A well run 360° feedback project ought to be a positive experience for participants and raters alike. It should provide participants with clarity about their leadership strengths, point out the way to using them even more effectively, and identify some areas where they could learn to be more effective. It should provide raters with an opportunity to provide constructive feedback to their colleagues and managers – so improving the climate and performance of the company.
Like any tool there is a risk that it may do harm if it is not handled properly. A hammer is great for knocking in nails, but you can also hit your thumb – a painful experience to be avoided.
This article is about the ways a 360° feedback project could inflict pain, and how to avoid this. The risk mitigation suggestions in the sections below are really just descriptions of best practice in running such projects.
FOR THE PARTICIPANTS
Everyone has a fear of being judged
360° Feedback is often presented as an “assessment” which sounds a lot like judgement and performance assessment. This fear may affect willing participation and make participants less receptive to the great learning opportunity provided by 360° feedback.
Risk Mitigation: Make the 360° feedback about leadership and personal development and separate it from performance assessment. Make this clear to participants: There will be no penalty for the contents of their report. (Some companies do use 360° feedback as part of performance appraisals. There is a separate article about this process.) At Thornhill we avoid using the term assessment as far as possible.
Excessive focus on lower ratings or negative, sometimes destructive comments
Almost everyone receiving a 360° report tends to look first at the lower ratings, and to focus more on a few critical comments than all the higher ratings and constructive and positive feedback. This can lead to participants brooding and developing a negative mindset which closes them off to both the positive aspects of the report, and to the developmental guidance which can be found in the report.
Risk Mitigation:
i. Even before receiving their reports, participants should be encouraged to look first at their strengths as reflected in the raters’ responses and to think about how to make even better use of them.
ii. However, the most important mitigation here is that participants should receive skilled feedback coaching on their report. This feedback facilitation is needed to help them extract full value. It is also critical to deal with any negative responses to low ratings or destructive individual comments. (How to give and organise the feedback is dealt with in a separate article in this resource pack.)
iii. Speed is of the essence. Participants should receive the feedback coaching as soon as possible after receiving their report, so that they do not have a long time to develop a negative response to the feedback received.
FOR THE RATERS
The two issues mentioned below create the risk that raters will not apply their minds to the process and perhaps just give average ratings or leave out responses altogether.
Worries about confidentiality
Raters may not give honest ratings if they are concerned about confidentiality. They could be worried about victimisation from a manager, or simply feel awkward if they think colleagues know how they rated their various competencies.
Risk Mitigation: It is essential that everyone is reassured that the process is confidential. This is a good reason to have an external service provider run the 360° feedback project, and to reassure everyone involved that they are able to ensure confidentiality.
Having too many participants to rate and/or rating people they do not know well
If raters are asked to evaluate too many colleagues, there is a real risk that they will feel overwhelmed and lose interest. This can result in raters moving very quickly through the exercise and not giving enough thought to their responses.
Similarly, being asked to rate people who the rater does not know well obviously leads to inaccurate responses, with raters tending to give average ratings, or to leave many questions blank, which undermines the value of the feedback process.
Risk Mitigation: Sufficient attention must be paid to rater selection. There needs to be at least three respondents per rater category for each participant, and preferably more. The selection process should be a collaboration between the Human Resources department and the individual participants to ensure that each participant has enough raters who know them well enough, and to ensure that no raters are overburdened.
It is best to select people whom you believe will provide honest and constructive feedback, and who ultimately have the participant’s best interests at heart. Also try to select a range of people whose views will represent various different, but frequent, interactions and experiences with the participant.
FOR THE COMPANY AS A WHOLE
As a general rule, it is important to be aware of any bad experiences that participants or raters may have had which could make them resistant to participating enthusiastically in the project. Find out about these experiences and promise everyone that this project will not be like that – and stick to that promise. Some things to look out for:
Staff suspicion
Staff in any organisation can get curious or even suspicious about any unusual activity – such as having executives and senior management take part in some exercise in which a lot of people are asked to participate. “What’s going on here? What are they doing? What will happen afterwards?” are all questions that can commonly occur, especially in companies where trust levels are low. This can potentially poison the atmosphere in which the 360° feedback project is taking place.
Risk Mitigation: The company should ensure that anyone who might be touched by the project knows what it is, and why it is happening. If it is part of a leadership or management development programme, say so. And make it clear that the intention is that the benefits of improved leadership should have a positive effect for everyone in the company. In the past, Thornhill has been asked to address all the staff online to explain what 360° feedback is, and how the process works. Later we were asked to give feedback to the staff on how the project went, without betraying any confidential information. This may not be possible in all cases, but it is something to consider.
Inadequate follow up
Since a 360° project is a substantial undertaking, there is a risk that everyone concentrates on getting it done, rather than making full use of the leadership development potential that the project should unleash. This will create disappointment amongst participants and skepticism about similar or other leadership development programmes in the future.
Risk Mitigation: The whole point of the 360° feedback exercise is to have leaders gain insight into their strengths and possible areas of improvement, create a personal development plan and implement it over a period of months or even years, with assistance and regular check-in from their manager or a coach. It’s essential that time and resources are committed to this process.
This is the final article in the series that will help you think through your 360° feedback project in more detail to best achieve the objectives that you have set.
Thornhill consultants will gladly answer any questions you may have to ensure the successful implementation of a 360° feedback process in your organisation.
For more information on Thornhill’s various products and services for all levels within your organisation, please contact us on admin@thornhill.co.za.
Written by Cedric de Beer