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What is 360˚ Feedback?
360˚ Survey is a questionnaire-based process where an employee rates themselves and has others (e.g., supervisor, peers, and direct reports) who interact with them on a regular basis rate them on behaviors related to performance. The feedback provides an employee with a comprehensive view of how their performance self-rating compares to how others rated them. When should I use 360˚ Feedback?
360˚ Feedback should be used as a developmental tool that can help an employee better understand how their behavior is viewed by and/or affecting others. Some common uses of the 360 include:
What are some of the benefits of using 360˚ Feedback?
Who should respond to my 360˚ Survey?
The general guidelines you should follow when identifying respondents for a participant’s 360 include considering:
How many respondents do I need to conduct a 360˚ Survey?
While there is no “right” number of respondents who should complete a 360 Survey, use the following when identifying how many respondents to include in your 360:
Who should select the respondents?
The participant is best suited to select their own respondents. Sometimes it is useful for the participant to ask their supervisor for recommendations to get a good list of respondents that will be representative and ensures balanced, honest feedback. Who gets a copy of the feedback report/results?
A 360˚ survey is intended to be a developmental activity. Therefore, the only person who must receive the report is the participant. The participant, in most cases, would do well to send the report to his/her supervisor. This can help ensure continuity of developmental efforts between the participant and the supervisor. In most cases the administrator or HR employee will obtain reports and then provide the reports to the participants during a feedback session. What is the ‘best practice’ for sharing results?
In order to be an effective developmental tool, best practice recommends sharing your results with your direct supervisor. Doing so provides specificity to developmental efforts and opens dialogue that can help better align your efforts with support from your direct supervisor. How often should an employee receive 360˚ feedback?
A 360 survey is best completed once every 12 months. However, “booster” 360s, which are focused on the areas where the most development is needed, can be conducted once every three months or so to monitor development progress. A “booster” 360 simply asks respondents to answer a subset of competency items related to areas on which they are focusing development. How is respondent anonymity or confidentiality protected?
The ThinkWise 360˚ survey platform has features to help ensure anonymity of responses. Some of the features include:
How many 360˚ surveys should be completed by a respondent at one time?
The ThinkWise 360˚ Survey was built to make completing 360s efficient by allowing the respondent to rate multiple people simultaneously. This Batch-Rating technology eliminates the need to launch a new 360 for each participant. Batch-Rating improves efficiency, reduces ‘rater fatigue’, and improves response (rating) distribution. Of course, there should be some sensitivity to how many people a single individual is asked to rate at one time (a maximum of 10 is a good guideline). How many competencies and related questions (items) should be on a 360˚ survey?
In general, when designing a 360, the competencies you select should be tightly linked to your business strategy and those behaviors deemed critical to drive that business strategy (contact ThinkWise regarding Competency Modeling tools, our High Performance Blueprint Analysis, and related services). In general, competencies should be limited to 10 (ideally 5-7 allows for better developmental focus) and the total number of items should be limited to less than a 100 (with 75 being a more reasonable number). For open-ended questions there is no system limit – however, we recommend that you limit the number of open ended questions to 5 (2 or 3 is most common). The ThinkWise 360˚ Survey includes the use of the ThinkWise competencies (our library contains behavioral items at three levels – Executive, Manager, and Individual Contributor) or the input of custom competencies and items that your organization may have already developed.
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