Hello, and welcome to The HR Uprising Podcast.
The HR Uprising is aimed at forward thinking HR learning and O.D. professionals, who want to elevate the way HR is perceived in their organisations, and deliver real lasting value. This Podcast and our online community, #HRUprising, is, for people in our profession, who want to make a difference. We all want to share that knowledge and expertise with others, and by doing so, rise up in our careers.
We know that HR can be tough and demanding at times. That means we don’t always have time, or I certainly don’t have time to prioritise our own development. So, podcast can be a really flexible and digestible way of freshening up our thinking. This is something that I discovered myself personally very recently. You can pop on a podcast when you’re walking the dog or doing your exercise. It’s a great way of freshening up our thinking and practice.
So, with this in mind, this is one of our earlier episodes. So, for those of you just tuning in, I’ll introduce myself in a moment, and I’ll also give you a feel of what the show is going to be about.
So, the first few episodes, probably the first 6 or so are going to be about specialist HR topics, the sort of things that we get consulted on regularly. We’ll be talking about best practice. I will share my experience, which you’re welcome to. But I’m not saying that I know everything. We will be then moving through to our conversations with pieces, where we’re going to get some really good, we’ve got some great people lined up to talk to, while we’ll hear from other HR professionals or advisors to the HR field about the sort of things, that they consider to be of use to us, that will help us raise our game. So, that’s what The HR Uprising is about.
Just to introduce myself, in case you didn’t tune in for Episode 1. Ny name is Lucinda Carney. So, I’m actually a Chartered Psychologist with 15 years corporate experience. So, within my corporate life, I was a senior HR professional. Actually, I was in learning and developments. Then since then, since 2009, I spent 10 years as a Founder and CEO and dogsbody sometimes it feels like, of Actus Software. I’ve been working with that business for 10 years now. We’ve got it to a place, where it’s established.
So, I’m now really excited that I’m able to get involved in more consultancy, more value-add, hopefully, and making a difference, because that’s really what I’m passionate about. So, I ended up being the O.D. Consultant, I guess at Actus. That’s one of the things I feel quite comfortable with. Through that experience, I’ve been really fortunate to work closely with a large variety of businesses.
So, I’ve worked closely with organisations in the NHS, education, not-for-profit, financial services, manufacturers, shipping. You name it, we’ve worked with them. That breadth of experience is really what’s convinced me, that it’s time to have this sort of podcast. And HR Uprising is our title. But really, it’s about collaboration. And it’s about learning across sectors. We are all feeling the same pains, believe me. It just may vary based on culture or size of the organisation.
So, this subject this week, we just had to start somewhere, was, about the Pros and Cons of 360 Feedback. I think what has triggered me to talk about this first, was, the fact that we’re getting more and more people coming through asking for 360 feedback. It has been something that some organisations do use it within appraisal, and it’s really embedded. Others want to use it.
My fear, is that, it’s seen as a bit of a panacea. I think it should come with a health warning. So, that is what I wanted to cover, really. So, we can have a think about, how we can use it really effectively, if that’s something you’re considering introducing in your organisation. You might already be using it, and using it really well, or hopefully there’s some tips that we can share with you.
So, during this episode, I’m going to explain what 360 feedback is, when it works well, and also the common pitfalls that you might want to avoid. If you’re actually delivering 360, I’ll share some tips about doing it effectively. We’ll talk about maybe the sort of culture, where you’re going to get the best out of 360, if you’re considering bringing it in.
So, definition a bit first. What is 360 feedback anyway?
Well, it, kind of, says it in the name. It’s what it says on the tin, the Ronseal moment. It’s a process of obtaining feedback from a variety of sources. So, usually, you get from your manager, upward, downwards from your team and sideways from your peers, or you might have customers. But basically, that’s what you are saying, is you’re getting the term 360, because you’re getting feedback from all around you.
Then these feedback sources, they should be asked a series of questions, which would typically be, behavioural. That’s quite important, because if they are behavioural questions, i.e., things that you say or do, then they can comment on their experience. I think that leads to one of the challenges actually, as the sort of questions that people find difficult, is, as if the questions are things that people haven’t had chance to experience so they don’t feel able to comment.
