can be found in the next section of this document.
8. Can I belong to multiple personas?
No. One employee can be mapped to one Persona and is decided based on his / her role & the key skills being used in the last 6 months.
9. Why is persona mapping important?
Persona mapping helps to create structured visibility into your capabilities and enables targeted learning, capability development, work alignments, and future-readiness planning.
10. How does persona mapping benefit me?
Persona mapping helps you to understand current capability alignment, identify growth pathways, access relevant learning journeys, build future-ready skills and improve visibility for future opportunities.
2 Delivery & Capability Leadership Model
11. Why do employees have both Reporting Manager and Capability Manager?
The dual leadership model ensures that talent receive support for both delivery excellence and continuous capability growth.
12. What is the role of Reporting Manager?
The Reporting Manager is responsible for project delivery, task allocation, utilization, performance management, appraisal inputs, time management, and delivery related responsibilities.
13. What is the role of Capability Manager?
The Capability Manager focuses on technical growth, mentoring, upskilling guidance, certifications, career capability development, and capability alignment.
14. How can I find my Capability Manager?
Capability Manager details can be seen in MyHCL → Growth Portfolio. Click on your photo that is visible in the right-hand corner and choose "Public Profile". You can find Capability Manager details along with your Work Manager (Reporting Manager).
15. Who should I approach for project-related concerns?
Project execution, timelines, work allocation, appraisal, leave approvals, delivery escalations, and utilization-related concerns should be discussed with Reporting Manager.
16. Who should I approach for skill growth and learning guidance?
Questions related to certifications, learning journeys, technical mentoring, capability progression, or skill-building should be discussed with Capability Manager.
17. Will the Capability Manager influence my career growth?
Yes, Capability manager will support long-term capability development and help improve readiness for future opportunities through skill enhancement and technical progression.
18. Will the Capability Manager replace the Reporting Manager?
No. Both roles are complementary and focus on different aspects of employee success.
19. Who is responsible for performance appraisal?
The Reporting Manager primarily drives performance appraisal inputs, while capability-related growth and technical progression inputs may be considered from the Capability Manager by the Reporting Manager. Technical progression includes validation of skill cluster in Growth portfolio, completing all enrolled assessments & learning journeys on time.
20. Will Capability Managers directly allocate or rotate employees to projects?
Project staffing, allocation & rotation decisions involve delivery and staffing teams. However, Capability managers provide inputs on technical readiness, capability fit, and future potential thereby influencing the decision.
21. What is the role of Capability Managers in strategic assignments?
Capability managers maintain visibility into employee skills, certifications, assessments, and capability progression, thereby helping to identify and align employees with strategic opportunities based on validated skills, capability readiness, growth potential, and future business demand areas. This is done in conjunction with reporting manager and only when the underlying process guidelines are met.
22. Can I express interest in strategic opportunities?
Yes. You are encouraged to proactively discuss career aspirations and future capability interests with your Reporting & Capability managers.
3 Assessments & Skill Validation
23. Why are assessments being conducted?
Assessments help employees understand their current skill level, identify skill gaps, and create targeted personalized learning journeys to help close the skill gaps.
24. In what scenarios can assessments be triggered?
Assessments may be triggered in multiple scenarios like:
- Periodic capability validation to assess your skill proficiency based on your current role
- As a pre-assessment before launching your future-ready persona transformation journey
- As a post-assessment after you complete any learning journey
- As a pre-assessment for your aspirational / project specific learning journeys
- Before alignment for any strategic role
25. What are the skill sets considered when an assessment is enrolled for me?
The skill sets depend on the scenario for which the assessment is being enrolled for you.
26. When the assessment is rolled out for periodic capability validation, what are the skill sets considered?
When the assessment is being enrolled to assess your skill proficiency for your current role, the skill cluster that has been updated for you in Growth Portfolio will be considered. Hence updating the right skill cluster is very important.
27. What is Skill Cluster?
Skill Cluster is a group of related skills, technologies & competencies that together enable effective performance in a role.
28. Who creates / updates overall skill clusters for MAS?
Skill clusters are typically created & updated by capability leadership teams and is aligned with organizational & customer demands, evolving technologies, and market trends.
29. Who updates my Skill Cluster?
Skill cluster is updated by your Capability manager by discussing with you on your current role and skill set being used.
30. What should I do if my Skill Cluster is wrongly mapped OR if my skill cluster has changed due to a change in role?
Reach out to your Capability manager to get the latest skill cluster updated based on your current role.
