complete) 360 degree performance appraisal.doc2
TRANSCRIPT
INTRODUCTION
Performance can be measured in many ways. One of the ways that most organizations
use is performance appraisal. According to Longenecker (1997), most organizations throughout
the world regardless of whether they are large or small, public or private, service or
manufacturing, use performance appraisal, with varying degrees of success, as a tool to
achieve a variety of human resource management objectives. Bennett (1987) defines
performance appraisal as the "assessment and analysis of employees' past successes and
failures, and the estimation of their suitability for promotion or training" whereas Yong (1996)
defines performance appraisal as “an evaluation and grading exercise undertaken by an
organization on all its employees either periodically or annually, on the outcomes of
performance based on the job content, job requirement and personal behavior in the position”.
This appraisal could be done annually, twice a year or depends on the need of the organization.
Performance appraisals are essential for the each and every organization. Its purpose is
to review performance of employee for over a period of time. Through feedback get from
performance appraisal, the employees know how well they are doing their job and they can use
the information to improve future performance. Besides that, another purpose of appraisal is to
facilitate decision. It provides information to assist in the Human Resource decisions such as
promotions, transfers, retentions, layoff and salary. Other purpose is to determine individual
training and development needs. From appraisal, employees knew what kind of training, skills
and competencies that they need to give greater contribution to the organization. Lastly, the
most important reason for an organization to have a performance appraisal system is to improve
organizational performance. It allows the organization to communicate performance
expectations to all employees and assess exactly how well each person is doing. When
everyone in an organization is clear on the expectations and knows exactly how he is
performed, it will result in an overall improvement in organizational success.
There are several types of performance appraisal namely General Performance
Appraisal, Technical/Administrative Performance Appraisal, Manager Performance Appraisal,
Employee Self-Assessment, Project Evaluation Review and Sales Performance Appraisal.
Besides these, there is another type of performance appraisal that can make evaluation
of performance becomes more effective which is the 360 Degree Performance Appraisal.
Sometimes called “multi-rater”, the 360 Degree Performance Appraisal is a formal process
whereby an individual receives feedback from multiple individuals or “raters” who regularly
interact with the person being reviewed. The employee’s performance is evaluated by others
such as manager, subordinate, peer, team, customer as well as themselves. What it simply
means is that when it comes to appraisal time, everyone in the organizational chart is able to
appraise everyone with whom they work, including those who supervise them. Input will be gets
from all angles as it name. For better understanding of how 360 degree appraisal is established,
we provide example of established organization that uses 360 Degree Performance Appraisal.
We choose Yum! Brands Inc. Formerly known as TRICON Global Restaurants, Inc., Yum!
Brands together with its subsidiaries, operates as a quick service restaurant company in United
States and internationally. It develops, operates, franchises, and licenses a system of
restaurants, which prepare, package, and sell various food items.
As many other types of performance appraisal, the 360 also has its own pro and cons.
Therefore the aim of this paper is to discover the advantage and disadvantage of 360 Degree
Performance Appraisal to the individual himself as well as the organization as a whole.
1.0 COMPONENT OF 360 DEGREE PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL
According to Bohlander V Snell (2010), there are six integral components while doing
360 degree performance appraisal. The components include of 360 degree performance
appraisal which is peer, manager/supervisor, subordinate, team, customers and employee itself.
Figure 1 shows the relationship between raters. An employees will do self appraisal and get
appraisal from his or her manager, peer, subordinate, team or customer.
Figure 1: Relationship between raters.
1.1 Manager/Supervisor Appraisal
Manager/Supervisor appraisal has been the traditional approach to evaluating and an
employee’s performance. In most instances, supervisors are in the best position to
perform this function, although it may not always be possible for them to do so.