So, each feedback source will then answer on a scale, commonly 1 to 5 or probably 1 to 6, is preferable, if you are choosing those, because you’re having people get off the stance. I’m sure you’ve all heard about the central effect. If you have 5 points, people are more likely to go for 3. Well, they say that. I’m not sure that’s always the case with 360. I’ve got some separate tips on that later about, if you are somebody who is completing some 360.
So, you might get a 360 question that says, how effective is Jane at delivering results against deadlines? All those different sources are then going to respond with a score ranking to the extent, to which they agree or disagree with it. So, 1 might be not at all. 5, always or consistently. Then these scores should be sorted basically, into representative groups. I’m using my arms here.
But you’ve got to imagine a graph now in front of you. So, you get a bar chart. You basically on that bar chart, you’re going to see at the top, the individual’s response, and then the manager’s response. So, that would be individually visible, which is important to note, if you’re a manager of others. Sometimes that scares people or shocks them. Then typically, the others would be grouped. So, their responses would be anonymised. We do that, say, 3 responses against peers, and 3 responses against customers. So, that’s the way you might see it.
The ones we use, we try to actually apply categories to the responses. So, you might have something, which would be, leadership behaviours or team behaviours. There would be different behaviours, the questions that were aligned against those. That then means you can have a nice spider graph, which helps people see their relative skills. So, you might have leadership on one area of it, as the team skills, didn’t I, analytical skills, strategic thinking. So, you get that vision, of where your relative strengths and gaps are.
Now, remember one key thing about 360, is, it is just perception. But it’s a really great tool, if it’s managed well. I’d say actually, it’s a really great tool for development, though I’m starting to hint at my preference here. I think it’s a good development tool. I have reservations about using it for appraisal, although I do recognise a lot of businesses do, do that at the moment.
Now, I’m going to step in here now with an example, that I came across literally a couple of weeks ago. In this situation, the manager had scored their person, 2’s and 3’s out of 6. But all of the peers and the team members have rated 5’s and 6’s. So, on that spider graph or on a bar chart, that showed a massive difference of opinion. Actually, it could be hugely damaging.
Now, it wasn’t my actual… I didn’t run the coaching session. It was someone else who’s running it. But that did say a lot to me about the managers in there. Did that manager realise, first of all, that their feedback could be individually identifiable? Secondly, was that going to come as a shock to the individual? Because actually, if you do not think that someone is performing in a certain area, you do not want to just tell them through a 360 bar chart. So, I felt it raised a number of questions that had I been the internal L&D professional within that organisation, I would have wanted to talk to the manager, almost before I actually spoke to the individual.
So, I feel that, if you are going to do 360 feedback, it needs to be introduced very carefully. You need to ensure that all of the respondents recognise, that they are going to be visible, that what they put down on paper actually can come across more stringently, more hard hitting than something that you might say in person. Really, the first place for feedback should always be face to face.
So, what I don’t actually know, whether or not that was developmental, and whether the individual did already know that. But one of the points I’d make, is, although I said, people have a tendency to mark centrally, go for 3’s out of 5s, in my experiences that that isn’t the case with 360 feedback. My experience, is that, people want to avoid conflict, and they tend to mark in the higher points. That’s why possibly having a 6-point scale is better, because then people will give feedback slightly more gently. So, their range might be 4’s, 5’s and 6’s.
Sorry, I’m not sure, if this is being clear here. But basically, they might say, where they think you are really good at something, let’s say, it exceeds or exceptional, demonstrates exceptionally well. Where they think you’ve got a bit of a gap, they might say, demonstrates sometimes. So, rather than say, it doesn’t demonstrate at all. So, it’s just less hard hitting. And it comes over in a more developmental way.
Then if you’re the coach, and this is my second point, is first of all, if you’re introducing it into an organisation, you need to brief people so they understand what they are doing, the purpose of the feedback, the way in which feedback can be written to be constructive. Then secondly, I believe strongly that 360 feedback should be followed up with some sort of neutral coach. So, therefore, that’s a big investment. So, if someone needs to spend an hour or so chatting to the individual about their report so they understand and get value out of it.
Now, that’s so important, understanding and getting value out of it using a coach, because otherwise, we are all human beings. Our tendency, is, to go straight to the negatives. They will literally drive straight in, and they might have an overall report, which is glowing, and they will drill into that one small point. And they, oh, I knew they didn’t like me, or I knew that this was bad.
