I understand why one has to review against the competencies chosen by HR, but they are always backward-looking.

I’d really like to reward people for developing new competencies like using social media long before before they were listed as competencies by HR, or changing corporate culture rather than just understanding it.

In your group, rewarding someone for developing a virtual meeting culture that works, or a virtual co-debugging system would drive competitive advantage instead of focusing on the development of a standard individual.