Managers with many subordinates often complain that they do not have the time to fully
observe the performance of each of them. These managers must then rely on
performance records to evaluate an employee’s performance. If reliable and valid
measure are not available, the appraisal is likely to be less than accurate. In addition,
research has shown that the ratings managers give employees they have known for less
than one year are less reliable, which can be a drawback when an organization uses
focal performance appraisal. (Bohlander & Snell, 2010) The Defense Management
Engineering College (DMEC) has made the following statement that its shows the
confident level of their employees when they conducted a manager/supervisor appraisal.
(http://www.opm.gov)
1.2 Self-Appraisal
Self-appraisal is a performance appraisal done by the employee being evaluated,
generally on an appraisal form completed by the employee prior to the performance
interview. Self-appraisal is an important part of the process where the employee himself
gives the feedback or his views and points regarding his performance. Usually this is
done with the help of a self-appraisal form where the employee rates himself on various
parameters, tells about his training needs, if any, talks about his accomplishments,
strengths, weaknesses and problem faced. Self-appraisal should ideally include the
accomplishments, the goals achieved, the failures, and the personal growth (i.e. new
skills acquired, preparation for the future etc.), the obstacles faced during the period, the
efforts for removing them, the suggestions, and the areas of training and development
felt by the employee (Bohlander & Snell, 2010). Mitchell International, a provider of
software and data solutions, self-assessment is used as an optional component of the
performance appraisal process. All employees need to complete self-appraisals to
provide input into the performance review written by the manager( Lawler-King).
1.3 Subordinate Appraisal
This is the appraising program that the performances of managers are being evaluated
by their employee. It is more appropriate for developmental than for administrative
purposes. From this kind of appraisal, we can assume that the employee is the one who
are very in good position to appraise their managers because employee are in frequent
contact and have a close relationship with their superiors. All the good and bad of the
managers can be seen by the employees without any obstacles. The judging criteria
including the manager’s leadership, oral communication, delegation of authority,
coordination of team efforts and interest in his or her subordinate (Bohlander & Snell,
2010). But in this appraising process, it cannot be deny that some of the disadvantage
are also appeared such as subordinates will not be truthful in the performance ratings for
fear of repercussions, managers will be over-concerned with pleasing subordinates in
order to achieve positive ratings, managerial authority will be questioned, managers'
ratings will reflect their popularity among the workers, not their abilities, subordinates are
not capable of assessing manager's performance and will, therefore, skew the ratings,
subordinates' ratings will be based on the weight of their workload (Bohlander & Snell,
2010). In others perspective, there are three important conditions necessary for the
successful implementation of an upward appraisal system. First, managers must be
supportive of the use of subordinates' appraisals; therefore, a participative style of
management is beneficial. Second, the statements of the feedback survey must be
representative of the managerial areas that subordinates are able to evaluate. Finally,
subordinate appraisals work most effectively with another feedback source, such as
peers, supervisors, or customers.
1.4 Peer Appraisal
For peer performance appraisal is a perform review process where the data used in an
individual’s review is generated by a number of his peers. These may be other team
members or individuals on the same pay grade or role. The purpose of peer appraisal is
to provide high performance work organizations and to provide a comprehensive
performance management system that fits the culture. Besides, the annual objectives
establish both by the individual and the team, is the basis for the evaluation. Peer
performance appraisal differs from traditional performance appraisal in about every way.
For instance, feedback is fast and frequent from team members who know the job and
the person. This essentially means the opportunities to make excuses or to camouflage
what is really going on are basically eliminated. The advantages of this peer appraisal is
to increased use of self-directed teams makes the contribution of peer evaluation the
central input to the formal appraisal because by definition the supervisor is not directly
involved in the day-to-day activities of the team. (Bohlander & Snell, 2010). American
Medical Association use Medical Peer review to make peer evaluation of clinical
teaching skills for both physicians and nurses. (Dippe, S.E.et al.,1989).
1.5 Team Appraisal
For Team performance appraisal is based on Total Quality Management concept that
recognizes team accomplishment rather than individual performance. Team projects are
a shared responsibility, and team performance appraisals reward success or punish
failure when judging a group venture. The key reason to use a team performance
appraisal is to obtain data an employee performance, whether that performance is good
or bad. A team performance appraisal is best used to avoid attributing success or failure
to a single employee performance is good or bad. A team performance appraisal is best
used to avoid attributing success or failure to a single employee working on a project.
