Most if not all organizations strive to evaluate their employees toward constant improvement. However, traditional performance management solutions are seen as inadequate at assessing performance. Organizations are looking for news ways to truly develop and motivate their employees.
To that end, many organizations have begun to implement 360 reviews and self reviews and when implemented correctly, these reviews have a great power to create a full profile of your employees’ strengths and weaknesses.
Benefits of 360 and self reviews
What is 360-degree feedback?
360-degree feedback has been a buzzword for many years. It is a method that provides each employee the opportunity to receive performance feedback from peers, their direct reports (if applicable), and their manager. 360-degree feedback allows each individual to understand how their performance is being perceived by people they work with.
There are many benefits with 360-degree feedback including that they (i) provide feedback to employees from a variety of sources, (ii) reduce blind spots and rater bias, (iii) develop and strengthen teamwork, and (iv) reveal developmental areas.
What are self reviews?
Self reviews give employees the opportunity to reflect on their performance and their contributions. It is a great way for employees to truly reflect on their performance.
There are many benefits with self reviews including that they (i) improve self awareness of the individual and their manager, (ii) increase employee accountability, and (iii) help employee examine and clarify goals.
Implementing 360 reviews and self reviews
While more and more companies are integrating 360-degree feedback and self reviews into the review process, some are finding that it’s not going as smoothly and easily as they had hoped. This can be due to large degree of data collection and processing. Moreover, if these reviews are conducted in an unstandardized process or completely in a hasty and incomplete fashion, they may not add any value.
Below we list some tips to successfully implement 360 and self reviews.
1) Provide the right education
If your organization wants to implement 360-degree feedback and self reviews, ensure that your employees first understand the benefits. If the employees do not understand why are they are doing the reviews, chances are the data you receive may be inaccurate.
2) Invest in the right tools
One important note is to consider how you will document this feedback – does your current performance management solution allow for 360-degree feedback and self reviews? Are the tools intuitive? Can data be easily retrieved? How will you use the data? Will peers be able to see other people’s feedback or will you anonymize the results? Investing the right tools and educating your employees on these tools is crucial to truly harness the power of these reviews. If you are looking for a simple 360 feedback software or a performance review software, check out Pavestep!
3) Keep it simple
Yes, you want to get as much data as possible. But if reviews are too long, employees will not want to fill it out, and if they do, it may not be accurate. A simple solution is to keep things simple! Keep the review to 5 questions or less. If you are investing in a review tool, make sure that the tool is customizable so you can ask the most relevant questions to your employees.
Does your company utilize self or 360 reviews? Let us know!
