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In this blog post are an abundance of tantalising pointers around the theme of 360 degree review projects.

Goal-setting theory addresses the relationship between goals, motivation, and performance. Goals are a source of motivation and that they serve to direct behavior. To positively influence performance, however, two conditions must be met: individuals must have a clear understanding of what the goal entails, and they must accept the goal as something that is worth accomplishing. Reviews are a critical part of any effective performance management strategy. And while traditional performance reviews — which allow supervisors to provide feedback to their direct reports — can be helpful, gathering feedback from multiple sources at different levels of the organization can be an even more effective approach to employee development. Readers of the 360 degree feedbackwill be wanting and waiting to find out where they did worst so you may as well give them the answer sooner rather than later. [I remember inventing the term “lowlights” for this section after a trip to the hairdresser!] If you want a positive feel then you need to list fewer lowlights than highlights. The appropriate numbers could then be five highlights and four lowlights for a 50-item survey, seven highlights and five lowlights for a 90-item survey. This trick gives a positive feel regardless of the level of ratings. 360 degree feedbackmay be about broad overarching issues like governance, aligning vision and purpose, financial acumen and business outlook, technical and functional skills, accountability, problem-solving, engaging and responding to stakeholders or thought leadership – as the requirement might be. If you’ve decided that you want to use 360-degree reviews within your organisation, then you’ll want to make sure you measure the right skills. Use empirical research to determine which competencies actually matter to your company’s performance – don’t just run headfirst into your 360-degree performance review using metrics that a senior executive thinks are a good idea. If the purpose for having 360-degree feedback is not clear, if it's not integrated with the other systems, and if there is a history of mistrust because of abuse or poor communication, it will come across more like a fad-and go the way fads usually go. Considerable literature supports the use of norms for traditional organizational surveys, but 360 degree feedbackis distinctly different from these surveys. Many users expect to see norms in multisource assessment processes because many vendors provide them using the same methodology as norms for organizational climate and culture surveys. Before investing in the comparison to other organizations' 360 degree feedbackscores, decide if such information adds value. Usually, in 360 degree feedbackengagements, the wuestionnaire has a fair number of questions that aim to capture optimal responses while not causing boredom or disinterest in the respondent. Typically, the size of the questionnaire is approximately10 competencies to rate and 3-5 subjective questions to respond to. Not only do you gather the best feedback, you also get results you can understand right away with 360 feedback. You also have the ability to integrate your feedback into the systems you use every day. You’ll maximize the ROI potential of your organizational 360 initiative if you plan for follow-up. A private one-on-one session between participants and a trained facilitator can enhance the impact of the 360 feedback process. Insightful 360 feedback, followed by or integrated with a coaching experience can reinforce development, can further extend the learning. Making sense of 360 appraisal eventually allows for personal and organisational performance development.Talent Review ProcessesCustomer involvement in 360 degree feedbackenhances strategic alignment. Customer input and feedback can play a critical role in linking a 360-degree feedback process to an organization's business strategy. Again, customer involvement in both defining performance criteria and providing feedback is critical to establishing that important strategic linkage. Organizations can gain access to credible, quantitative information to understand organizational strengths and weaknesses, leadership gaps, and training needs more fully through the 360 degree process. This information is much more useful than relying on intuitive judgment or responding to those who are making the most noise. No wonder there are insecurities and ambiguities about the right role and place for HR. If it is doing a fine job of enabling change then it is likely to be somewhat invisible unless it is positioned in a strong way. Selling HR and its value is a whole challenge in itself. 360 degree reviews have the power to clarify expectations by identifying behaviors that promote team objectives and values. For example, let’s say your team recently wrapped up a big project. The 360 degree feedbackindicates that they were excellent at meeting deadlines, but still made some mistakes that slowed down the process. This makes it clear to the team that time management is one of their strengths, while detail-orientedness is an area they could improve on for the next project. There is no evidence to specify the ideal number of 360 degree raters, however consultants usually suggest between four and ten. A minimum number of raters should be set to maintain anonymity: if there are too few they may be identified by the recipient. What is of greater importance is who the raters are. Those who interact most frequently with the employee undertaking a survey will be able to give meaningful feedback on them. People need to feel in control of their destiny - that is why a clear understanding of 360 feedback software is important to any forward thinking organisation.User surveys may be used to determine whether employees would feel comfortable using 360 degree feedbackfor appraisal and pay purposes. When participants see added value in this process and trust the results, they tend to recommend its use for performance appraisal and pay. A strong desire among employees to use the system to support appraisal and pay purposes is the most critical issue in process validation. Only one behaviour should be questioned at a time in a 360 degree feedbacksystem, not two and not three – eg if you ask “How well does he plan resources so the team can achieve high standards of performance?” you are asking about planning, organising of resources, managing of the team and setting of standards. This is four questions. All may be relevant but a low rating on