I am still intrigued that after many years in use in organisations all over the world, there are still instances where 360 Degree Feedback is used in completely the wrong way, and the for the wrong reasons.
The latest gem is this one (from New Zealand*): it seems that someone who already had a history of difficult relationships made a comment about ‘working with idiots’ in her performance review.
Subsequent to this, and because of the poor performance appraisal (my italics), the individual was then given a 360 Degree Feedback review, where apparently, ‘up to 80 people’ were invited to provide her with anonymous feedback. The upshot was that a court agreed that, in those circumstances, she had been ‘disadvantaged’ by the 360 Degree Feedback review. Whilst the 360 was not the only element in this story, it was a factor in this individual winning her case against the employer for constructive dismissal and $15K in compensation.
None of this is surprising; where 360 Degree Feedback brings the best value is when it is part of an open, agreed and two-way process between feedback givers and feedback receiver. It needs to be specific, structured (so it’s not just random feedback depending on the mood of the feedback givers that particular day), and it should be part of an overall process.
So how did this organisation get it so badly wrong?
“The performance appraisal resulted in Ms Henderson being subject to a review, known as a 360 degree feedback review”. It was already clear that this employee had difficult relationships with her co-workers, a fact borne out by the appraisal discussion. Why then did the employer decide to run a 360 for her? Was it to avoid making a decision based on the manager’s view? To get more evidence because the employee was being difficult and it would be easier to quote anonymous colleagues?
Our advice is never to use 360 Degree Feedback as an excuse or cover up for a bad line manager relationship (i.e. to save the line manager having to give difficult feedback). Even more importantly, don’t use 360 as a way of trying to deal with an employee who is underperforming or difficult to manage. 360 Feedback depends for its power on the strength of working relationships, trust and a willingness to learn.
Where there is lack of trust or poor relationships, it’s probably one of the worst things you can do.
Following on from the first point, I would advise my clients never to run a 360 for one person alone.
Inviting feedback on one individual will quickly signal to all his or her colleagues that there is a problem, which will in turn add to that person’s discomfort, and the conscious or unconscious biases of those colleagues in the feedback they give.
“Ms Henderson was faced with the prospect of up to 80 people giving anonymous feedback about her…”
It’s sometimes mistakenly believed that the more feedback you get in a 360, the better. This simply doesn’t make sense. 360 works best when the feedback is credible and valid for the person receiving it – and a big part of that credibility lies with who is providing that feedback.
If I believe that the people giving me feedback are able to give true and accurate observations, because they have worked with me in the recent past, I will be more inclined to take the feedback on board, than if I think a large group of people who only know me from occasional meetings are being invited to do so. No-one can possibly work with 80 people closely enough for those people to be able to give effective and meaningful feedback. In such a case, most of the feedback would be very general, lacking credibility and hence completely unhelpful.
360 works well when an individual gets feedback from colleagues with whom he or she has worked with closely (realistically between 8 and 12 at most), and within the previous 12 months.
In summary then, here are the key tips for how not to use 360 Degree Feedback:
- Don’t use 360 to cover up poor management or difficult conversations. Employees should be having one to one, regular discussions with their managers – not hearing about issues for the first time from anonymous feedback.
- Don’t assume that the feedback will be better the more people are invited to give it; whilst it’s important to have enough feedback to provide consistency of message, quantity certainly does not mean quality.
- Don’t single out individuals for 360 Degree Feedback. It should be part of a bigger activity, for example a training, development or coaching programme, that is aimed at a group of employees with common objectives. In this way, it does not ‘pick on’ specific employees in a very public and potentially humiliating way. In fact, when in this way, 360 will quickly gain a reputation in the organisation for being a remedial tool, rather than one for supporting development and change, which is where its value lies.
