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online feedback system
Online 360 feedback tools are a genuine help to anyone who has ever used one.
- Want to know what your clients think of you?
- Want to get some greater information out of your teams about your own management group?
- Want to get some more honest and valuable feedback from the people working around specific individuals?
Let us explain...
what is 360° feedback?
360° feedback is a report generated by compiling the perspectives of a number of selected respondents (contributors or raters). The process is commonly used as a vital information-gathering tool in the following contexts:
- To complement and enhance the annual appraisal process or performance development reviews
- In the form of a Client Survey, to gather and understand the all-important feedback from clients on the levels and quality of service being delivered
- As an aid to clients needing to identify their specific needs for development training in order to cultivate the best results and consequently the best value from their training investment.
The whole process is run online and is seen as giving significant benefits over a ‘standard’ feedback mechanisms where the appraiser (line manager/ client representative) will meet solely with the appraisee (team member/account manager). The benefits of the greater involvement are:
- The report provides a very powerful insight into the performance of the appraisee from a variety of viewpoints
- The appraisee has significantly more valuable information on which to act
- A fairer assessment of competence by managers who appraise team members with whom they do not work very closely
- Vastly improved self-awareness in the appraisee
- Broader confirmation of strengths held by the individual/organisation being appraised
- The differing perceptions from the various contributors or raters often create a broader discussion
- Exhibition of an open culture of communication between managers/team members or clients/service providers
- Clearer focus on action plans for development
Each of the respondents is asked to complete a questionnaire that asks them to score and comment on the person. The questionnaire is based on facets of service/behaviours that are expected to create high performance in the appraisee. The results are then compiled into a feedback report for analysis. The report indicates detailed results in various sections, finishing with a summary on both areas of success and where development may be required.
Typically, 360° feedback would be applied in an annual appraisal context. This will usually involve the appraisee themselves, their manager, selected peers and selected people that the appraisee manages – 4 dimensions.
The process can sometimes also be called 180° or 540° – with the difference being the number of respondent ‘groups’ or dimensions. A 180 degree could be just the person and their manager, the person and their peers, the person and the people they manage or a service provider and their client – but still just 2 dimensions.
540° degree is where additional groups are asked to contribute – for example in an annual appraisal, you may request feedback from several customers and other stakeholders in addition to their manager, peers, direct reports – in total, 5 or more dimensions.
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what questions can we ask?
There are various sets of template questionnaires for all management grades and other role types. The system also has the capability of completely customising the list of questions that are asked. Sets of questions are often agreed between ALP and the client in order to extract the appropriate information that can then be acted upon.
Because of this ability to customise, other applications of the system can range from internal departmental/divisional analysis to externally based customer satisfaction surveys.
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how does the system work?
The 360° system allows ALP to complete all of these steps – with some additional features that enable us to customise the process and brand the ‘look and feel’ to that of our clients.
The system contains a series of modules to simplify the management process:
- Template: Create a template to contain:
Custom branding (of the on-line questionnaire and the report)
Your own questionnaire design with a selected scoring scale
A Custom e-mail invitation
Your choice of report layout (including adding custom text pages)
Preview the ‘look and feel’ of the template
- Appraisal: Select respondents and send the questionnaires:
Add additional people
Select their relationship to the appraisee
- Feedback: Monitor the response rate:
Send e-mail reminders
Generate reports
- Reports: View and download the completed report:
Create folders to store and manage compiled reports
what are the principle steps in the process?
There is a simple chronology in the steps of the process which are:
- Select the appraisee group
- Create a questionnaire
- Select the respondents per appraisee
- Distribute the questionnaires
- Set timescales for people to respond with their completed questionnaires
- Generate the report from the responses gathered
- Reports returned to the client for their action/use
who should be involved?
Typically 8 to 10 people are asked to be involved. The power of the process is realised when you ask colleagues and contacts who have ‘observed’ the person operate at work – people who have worked with this person closely.
For a true 360° result within an Annual Appraisal application the following parties should be consulted:
- The ‘manager’ of the person being appraised.
- People who have a similar role, (known as ‘peers’) and preferably at least two in number
- People directly managed by the person (‘direct reports’).
- In addition to these, we must not forget the person themselves (to allow a direct comparison between ‘self’ scores and others).
In this example, it is normal to send questionnaires to: 1 to self – 1 to manager, 2 to peers – 2 to direct reports and if other groups are used 2 to each other groups. The reason for this is that it ‘protects’ confidentiality of the peers, direct reports as there is no-way of knowing who said what.
And if the context is within a Client Survey application:
- ‘Customers’ – people to whom the person’s work supplies a product, service or process.
- ‘Stakeholders’ – people who have a ‘stake’ in the role of the service provider.
The feedback process will have a set deadline indicating a ‘return date’ for the questionnaires. We then monitor the progress of feedback online and (if required) chase outstanding feedback. Completed (or partially completed) feedback per questionnaire will be included in the final report.
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what does the interface look like?
The system will initially send out an email invitation to all contributors – including ‘self’. Access is gained by simply clicking on the link provided in the email.
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