Tools for competence management are very often presented as innovations or disruptions. The idea of efficacity springs spontaneously to mind: the longevity of tools would have its source in the tried and tested efficacity of their uses. The theory of managerial methods and neo-institutionalism contribute most directly to understanding the dissemination of competence management models. However, while basing their development on rational discourses and myths, management models in general and those for the management of competences in particular have the particularity of combining them with material elements which we wish to highlight, in an approach that we qualify as a sociotechnical analysis. The genealogical approach to management tools is the heir to Michel Foucault and refers to the successive developments of the management tool, by placing these back in the theoretical and practical debates in which the tool was conceived and then disseminated.