So, that’s why you need somebody who’s going to set the scene, and I’ll point out the key ways, in which, you can do that later. But someone who’s going to ensure that, that experience of having the 360 is sort through, it’s reflective, and they walk away from it feeling positive, feeling they’ve learned something about themselves, and knowing what to do next. What you don’t want, is, for them to feel damaged. If you let someone just read their own 360 and do it on their own, they might.
On that point, again, if you’re someone who is administering or managing a 360 programme in your organisation, my preference, and this is how we used to do it in the organisation I worked with. We used to roll out 360s. I would say, it took us probably 3 years to get the culture of the organisation to a point, where they actually would give quality feedback, where people would write comments. When we first started out, people would just fill out the from, because they had to. Then they wouldn’t write any comments.
So, you have to give the organisation time to mature. But then I think I remember looking back after 3 years and thinking, wow, how far we’ve come. People start to trust it, if it’s managed well. If it isn’t managed well, then they won’t, and it will become negative.
So, I use that trust word there. How do you build trust?
Well, you build trust by being consistent, and delivering it in a consistently safe way. So, we told people how to do it. We told them that they would be visible. We set expectations about completing it. Actually, we got the leaders within the organisation to complete these first and go through the feedback. So, they then responded when asked the feedback from others. They also realised the value of quality feedback. So, they had trust and by then responding to the people below them, that helped.
We also build trust, by saying that, this is something, which was, they would be individuals. It was for people’s development. We were very clear about the purpose of the 360. So, we told people it was for their development. That meant that the individual would get an hour with the coach, a neutral coach from Learning and Development. They would walk away with some development points.
We always recommended that they shared those development points, and actually thanked people who gave them feedback, and said what they had learned. But it wasn’t compulsory. We’d also tell people that their feedback was theirs to keep, but we would recommend that they shared it with their manager. But we wouldn’t make them. So, that actually built trust. I suppose initially, people were suspicious, and thought there would be lots of feedback, but people build trust.
Now, there were a few notable exceptions. Again, this is where it links into how you manage that feedback session as a coach, where I remember one particular sales director, who shall remain nameless, but if anyone knows me will know exactly who I’m talking about, who stormed across the sales floor saying, who gave me this feedback? Seriously, people were cowering. That actually scarred a load of people in that department for some months about their feedback. People would then only give positive comments. So, it’s really important you manage it so it is a constructed good experience with people. People trust it, and they trust you.
Over time, we found though that 360 became a really useful tool for development in this organisation, and we used it. All of the senior managers would get a 360 feedback once every 2 years. So, we had a rolling cycle, where it was about self-development and reflection. We also would use it during leadership programmes. So, it was a way, in which, you could get some data about whether or not, people’s behaviours have shifted as a result of spending money on them.
Let’s say, they’ve been on an 18-month leadership programme. Have they changed their behaviours? It also gave people an area to focus on in terms of their development. So, it was a really useful tool as a development tool, certainly. That was my experience. But it was about setting the scenes to make it as safe as possible. And that’s how you get constructive experiences from it.
One other point that I thought about last week again, I was consulting in an organisation, is, whether or not the coach should send the report to the individual to look at in advance of the coaching session. Now, in that organisation, they did do it, and they would send it 24 hours before, not too long before.
With our organisation, we didn’t do it. The reason we didn’t do it, is because we would set the scene. I had to say, that is my preference. Even though it does make it feel a little bit like, people are getting nervous in the build-up to the coaching session. It means that you can sit there, and I’d talk later about the sort of things I would say as a coach, at the start of a session, to set the scene positively.
You could do that. You could control how that person was going to react, by sending it 24 hours in advance. They had already looked at it. So, they had that first emotional reaction. That said as a coach, I would absolutely say, you must look at that feedback and think, what is my first question going to be? One of the great ones is here to say, what are you expecting? It’s like that can help a hell of a lot. I’ll mention that later.
So, those are some of the key points that I think, we should bear in mind. I think it is probably helpful. I’ll just check my notes to summarise those, because I know I do waffle on a bit. So, if you are going to introduce 360, this is my preference, and this is how I do it developmentally. This is how I think you can make it work well.