Project leaders might be responsible for more than the average participant of a business
project, but a project lead need not be the only one to reap the benefits of a job well
done. (Bohlander & Snell, 2010). Real Dolmen, a Belgium’s largest ICT companies use
team appraisal to evaluate which they expertise in various sectors such as infrastructure
sector and technologies like the Microsoft stack and Java. They evaluate by given a
task to two team to make a new software for their company and had given a designer to
develop it. Then evaluate by looking how creatively both of team.
(http://www.silverlightshow.net)
1.6 Customer Appraisal
The customer appraisal is based on Total Quality Management concepts and seeks
evaluation from both internal and external customers of the organization. Internal
customer is those people and employees who might use organization services and
products, who reside in the same organization. Internal customer can provide feedback
about value added by employee. This appraisal is important for both developmental and
administrative purpose. Internal clients may include supervisors, subordinates, co-
workers, and representatives from other departments. For example the computer
department and human resources department serve internal needs to each other.
Organization may have performance goals such as the completion of work orders on
time. Therefore, the evaluation of employee can be seek from the goals. (Bohlander &
Snell, 2010)
External customers on the other side are outside organization or individual that receives
a product or service from the organization. It may include clients, suppliers, consultants
and customers. It is important to have external customer appraisal in order for
improvement. This is because if the external customer do not satisfied with the service
or product of the organization, they can take their business elsewhere and the will be
loss for the organization. This appraisal usually used by organization that involved with
outside people and profit are gain from them. For example, customer evaluates
restaurant personnel or customer service officer. (Bohlander & Snell, 2010).
Customer appraisal usually done in organization that provides service. For example, in
hotel, customer may give feedback on how their front office staff such as receptionist
performed.
2.0 CONSIDERATION WHEN MAKING 360 DEGREE APPRAISAL
There are several things to consider when implementing 360 degree performance
appraisal.
2.1 Rater
When implementing this scheme, there is something that organization must take it
seriously which is the number of raters. This is important to know the number of raters
because if the amount of raters are small it probably will affect the overall result at the
end because that was show the person who are being rated get the wrong feedback
because it is not from a majority voice. Others element is the samples of rater needs to
be large enough that individual sources cannot be identified. (http://www.psytech.com)
2.2 Questionnaire
The questionnaire needs to be relevant to the raters and their day to day involvement
with the individual. A well-designed questionnaire should offer respondents the
opportunity to indicate where they have not had the opportunity to observe a behavior, or
where the behavior is not relevant to the job, so as not to force them to guess. While the
majority of 360 degree feedback processes involve the use of a questionnaire, it is
possible to run very effective programs without the use of questionnaires. However,
these programs need to be managed with extreme caution and require a mature
organizational culture and the support of a good facilitator. (http://www.psytech.com)
2.3 Feedback Format
Feedback can be provided through aggregating the ratings and presenting an average
‘score’ on each question. While this preserves anonymity, it does have the disadvantage
of failing to identify important differences in perspective. Ideally, the ratings of the
different groups are presented separately, and the range of the ratings for example
highest and lowest as well as the averages included so that these differences in
perspective are identified. Some questionnaires include a free-written section in which
other observations or comments may be made. This can help to throw more light on the
ratings, but again the person giving the feedback needs to be sensitive in managing this
information. (http://www.psytech.com)
3.0 MISTAKES THAT MAKE 360 DEGREE PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL TO FAIL
Appraiser or appraisee may make several mistakes when conducting 360 degree
performance appraisal. Some of them are:
3.1 Ineffective Assessment Items
When employees want a very good data somehow they didn’t ask the right questions to
get it. Thus, manager needs to consider organizational expectations as well as job-
specific competencies. Moreover, the assessment items need to be well written to gather
the data that organization is looking for. When have a poorly written items, the data
might yield useless data. (http://www.custominsight.com/360-degree-feedback). People
often speak of the merits of performing a systematic evaluation but don’t actually do it
too often, 360-degree feedback systems are implemented with the expectation that
they’ll translate automatically to improved management effectiveness better team and
individual performance, and enhanced relationships between people and their
managers, staff, team members, customers, and others. Moreover, only through follow-
up and evaluation will an individual or organizations learn to what extent a behavior
changes was successful and whether it had an impact on performance. Despite the
growing popularity of 360 degree feedback and other multi-rater systems, few
companies rake the time to evaluate systemically the impact and effectiveness of these
powerful interventions. Scattered comments from respondents or feedback from senior
management are often the only form of evaluation that takes place (Scott Wimer) .