31. Will assessment result impact my appraisal?
Assessments are primarily intended to identify your capability growth path and skill development. Any linkage to performance processes will be communicated specifically & separately, if applicable.
32. What happens if I do not take assessment?
You are strongly encouraged to complete assessments as they form the foundation for personalized learning journeys, capability planning, and skill visibility. Not taking assessment will result in not understanding the current skill proficiency & skill gaps thereby impacting your future-readiness.
33. Will failing an assessment / getting lower score negatively impact my career?
The focus of assessment framework is development and growth rather than penalization. Employees are encouraged to continuously improve through guided learning.
34. Can I retake assessment?
Yes. You have opportunities to retake assessments after completing recommended learning journeys or capability-building activities identified as skill gaps in pre-assessment.
35. How frequently will assessments happen?
Assessment frequency may vary based on capability requirements, skill areas, certifications, and organizational priorities. If assessments are taken on the same skill set in last 3 months and is enrolled again, then the employee can update capability manager and skip the assessment.
36. Will assessments cover only technical skills?
Assessments primarily focus on technical & capability-related skills, though some bot-based assessments may also focus on certain behavioural skills like communication, confidence etc.
37. Will industry level certifications be linked to assessments?
Pre-assessments are given for Industry standard certifications, specifically when vouchers are provided.
38. Who can view my assessment results?
Assessment visibility may include employee, capability managers, HR managers and reporting managers. When assessments are conducted for positioning you into any open demands, reports are shared with respective TSC and account stakeholders.
39. How will skill gaps be identified?
Skill gaps will be automatically identified by assessment tool (by comparing against the defined skill matrix / std. criteria) and will be available in the individual report.
4 Learning Strategy & Learning Ecosystem
40. What is changing in the learning strategy?
The learning model is evolving from organization-driven training nominations (push method) to employee-owned, system-enabled continuous & guided learning (pull method).
41. What does "employee-owned learning" mean?
Employee-owned learning means individuals take active ownership of assessing, improving, and validating their skills with organizational support and guided learning systems.
42. Does this mean the organization is reducing learning support?
No. The organization continues & is continuously investing to provide assessments, learning platforms, curated content, mentoring, certifications, and capability interventions to meet the learning demands as per business & aspirational needs. The change is only in shifting learning ownership closer to employee.
43. Why is the organization moving towards this model?
Technology and business needs are evolving rapidly, and personalized, self-driven learning is more scalable, relevant, and impactful than one-size-fits-all training approaches.
44. What are the benefits of self-owned learning?
Employees can learn at their own pace, focus on relevant skills, access personalized learning journeys, and build future-ready capabilities aligned to career aspirations & business needs.
45. Is learning mandatory in this model?
Continuous learning and capability development are strongly encouraged and recommended as part of professional growth and future-readiness.
46. Will employees still receive guidance in this model?
Yes. Employees will continue to receive guidance through Capability managers, SMEs, learning systems, assessments, curated learning paths, and capability programs like partnership led tech talk days / webinars, Aspire learning journeys, Learning Carnivals, Focused Certification programs etc.
47. How does this model support career growth?
Validated skills, continuous upskilling, and stronger capability alignment improve readiness for future projects, advanced roles, and emerging opportunities.
48. What is a personalized learning journey?
A personalized learning journey is a curated learning path tailored to an employee's current skill level, identified gaps, role expectations, and career aspirations.
49. How can I get my personalized learning journey for any skill?
The following are the steps to be followed:
- Login to TalentStudio and click on AI LMS
- You can access existing learning journeys or create new journeys after providing the skills that you want to learn
- Start your learning journey, take regular assessments that are part of the learning journey. Use the channels provided for getting any of your doubts clarified.
- Once you complete the learning journey, reach out to your capability manager for enrolling you for post assessment.
- Complete the post assessment and assess the improvement in your skill proficiency through your report.
50. Will all employees receive the same learning path?
Standard learning journeys for all key skills will be available in TalentStudio tool and can be used as a complete refresher course (along with skill-gap closure) by any employee. Additionally, every employee will also have an option to generate personalized learning journeys which will be curated based on his/her specific skill gaps & needs.
51. Can I choose additional learning areas beyond recommendations?
Yes. You are encouraged to explore and learn beyond recommended paths based on career interests, roles, and future aspirations.
52. Can I pursue multiple learning paths simultaneously?
Yes. You may pursue multiple complementary capability areas based on role relevance, interests, and learning capacity.
53. How much time should employees dedicate towards learning?
Employees are encouraged to make learning a continuous habit integrated into professional development. Separate communication will be sent if any mandatory learning hours compliance must be met.