First of all, make sure you set the scene to the business. People understand why it’s coming and the rules. They trust that it’s going to be anonymous, or they understand who will see what. Then do what you say you would. Okay. Keep that trust. You can’t come back from that. Ideally, start from the top.
Get the Board and the Senior Management Team to do it first so they go through the experience, because then they are much more likely to respond to others, who will ask them for feedback. It’s very difficult, if people just don’t respond. The cause of that is fear. Okay. People are scared of feedback and that’s a whole different topic that we can talk about. But start off by setting the scene and start from the top.
Then I believe it is something, where you should have a neutral coach. To be honest, if you can’t afford that investment, either in bringing someone in from outside, or training up a coach internally, then I don’t think you should do it. We should only really do it for small number of people. Running the 360 reports is not the cost. The cost is the time of giving quality feedback.
So, it’s a bit like coaching, and it is quite a high value input. So, it’s not really something for the whole organisation. You need to think about why you’re doing it for people. So, we’ve got neutral coach.
I’d also say, I can’t read my own writing here. But make sure people understand it’s about their development so they know what they are going to do with this, and they end up with some development actions. Also, I would say, don’t send it in advance. I would say let the coach to look at it in advance, and then manage the coaching session. So, hopefully those are some key topics that you can take from that theme there.
So, now let’s think about, when it maybe doesn’t work. Well, some of you might have seen the 2016 research by the CIPD, which was, you could do better. Really interesting, actually. They pointed out that people rate differently based on the perceived purpose of feedback. So, they are more likely to be strict in principle, if they think it’s going to be developmental feedback, and more positive, if they think ratings are going to link to pay or job prospects. So, that’s interesting, isn’t it? So, it means that when people are getting a rating, they are not actually honest entirely. Therefore, no one wants to stop you from getting a pay rise, let’s put that way, maybe.
So, we know that as a nation, our managers are not as skilled as they should be, and we really haven’t made great deal of progress in that. If you look at the research, in many ways, we are still way behind lots of other countries. So, therefore, my concern, is, if you say, I’m going to rate you at the end of the year, my manager would sit down with me and say, do you know what? I’d love to give you an exceeds. But I can’t possibly do that, because the ratings say no. I think it’s just going to breed weak, who haven’t got the balls to give proper verbal feedback to their staff. They will hide behind the ratings of others.
As I said earlier, I think it took us 3 years to become mature enough to use 360. That was purely for development. So, if you’re going to introduce 360 in order for you to determine ratings, and we know that the jury is out on ratings anyway, then is it really a good idea? So, that’s one point, just to watch out for in terms of maybe, a health warning of 360.
So, I said earlier that I’d give some tips about how you can set the scene to have a positive 360 feedback session with somebody, if you’re going to do the coaching. So, first of all, my experience, is, it probably has been a 6 to 8-week lag between actually, the feedback giving and you getting to sit down with people, when you consider diaries and chasing people for reports.
So, I would generally sit down with the candidate and say, right, it was 6 to 8 weeks ago. Tell me a bit about how things were going, what you are expecting. How are you feeling about getting this feedback? Why did you choose the people that you chose? You’ll find out, whether they are really nervous, or whether they chose people they thought to get challenging feedback, or just generally get a sense of that person. So, try and put them at ease.
Then what I’d often say, is, I remember having one, where there were a few really big gaps in perception between the individual, who felt that they were doing really well and others not agreeing with that. I always think that’s one of the most difficult positions to coach. But I think, if you ask them what they are expecting. This person said, well, I chose really challenging people. I know actually, they don’t rate me in these areas, and I really wanted to get their feedback. I thought, phew.
So, actually, it was fine. Whereas, had I just gone straight in, I would have been worrying about it. I don’t know, whether it would have been as effectively. So, it’s all about really understanding where the person is coming from. That actually goes back to the point I made earlier about, if you give them the report in advance, they’ve already gone through that psychologically. You haven’t been able to go through that journey with them. So, you don’t exactly know where they are. So, they might arrive saying, oh well, it’s fine, anyway. They might be quite defensive, because the damage has been done.
I spoke to a client recently, who was doing their own 360. He sends them out 24 hours in advance. It was interesting. He said, sometimes, he finds that people go sick. I thought, don’t you think there’s a coincidence between people going sick, when they are having their 360 feedback, and you just having sent the reports? So, to my mind, is, hold onto it, and then manage that first piece so you can make sure it’s positive.
