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The concept of 360-degree feedback isn't new, having originated with the German military during WWII. But perspectives on how it applies in the modern workplace are fresh and rapidly evolving.
One thing experts agree on is that deploying 360 feedback well can benefit companies in profound ways.
“If you’re a leader, and you’re asking yourself, ‘Who are my best leaders? Who’s going to help me go forward?,’ then a well-validated, predictive 360 tool will give you a better result than any other psychological test,” said Joe Folkman, cofounder and president of Zenger Folkman, a firm specializing in 360-degree assessments, leadership and organizational development.
Maury Peiperl, professor of management at George Mason University and co-author of the leading textbook on change management ”Managing Change,” agrees: “Your purely metric-based feedback just doesn't get you there. The main thing that 360 does for us, if it’s done well, is it gets recipients information that we can’t get any other way.”
Organizations use 360-degree feedback in various ways, from formally assessing upper managements’ development needs to enabling ongoing conversation about performance and growth among coworkers. There’s no “right” way to collect or use it, but here are a few tips to help you craft an effective approach.
Make It All About Learning and Development
Perhaps the most important principle is that the process of 360 feedback — or any performance evaluation for that matter — should be about helping workers improve, not about making assessments tied to concrete outcomes like raises, promotions or discipline.
“In order to make this work, the process has to be seen as development,” said Folkman. “If it’s a score of who loses and who wins, that creates a negative culture in the organization. It’s got to be that the organization is helping people learn and grow.”
A lot of that is about messaging, culture and process.
One good step toward achieving that vision is to decouple the 360 process from the usual review cycle.
Get Feedback From a Range of Sources
The key idea of 360 assessments is to seek feedback from those positioned laterally or below the individual being evaluated in the company hierarchy, as well as, when possible, from other stakeholders such as customers.
“You’re sourcing feedback not just downward or upward,” said Amanda Myton, director of Lattice's People Strategy Group. “You’re looking out; you’re looking laterally. It is a very broad view.”
Each feedback provider needn’t know the recipient well. A collection of limited feedback from different sources works together just as well to create a full picture of strengths and growth areas.
“You can get 360 from anybody who knows you reasonably well on at least one important dimension,” said Peiperl.
Related Article: Employee Feedback Apps Aren’t Immune to Bias. Here’s Why.
Encourage Specificity and Active Listening
A benefit of qualitative feedback is that it can be tailored specifically to the receiver and their work. This type of narrow focus allows for particularly helpful insights.
A specific piece of feedback, said Peiperl, would be something like, “When this person did X, it was helpful to Y.”
Jakada Imani, CEO of The Management Center and co-author of “Management in a Changing World,” said if the feedback is being given openly, leaders may find it helpful to have the recipient repeat what they heard. This, he said, helps ensure that the individual understands the specifics correctly and gives them a chance to describe what they plan to do to improve.
Provide Anonymity and Lots of Trust
360-degree feedback can be given within an anonymous or open process. Each approach comes with its advantages and drawbacks.
Folkman, whose organization helps companies set up anonymous 360 processes, said that a manager’s feedback should never be anonymous, but care must be taken to ensure the privacy of all other commenters. To obscure identities, his firm requires a minimum of three people giving anonymous feedback for each recipient.
Additionally, it can be a good idea to engage a third party to do an anonymous process, so that someone outside the organization “owns” the data.
“You want to be in a situation where everybody believes, with good reason, that their answers are completely confidential,” said Peiperl. That being said, “you can do 360 around a table. There’s nothing saying you can’t, but the level of trust has to be much higher. And that actually builds trust, in my experience.”
Myton agrees that trust must be high for people to provide honest feedback on a coworker, which, in the end, comes down to company culture and messaging around the learning-oriented nature of the process.
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“It has to be very intentional, but it can be done,” she said.
Related Article: How to Respond to Frustrating Performance Appraisal Feedback
Provide Pathways to Improvement
What happens after the 360-degree process is just as important as the feedback itself. Feedback recipients need clear pathways for improvement, so they can implement what they’ve learned.
“This whole idea, it blows up in your face if it’s not a process to help people grow and learn and be better leaders,” said Folkman. “What you need is a growth process — a process that helps people to get better and puts people in jobs they love. Without a way for people to improve, it’s just nasty management.”
Watch and Account for Bias
Unconscious bias can make it more likely for women, people of color and young or older workers to receive sharper feedback. Those collecting, vetting and sharing the feedback with recipients need to be thoughtful in framing it to ensure equity, advised Imani.
“For a man, one might say ‘he’s very direct,’ and for a woman or femme, they might say ‘she is shrill and mean,’” he said. “Nobody’s going to call me shrill no matter how shrill I’m being. Feedback can be harmful when it’s muddied up with our biases.”
Related Article: How to Tackle Microaggressions in the Digital Workplace
Use Technology to Help Organize and Share Data
There are no tech tools specifically designed for doing 360-feedback because there’s no one way to conduct this process. But traditional HR and info-management tools can be effective at assisting in the process.
When choosing a tool for 360 feedback, the important elements to look for include effective data management, communication capabilities and the ability to anonymize and store data securely.
The Bottom Line: It’s All About Learning and Improving
A 360-degree feedback process can be a powerful tool to help employees at every level learn and grow. But doing it well takes a thoughtful approach and a company culture that values openness, honesty and vulnerability.
If your employees aren’t open to hearing and accepting the feedback they receive, there’s little to gain from the process.
“This is not a way to make people open to learning,” said Peiperl. ‘It is a way to give them learning they won’t otherwise get.”
