360 Feedback: Reduce Your Blindspot! - 

Feedback, or 'the F word' as we refer to it in business terms has powerful connotations and far reaching implications for us all both in business and in our personal lives. However at work, few of us get enough of it, some of us get very little and many of us get none at all!

So what is feedback and what's the point of it?

According to Wikipedia, “feedback is a process of sharing observations, concerns and suggestions between persons (or divisions of an organisation) with an intention of improving both personal and organisational performance”.

Feedback can either be positive (i.e. praise and encouragement) or it can be constructive or developmental (i.e. direction about what could be improved). Positive feedback is designed to build confidence in a person, whilst constructive feedback is designed to build competence and skill.

So what does feedback do for us and the organisation for whom we work? Think of it this way......if you don't receive feedback either positive or otherwise, how will you ever know how others view your skills, characteristics or behaviours? Without feedback you will probably go 'blindly' on doing what you have always done, without the awareness of how doing more of it or changing something might help you and/or those around you. We refer to this as your 'blind spot' because others can see it, but you cannot.

So how can you and your organisation begin to improve the use of feedback?

One of the simplest ways to give and receive feedback is obviously to just sit down and talk to someone. There is an old saying, if you want feedback about yourself then ask for it! Whilst this simplest of methods is used by many, it is still not apparently part of the culture of many organisations that we come across and so it either doesn't get done at all, or it gets done badly. This can be for a number of reasons, but is usually because feedback is only culturally expected to be given 'down the line' by someone more senior; it may be saved up and only ever given in a formal setting such as an appraisal, and/or the person does not have the skill to give it well. There is also a degree of reticence with many line managers who feel that it is uncomfortable to give feedback, especially anything that appears to be negative or critical in some way. For this reason, many avoid it.

So how can you start to get over these issues and help yourself and your colleagues to benefit from well given feedback?

Well there are really two approaches that you can consider as follows:
1. You could invest in a 360º feedback (360 degree feedback) initiative for specific people in your company
2. You could invest in improving the skills and willingness of employees and particularly line managers in giving feedback to others

So what is 360 degree feedback?

360 degree feedback is effectively a formal mechanism for soliciting feedback from a group of people to another person. 360 degree feedback is usually done anonymously (or at least with an element of anonymity) and with modern 'web enabled' systems can be done quickly and easily via email.

360 degree feedback has many really useful specific uses in the business world, and so a relatively small investment, organisations can begin the process of achieving many things.

As an example, 360 degree feedback can be used for the following purposes...

It acts as a 'training needs' analysis and so any subsequent developmental activity can be targeted at the individual(s) who need it, rather than people being 'sheep dipped' through training programmes with no prior knowledge of their needs. This clearly makes the developmental activity more effective, as well as saving money.
If the 360 degree feedback initiative is re run for example 12 months later a second time (many organisations do them annually) this can act as a quantifiable measurement tool for how effective the development activity has been in improving the individual over time. 'Training' is notoriously difficult to measure in terms of its effectiveness so this is a useful measurement device.
It is effectively an appraisal of behavioural performance and many organisations use 360 degree feedback either instead of, or to compliment a more traditional appraisal process.
Feedback helps in determining an organisation's succession plan opportunities, and assessing how 'rich' their bank of people may be for internal promotion
Poor or sub standard performance can often be hard to manage so 360 feedback helps to encourage the person to acknowledge their performance and mindset or skills gaps and take further accountability for their performance.
A 360 degree feedback initiative however is only as good as the questions asked in the first place. It is essential therefore for the organisation to ask the right questions of the people providing the feedback. So for instance, if you want to know how effective any one of a group of line managers are at setting employee objectives, then the question should accurately and clearly reflect the feedback you want.

The second option alluded to above was to improve the skills and competence of the line management within your organisation in the giving of feedback.

There are many development options to help people improve this, many of which your organisation may well be able to do 'in house'. However you do it, it is essential for the person concerned to firstly acknowledge the need for change and improvement. If they don't, then developmental change is unlikely to happen.

360 degree feedback is often a good way to encourage acknowledgment as it effectively introduces people to what may be their blind spot and helps them to see other people's perspectives, often from several people at once.

Once the person has acknowledged the need for developmental change, half the battle is won. They then need to simply gather the knowledge or theory of how to give good feedback, and then have as many opportunities to practice this as possible. These can initially be 'role play' which effectively have no risk attached. When the person is ready they can then move on to 'doing it for real' with one of their own direct reports and steadily build skills and confidence as they go.

So how can we help with your quest to develop the giving and receiving of feedback in your organisation?

Well, we can help with both of the two approaches we have suggested. We have our own 'in house' web 360 degree feedback system and so can design, facilitate and evaluate a complete 360 degree feedback initiative within your organisation surprisingly cost effectively. Have a look at our 360 degree feedback demo page, or you can even talk to us about a free live trial.

Alternatively, we can help your people to be more confident and capable about giving and receiving feedback. We can do this either by designing and facilitating a bespoke training workshop for a group, or we can develop individuals via a coaching session medium.

We are also able to make any workshops we run (and particularly on this type of topic) highly experiential and interactive by running them at our very own state of the art training and meetings venue in Nottingham. Here we have one of our suites designed with this type of training in mind, where the main training room has a digital recording device and is linked up to a neighbouring meeting room which is fitted with high resolution colour cameras and a ceiling microphone. Delegates can therefore practice the giving of feedback with each other (or actors who can be hired to play that role) and the outputs recorded and reviewed as part of the training experience.