I can honestly say, I have delivered probably 100 plus 360 feedback coaching sessions. And I’ve never had one, where someone has walked out in floods of tears. They might have had a few tears in the middle, but it’s been a constructive experience, and you’re able to take them on that journey.
These are tips that I’d say, if you want to take them on that journey.
- The first one, is, set the scene before you show them the report, and say that this is perception. Perception is reality in someone else’s mind, but it’s not necessarily reality, full stop. All right. It’s something that people perceive about you. You don’t need to accept that. But it might be useful, because actually, if many people perceive it, and it’s not your intent, then that’s useful feedback.
So, for example, if you’re someone who blasts your way into meeting rooms, all positively, firing on all cylinders, and you think it’s all about energy and positivity, and actually you get a feedback, you scare the living daylights out of some of the people you work with, well maybe, that’s useful, because that wasn’t your intent. So, that’s a useful shift in perception, because we don’t all see the world the same way. That’s the point of 360, understanding how different people perceive different things or your behaviours. So, you can choose, and the individual can choose, if they want to carry on delivering those behaviours, barging into meeting rooms, or whether perhaps, they are going to soften their approach.
- The second thing, is, let them know or just remind them that there has been a lag, and it’s a snapshot in time. So, you could have had a blazing row with somebody 6 or 8 weeks ago, and then they completed your 360 feedback. That is going to make a difference to how they complete it. So, it’s a snapshot in time. It’s not necessarily everything. Yeah, equally, you might have done something brilliantly. So, you get a halo effect.
- The third point to remember, is that, people all rate differently. So, we all remember the tough or lenient teachers at school. Workplace and colleagues are no different. So, one person’s 5 might be another person’s 4 or even 3. That’s really important with managers or something like that where the individual score stands out. You might just have somebody who is tough to please. So, you get a 4. When I’m working with them… Sorry, waffling a bit there. But when I’m working with people with that sort of thing, I always say, it’s the pattern of responses more important to look at. So, actually the relative positives or negatives.
- So, you find out everyone’s got a baseline when they are giving feedback on a 360. So, you can see where they go up or down, gives you the relative differences. Feedback is a gift, is, my first point. Again, let people know that. This is a gift, whether you like it, or agree with it. You don’t have to.
So, people have still given the time and effort to complete your form. Bear in mind that sometimes, that’s one of the hardest things, if you’re rolling out 360, actually getting people to respond as I said earlier. Sometimes they are scared of it or too busy. It’s an effort.
So, if you get to a point, where you’re getting really high response rates, or all of your respondents have responded, that’s a real compliment that they have taken the time to give you feedback. So, I do say it would be great, if you can go back. You don’t have to share your report, but thank the people who went through the effort of completing it. It’s really good.
This is something that we got people into a habit of. They would just send an email out saying, thank you so much for contributing to my 360 feedback. I thought you might be interested, that these are a couple of the points that came out. I’m going to be developing in these areas. I’d encourage them to look at strengths as well as areas to develop.
- That links into my fifth, which is, make sure that there are some specific takeaways. There’s no point in doing a 360 report, spending an hour coaching it, and then going, oh that was interesting. So, make sure they commit to some actions, that they want to take forward with. I think that’s quite key. So, I usually say, finish with 3 development points. They would go into their development plan.
So, in conclusion, 360, I think is a really powerful tool, but it can be a little bit risky, if you don’t put it in badly, or if you do put it in badly, sorry, if you implement it badly. The scars of those experiences are long lived. So, just be careful with it, really. I think it’s something that requires commitment as an organisation. You need to invest time in coaching. It’s not maybe, for the entire organisation. Maybe, introduce it in pockets, and develop it over time.
Thank you so much for listening to The HR Uprising Podcast. I really hope it’s been informative and interesting to you. We’re going to be covering loads of really exciting and relevant topics, going forward. We’ve got tunnel management. We’ve got O.D., onboarding, you name it. We’ll be covering things as well as our conversation series. Please do join with us on various social media aspects. You can look up on LinkedIn @LucindaCarney, or on Twitter, or on Instagram. And just look for HR Uprising. We’d love to hear from you. And remember, when we look up together, we rise up together. Thanks for tuning in.