3.2 Lack Of Alignment With The Organization's Vision, Mission, And Strategy
If the things that are measuring are not important to the organization's vision, mission,
and strategy, then employees will not be developing competencies that are aligned with
the direction of the organization. Because they didn’t know what the purpose of their
organization want in the future. The superior think their employees cannot know more
details about the organizations vision, mission and strategy because they think it not
necessary. Their superior might be not tell the employees what to do and from that the
employees will be not together with their co-workers to achieve what organizations
vision, mission and strategy. (http://www.custominsight.com/360-degree-feedback). It
can cause great confusion if you don’t make sure people know whether the feedback will
be used for evaluation or development purposes. Other organizations use 360-degree
feedback as a vehicle for performance management, typically as an adjunct to existing
systems. Sometimes, 360-degree feedback falls somewhere in between; it’s purpose us
for development and evaluation (Scott Wimer)
3.3 Lack Of Senior Level-Support
If the leaders of organization do not vocally support and encourage participation in the
program and express their belief in the benefits it will provide, the 360 initiative will never
get off the ground. (http://www.custominsight.com/360-degree-feedback). The survey
was conducted by AMA Enterprise, a specialized division of American Management
Association that offers advisory services and tailored learning programs to organizations.
“While program complexity and cultural differences were noted by some survey
respondents,” said Sandi Edwards, Senior Vice President for AMA Enterprise, “most
cited a lack of executive support, which is problematic now that nearly all best-in-class
organizations today need their leaders to think and act globally.”
3.4 Lack Of Communication
There must be a communication with both management and employees. If management
do not tell them what, why, how, and when, they will not be comfortable with the
program. Therefore, manager must get buy-in at all levels of the organization to make it
work. (http://www.custominsight.com/360-degree-feedback). Besides that
communication in the written form of a letter or email takes time to be formulated and
then sent to various individuals; this may take hours or days. Once the communication is
received, it could then take even more time to be reviewed by the recipient. Voice mail
messages are another example of communication that isn't instantaneous and could
result in a delay of information. This delay could cause a loss of time or money. (Jennifer
F. Bender, 2011). Complete communication is especially important with 360-degree
feedback. Given that some feedback can seem threatening, it’s important that its
purpose be communicated clearly. To avoid potential misunderstanding or feelings of
betrayal, it’s also essential to communicate clearly about confidentiality issues.
3.5 Fear / Lack Of Trust
When a feedback process is new and unfamiliar, people may not treat their ratings of
others with the concern for accuracy necessary for such systems to work. Only later, it
might be discovered that feedback providers were engaged in a ratings game, which can
prevent future trust of multi-rater evaluation. Often, participants are afraid to get
feedback or if respondents are afraid to provide feedback. Communication helps reduce
fear. One of the most effective ways to reduce anxiety is to use a neutral third party to
administer the program. The world is in a crisis of trust, according to Steve Covey. Trust
is lacking in financial markets, in employee-management relationships and between
CEOs and companies. As a result, costly regulations and laws are increasingly
implemented to oversee relationships, at an estimated annual cost of 1.1 trillion dollars,
according to Covey. Dale Carnegie & Associates emphasize that lack of trust between
employees and management reduces employee performance. Building trust and
credibility should be a goal of all organizations and all partners in any relationship that is
expected to produce desirable results. (Sara Mahuron, 2011).