54. Will managers support learning time?
Managers and leaders will encourage capability development and support continuous learning. However, employees should ensure that there is no negative impact on the work deadlines & quality of deliverables due to prioritization of learning activities.
55. What happens after completing a learning journey?
Employees must undergo post-learning assessment to validate the closure of previously identified skill gaps and to ascertain the skill progression.
56. Can learning journeys change over time?
Yes. Learning journeys will evolve based on changing technologies, project needs, capability priorities, and employee career aspirations.
57. Are there any badges or certificates post-completion of learning journeys?
Yes. Badges & internal certificates are provided after completing critical learning journeys successfully.
5 Future-ready Persona, Capability Growth & Career Progression
58. How does capability development support future opportunities?
Strong capability growth improves readiness for emerging technologies, movement to strategic projects, advanced engineering roles, and broader career opportunities.
59. Will capability growth influence staffing opportunities?
Validated skills and updated capability visibility may improve alignment to relevant project opportunities and future workforce needs.
60. How can employees proactively grow in this model?
Employees can regularly assess themselves, complete learning journeys, pursue certifications, engage with capability managers, and continuously update their technical skills to become more relevant & skilled in the fast-changing technical landscape.
61. What are future-ready personas?
Future-ready personas represent strategically important skill profiles and roles aligned to evolving technology, customer, and business needs within Modern Apps Capability.
62. Why is there a focus on future-ready personas?
Technology landscapes are rapidly evolving, and we need talent equipped with the latest technological advances to stay competitive and future ready.
63. Are future-ready personas limited to niche technologies?
No. Future ready personas cover a broad range of modern skills including Full Stack Engineering, Cloud, DevOps, AI-enabled development, Integration, Platform Engineering, SRE, Automation, and related areas.
64. How much time will I be given to complete a future-ready persona?
Duration of learning journey depends on your current skill proficiency, skill gaps and the role you have considered in future-ready persona. It may anywhere between 4 – 12 weeks.
65. What are the steps for getting into any future-ready persona learning journey?
The following are the steps:
- Reach out to your capability manager and update the future-ready persona you want to pursue.
- After checking the pre-requisite skills, Capability manager will enrol you to the pre-requisite skill assessment. If skill gaps exist and threshold is not met, complete the refresher course and retake pre-assessment.
- Upon successfully clearing the pre-assessment with required threshold value, you will be enrolled into the future-ready persona learning journey in TalentStudio.
- Complete the learning, interim assessments that are provided in learning journey.
- Upon completion of learning journey, capability manager will enrol you for post-assessment to assess your skill proficiency.
- Badges / Certificates will be given upon successful completion of learning journey.
66. Can you give me the various roles in future-ready personas, their pre-requisite skills and learning path?
Key roles handled as part of Phase 1 future-ready personas in FY '27 and their paths are given below.
| Persona | Future-ready Persona | Pre-requisite Skills | Training Skills |
|---|---|---|---|
| Full Stack | AI Java Full Stack Engineer |
|
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| AI Java Backend Engineer |
|
|
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| AI .Net Full Stack Engineer |
|
|
|
| Front-end | AI .Net Web Development Engineer |
|
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| AI MEAN / MERN Full Stack Engineer |
|
|
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| Automation Testing | AI SDET |
|
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| AI Automation Test Engineer |
|
|
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| AI Test Engineer |
|
|
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| DevOps & SRE | AI Reliability Engineer (SRE) |
|
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| AI Platform Engineer |
|
|
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| MLOps / LLMOps Engineer |
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67. Can you give me the various future-ready personas & roles that employees can grow from their current personas & roles?
| Current Roles / Skills | Future-ready Role | Alternate Future-ready Role |
|---|---|---|
| Java Backend Engineer | AI Java Backend Engineer | Java Full Stack Engineer → AI Java Full Stack Engineer |
| Java Full Stack Engineer | AI Java Full Stack Engineer | |
| .Net Full Stack Engineer | AI .Net Full Stack Engineer | |
| Front-end Engineer (Angular / React / Node.js) | AI MEAN / MERN Full Stack Engineer | |
| AMS L1.5 / L2 Support Engineer | AI AMS L1.5 / L2 Support Engineer | Reliability Engineer (SRE) |
| Reliability Engineer (SRE) | AI Reliability Engineer | |
| Platform Engineer | AI Platform Engineer | |
| Programming languages like C, C++ | Backend Engineer | |
| Application Scripting like PHP, Ruby etc. | Front-end Engineer | |
| System Scripting like LINUX, Shell, Bash | DevOps / SRE Engineer |
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