this item will leave the focus confused about what they have to do more or less of. 360 degree feedbackdraws on the principles of wider involvement and consultation evident in employee attitude and opinion surveys, but with a focus on individual performance rather than organisational culture and climate. One important way an organization can address process concerns is by creating an appeals procedure. Employees want to know that an appeals process is in place, and they want to know how it works with the 360 degree feedbacksystem. The appeals procedure offers a valuable step in process validation. A variety of these processes have been developed. Although it can be laborious and complex to get it right, there is no better source of evidence for an executive’s reputation, and no better way to enhance their self-awareness, than through 360 degree feedback. Nonetheless, a keen understanding of what is 360 degree feedback can be seen to be a multifaceted challenge in any workplace.Listening, Making Safe And Deep Questioning360 degree feedbackcan help identify developmental needs at an organizational level. For instance, if multiple 360 reviews reveal that employees are struggling with motivation and engagement, it could be an organizational issue, not an individual one. Leadership could then use those reviews to develop a plan to drive employee engagement and motivate their teams. Manager-only feedback can only go so far. If you only spend a couple of hours a week working with your employee, it’s difficult to know how they’re performing the rest of the time and in different circumstances. Even if you work closely with your employee, the manager-employee relationship means that you probably get a very different perspective of their work than their colleagues. 360-degree feedback, on the other hand, gives you a much richer, more comprehensive insight into an employee’s performance. The key process in reaching understanding in a 360 feedback session is that of generating hypotheses whereby a theory about why reviewers are rating as they are is generated (if not a number of theories), and this is checked against the rest of the data (and other observations) to see if indeed it fits. A triangulation of data is the aim, ie three different pieces of data pointing to the same conclusion. This encourages a confidence and is a more robust position than simply referring to one, no matter the validity of the source. A benefit of 360 degree feedbackis that results are documented. The report is relevant and clear. Therefore, even when a supervisor provides no additional feedback or coaching, the employee has quality performance information from 360 degree feedback. The philosophical concept of Naïve Realism explains that each of us thinks we see the world directly, as it really is. We also think that what we see is what everyone else sees. The 360 degree feedbackprocess exposes us to others’ perceptions about our behavior. Fortunately, participants find that most of their multi rater feedback is consistent with their own expectations. Researching 360 degree feedback system is known to the best first step in determining your requirements and brushing up on your understanding in this area.You are probably not doing a 360 degree feedbackproject in order to leave people scarred. You may have the best of intentions but emotional scarring can indeed be the outcome of a 360 project – at a number of levels. 360 degree feedbackis usually anonymous and comes from the employees and others who work with this person. Usually a group of about 8 to 16 individuals are selected to provide feedback by completing a survey questionnaire. These surveys are easily administered via the Internet. Managers and employees want pay and promotion decisions to be fair. Research across large sets of employee groups indicate that users perceive 360 degree feedbackto be more fair than single-rate processes. When these decisions occur in a culture where rewards are based on performance or contribution rather than on seniority or politics, they will be fair. A lack of trust will undermine your 360 degree project. It will go smoothly if you are trusted as a project lead, if the 360 degree feedbacksystem is trusted, if the survey is trusted as relevant and robust, if the coaches are trusted to be professional, skilful and confidential, if reviewers are trusted to provide honest constructive feedback, if participants are trusted to respond maturely and if the senior leaders are trusted to follow through on promises regarding sight of personal data. If some of your team members are scared to share negative feedback about a colleague, then 360 feedback can be a safe space where they are able to flag these issues to their manager and the colleague in question. Supporting the big vision encompassing 360 degree feedback will lead to untold career development initiatives.Healthy InnovationImplementing a 360 initiative can be a complex undertaking. Despite technological advances in data collection and reporting, a lot of people must do what they’re supposed to do for this to work well. When you’re planning the rollout of a 360 feedback initiative, consider carefully both the when and the who. Acceptance of things the way they are is the route to happiness84 and satisfaction. Acceptance can lead you to see why things are the way they are. You might start to see the funny side of things. You can clearly see the consequences of how it is and can come to terms with this. You can start to see alternative strategies or you can be happy continuing exactly with how it is. You can see it as “perfect” – fine exactly as it is. This is a powerful and empowering position and can be your goal for your participants completing the 360 degree feedbacksurvey. Reviewers in 360-degree feedback are divided into groups so that it would be possible to compare the average scores of the groups with each other and with an overall average score. We recommend using groups that are clear to the reviewers so that there are no difficulties with reading review results and understanding which of the reviewers belongs to which group. One can uncover more intel on the topic of 360 degree review projects at this Wikipedia page.Related Articles:Additional Insight With Regard To 360 degree review software systemsFurther Information About 360-Degree appraisal performance dimensionsMore Background Insight With Regard To 360 review applicationsMore Background Findings About 360 appraisal applicationsMore Information On 360 feedback technologiesBackground Findings With Regard To 360-Degree evaluation performance dimensionsFurther Insight About 360 evaluation systems