Others issue is when some employees may feel that there is not a mutual understanding
of what is expected of them and what management actually evaluates. They may also
lack trust in the ranking (measurement used for performance objectives). For example,
an employee who has an objective to decrease the number of defect errors may not
understand a particular formula (numbers and methods) management uses to determine
the errors.
3.6 No Follow-Up
Follow up is important to know whether the program has been a success. Plan to solicit
additional feedback six to twelve months after the initial data are collected. The potency
of the 360 degree feedback program is in the follow up. Once the data has been
collected, it must be analyzed and delivered to the target of the survey. Then, that
person must develop a set of measurable goals. Without a follow up process in place,
the data becomes useless. Plus, the employee doesn’t develop competencies in areas
in which weaknesses have been identified. Worse, the peer group can become less
willing to participate in future surveys. (http://www.custominsight.com/360-degree-
feedback).
3.7 No Accountability
Developmental goals are meaningless unless people are held accountable for achieving
them. Make sure employees and understand how to create Specific, Measurable,
Attainable, Realistic and Timely (S.M.A.R.T). (http://www.custominsight.com/360-
degree-feedback) Specific is specific goal has a much greater chance of being
accomplished than a general goal. To set a specific goal, the organization must answer
the 4W1H questions. Measurable establish concrete criteria for measuring progress
toward the attainment of each goal that set. When measuring the progress, it is
important to stay on track, reach target dates, and experience the exhilaration of
achievement that spurs on to continued effort required to reach the goal. Attainable is
when people identify goals that are most important and begin to figure out ways that can
make them come true. Employees will develop the attitudes, abilities, skills, and financial
capacity to reach them. They begin seeing previously overlooked opportunities to the
achievement of goals. To be realistic, a goal must represent an objective toward which
they are both willing and able to work. A goal can be both high and realistic. Employee is
the only one who can decide just how high the goal should be. But be sure that every
goal represents substantial progress. Timely stresses the importance of grounding goals
within a time frame, giving them a target date. A commitment to a deadline helps a team
focus their efforts on completion of the goal on or before the due date.
(http://topachievement.com/smart.html)
3.8 No Development Plan
If management fails to do anything with the data, it will be wasted of time of both
participants and respondents. 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.
(http://www.custominsight.com/360-degree-feedback) To improve the development plan
start by identifying the gaps. The best way for an individual to get the perspective of
everyone around them is to use a 360 feedback survey and report. These surveys often
point out gaps between the perceptions of various rater groups. All good 360 feedback
reports include the information needed to identify significant and consistent differences
between rater groups (self, supervisor, co-workers, direct reports, etc.). next is to
Recognize real strengths. There are things we do so well and effortlessly that we often
forget we possess a talent. The 360 feedback report helps identify an individual's highest
scores as seen by others. However, each person needs to interpret what his or her real
strengths are (Scott Wimer).
3.9 Inappropriate Delivery Feedback
The idea of a feedback program is to help employees perform better. Negative feedback
can be demoralizing and counterproductive. If feedback is not provided in an appropriate
manner, the program could backfire. It is recommended to use professional, neutral
coaches to deliver feedback. (http://www.custominsight.com/360-degree-feedback).
Some others mistakes regarding to the use of the 360 degree feedback, it is probably
the multi rater feedback that is based on the idea that the people can feel safe providing
the anonymous feedback. One thing that causes the great confusion if you do not make
sure people know where the feedback will be used for evaluation or development
purpose. In the organizations use 360 degree feedback strictly as a development tool
and there are no repercussions for people getting negative feedback (Scott Wimer) .
