360 Degree Appraisal system

What is 360 degree appraisal system?

It is a process which receives confidential, anonymous feedback about the person from his manager, peers, and direct reports. Eight to Ten Employees who are associated with the employee fill feedback form that asks questions to measure the workplace competencies on a rating scale. The person receiving feedback also fills out a self-rating survey that includes the same survey questions that others receive in their forms.

Individual responses are always combined with responses from other people in the same rater category (e.g. peer, direct report) in order to preserve anonymity and to give the employee a clear picture of his/her greatest overall strengths and weaknesses.

360 degree Appraisal system for non-managers is useful to help people be more effective in their current roles, and also to help them understand what areas they should focus on if they want to move into a management role.

The relationship of 360 Degree Appraisal System with other Human Resource Systems is positive in terms of its utility. It is used for training, team building, career development, succession planning, performance assessment and for monitoring the effects of change training programmes.

360 degree Appraisal system makes better performance of the organization because

• Enhances performance quality

• Provides specific performance feedback
• Targets developmental areas
• Provides strong motivation
• Facilitates performance improvement
• Allows measurement of training effectiveness
• Enhances self-knowledge
• Supports continuous learning
• Improves the reliability and validity of performance information.

There are few inherent difficulties are not unique and common with any appraisal & feedback systems like

• Managers may focus on pleasing subordinates in an effort to get higher appraisal
• The authority of manager could be undermined by the pressure of upward appraisals and the implications of low evaluations for a manager’s status within the organization.
• 360 degree Appraisal System is not focused on basic technical or job-specific skills
• 360 degree appraisal system should not be used to measure strictly objective things such as attendance, sales quotas, etc.
• Managers may also be confused about how to interpret subordinate appraisal relative to ratings from other sources, such as their bosses

In order to reap maximum benefits from the system, the system should have

Senior-Level Support – Senior Managers should participate in the 360 degree feedbackappraisal process and actively pursue their own developmental plans.

Communicating the purpose of the system to all the employees

Proper Planning for the implementation of 360 degree appraisal system

Delivery of Feedback - If feedback is not provided in an appropriate manner, your program could backfire. We recommend using professional, neutral coaches to deliver feedback.

Developmental Plan - Every person who receives feedback needs to create some developmental goals based on the feedback he or she received - and remember - those goals need to be both measurable and achievable.

Accountability - Developmental goals are meaningless unless people are held accountable for achieving them. Make sure your employees and their managers understand how to create S.M.A.R.T. goals - Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic and Timely.

Follow-Up - Plan to solicit additional feedback six to twelve months after the initial data are collected.

Conclusion:

360 degree appraisal system as discussed above has its advantages and disadvantages. However, this has lesser limitations as a performance Management system in comparison to the traditional top-down performance methods. In order to reap the full benefits, organizations need to nurture a value system wherein openness, trust and objectivity are given more emphasis.