360-degree Feedback, 360-degree Evaluation 360, 360-degree Questionnaire, never mind what you call it, the 360-degree concept shows that it is just as effective for collective analysis of relationships within the company as for the personal development of each individual.
However, if the content and engineering of the questionnaire are key and often well taken into account by HR firms, the tool itself counts for a great deal in the adhesion and commitment of employees
Duration, presentation, dissemination, restitution, confidentiality, costs: an overview of good practices for the roll-out of your 360-degree feedback from a software perspective..
An analysis initiated by the XPERTEAM customers, for whom using the Quiz Manager evaluation solution has already democratised the use of 360-degree feedback.
The good length/duration ratio
"This questionnaire will take you 15 minutes" - a promise that is rarely kept in practice: answering a 360-degree questionnaire takes time and requires reflection.
With an average of 50 to 80 questions from several analysis angles, you can quickly run over the recommended 20 minutes and dent respondents' motivation.
➔ Your software must offer a matrix presentation of the questions, which will lighten the process, provide an overall view of a dimension and optimise data entry time.
Above all, respondents must be able to break off without having to go back to the beginning.
Feedback and Feedforward versus evaluation
"He/she is committed to his/her customers and commercial partners – DEFINITELY DO NOT AGREE"
While MCQ questions are essential to provide a collective analysis grid that meets the company's HR challenges, it must also be possible to collect and restore the feedforward from the main respondent and the feedback from other employees in the form of comments. A particularly sensitive point when the feedback mentions behaviours needing improvement.
➔ The software must also be able to add visuals that bring a human and caring dimension to the questioning process.
Progressivity and personal development
"He/she accepts criticism and learns from his/her mistakes"
The 360-degree is a questionnaire like no other. It often affects our individual positioning, our relationship with the company, our teams, our manager and sometimes our values. Even when well run and anchored in the company's culture, the exercise is not always obvious and raises personal questions..
➔ Progressivity is key in encouraging commitment and adoption and the tool should ideally allow the questionnaire to be launched without forcing feedback from the outset, first in self-diagnosis mode (90), then in mentoring mode with a coach or manager (180) and finally in 360 mode. Above all, everyone must be able to take ownership of their results at each stage, from self-diagnosis to feedback.
Anonymisation, confidentiality, right to be forgotten
"V. spends more time on her reporting than with her teams, she is never available"
To be adopted as a personal development or behavioural awareness tool in the company, anonymisation of feedback, but also protection and confidentiality of the data entered by the respondents, are key issues.
➔ Ability to purge certain results legally at the request of the employee or at the end of the employment period, secure access to the data and anonymous or non-anonymous responses are all required features..
Individual and collective monitoring
While the ability to render information in real time is important, the quality of the analysis report and graphic representations are hugely important for adoption and motivation to progress.
➔ A careful graphic representation, highlighting strong points and areas for development, possible discrepancies between my personal vision and that of "others" (peers, collaborators, management), allowing several levels of summary or detailed reading are essential and the report must allow for immediate interpretation, even before serving as a tool for dialogue with the manager, mentor or HR.
Agile facilitation plan
More than any other questionnaire, the 360-degree must bring together enough respondents to be relevant.
➔ The 360-degree tool must incorporate facilitation functions: invitation to primary respondents, monitoring requests for feedback, reminders.
Quite often, however, this facilitation is delegated to the HR firm in charge of the project. This firm, subject to its own constraints in terms of consolidating and restoring information in a timely manner, often imposes essential deadlines for the campaigns. This rigidity has an impact on the respondents' perception of the programme.
➔ Having control over your own tool brings this useful flexibility to overrun the schedule slightly, collect a few extra responses and get everyone on board
Pooled, multi-lingual, with delegated management
The 360-degree is frequently a group project, potentially rolled out multi-lingually in each subsidiary.
To avoid being overwhelmed by the administrative workload, the group HR must therefore give itself the option of delegating part of the facilitation to the subsidiaries/BU, whilst retaining the central vision.
➔ the software solution must allow the same questionnaire to be distributed in each language without losing the effects of a global consolidation on the same analysis focal points. It should also be used to delegate the facilitation for participant registration, reminders and analyses, etc.
Optimised costs for a democratised approach
€50 to €80 per passage for collective feedback - €1,200 to €2,000 for feedback with individual coaching: the 360-degree questionnaires are often proposed by HR firms as a package, including the engineering of the questionnaire, its distribution, its statistical consolidation and its restitution, sometimes with individual coaching. Hence the fairly high cost, which puts the brakes on democratising the approach and reserves it, especially in France, for a managerial, talent or high potential target.
➔ Keeping control of the tool yourself can reduce the unit cost substantially, by capitalising on a use base covering all the variations of your questionnaires created in-house or with the help of an HR consultant.
To find out more about roll-out methods and use cases, please e-mail our Sales and Marketing Department atcontact@xperteam.net
