Competence

Part of speech: noun

Pronunciation: /ˈkɒm.pə.təns/

Definitions

1. The ability to do something successfully or efficiently
2. The skill or capability to carry out duties or activities with success and proficiency
3. Possessing the necessary knowledge or skill to achieve desired results in a particular area

Etymology: "Competence" began as a legal and logical term before it described skill. Its Latin ancestor "competentia" carried the sense of agreement or proportion, the idea that two things fit together or are commensurate. Late Latin speakers used it for a person's fitness or legal capacity to act, and that sense of being qualified to take on a task passed into Middle French as "compétence" with the same meaning of fitness, jurisdiction or authority. English borrowed the word from Middle French, and its early uses kept that legal flavour: a court's competence was its right to hear a case. The general sense of being able to do something well came later, so that "competence" now mostly describes practical skill rather than formal authority.

Synonyms: ability, capability, proficiency, skill, expertise

Antonyms: incompetence, ineptitude, ineffectiveness