3.10 Poor Planning
There’s a danger in being too ambitious too soon when introducing any major change in
an organization. Most 360-degree feedbacks systems represent a radical departure from
the way people are traditionally given feedback and managed. The concept of upward
feedback to a supervisor or manager and collecting information from peers, staff, and
customers may be considered radical in top down cultures. If the program is not well
thought out, it will not run smoothly. There are many logistical issues to consider before
launching a feedback program. If the employees perceive that the program is not well
planned, credibility of manager will be undermined. (http://www.custominsight.com/360-
degree-feedback) This possibility for a poor evaluation is difficult to accept, but it is
important to look into it fully. It is not sufficient to accept management’s comments.
Manager need to find some trusted people with whom he have worked with and ask for
their frank input. (http://workingwithinsight.wordpress.com/about-ps/)
4.0 WHEN TO COMMUNICATED THE FEEDBACK
Ideally the 360 degree process would be designed so that the individual receives
feedback as soon as possible after that feedback was given. Having shorter turn-around
times maintains the momentum of the process as well as motivation for the individual.
Given the pace of change in many organizations, shorter turn-around times will ensure
that the feedback is still relevant for the role. When planning the timing of the feedback,
it is important to ensure that people receive it when there is support available to interpret
the results(Aine Gray).Providing a report without support, particularly prior to a weekend
or going on holidays, is far from ideal, and can have strong negative consequences. If
the feedback facilitators do a number of feedback sessions, they can provide very
valuable information about the themes across the sessions. This would evidently need to
be done without compromising individual confidentiality. This information could feed into
the management development process to help tackle some of the wider organizational
issues(Neil,1999).
5.0 ADVANTAGES
The 360 has its own advantage over the other types of performance appraisal. Some of
them are as follows.
5.1 Provide More Comprehensive and Accurate View of Performance
Research obtained by Roberto Rivera’s research project, A Change from Single Source
to Multi Source Evaluations (1996) indicated that multi source assessments are the
wave of the future. A traditional performance review, where one supervisor assesses a
subordinate, is no longer seen as an effective means of obtaining accurate feedback for
employees. The feedback get from the 360 degree appraisal is more honest, reliable
and valid rather than feedback come from traditional appraisal which is comes from one
point of view only. 360 degree feedback is viewed as more accurate because, by nature
of the process, it offers feedback on observed behaviors and performance from a circle
of raters, as opposed to subjective viewpoints from a single individual. The accuracy of
the 360 degree process depends on whether the appraiser interacts regularly with the
employee and whether the employee reveals himself to others. Since employee can be
different with each person, it would follow that there is a benefit to having many
respondents involved. The view of most practitioners is that the use of more raters leads
to more accurate results for the individual (Church, A.H. & Braken, D. W.,1997). The
collective opinion gives perfect, objective and overall ideas on employee’s performance
throughout the time. This is because the feedback providers interact regularly with the
employee at work. When employee is reviewed by many people, the combination of the
opinions can be approximate to an ‘accurate’ view. The ratings from different
perspectives also provide a more complete picture of the participant's capabilities than
just one perspective. Besides, there are certain skills are best judged by peers and staff,
not by manager alone whereas leadership qualities are perfectly judged by peers and
subordinates rather than seniors. This is especially critical when the supervisor does not
have the opportunity to observe all areas of an employee's performance.
5.2 Acceptance of Feedback
While traditional performance reviews offer a single or limited viewpoint, the 360 degree
review offers feedback from many sources. Sometimes the feedback gives repeating
and consistent messages. When a learner sees a consistent pattern of feedback, that
feedback is more likely to become reinforced and is more difficult to write off as invalid
(Alexander, D.M, 2006). Therefore, there is a possibility that multi-rater feedback from a
360 degree review is more likely to be accepted by the employee. Survey conducted at
Wilson Fire and Rescue Services personnel shows that 98.4% were willing to accept an
evaluation from their peers and subordinates. This is because it is nature of people to be
open to accept even the bad feedback from people he feels close to him. Once an
individual accepts feedback there is an increasing likelihood of behavioral change and
performance improvement.
5.3 Minimize Bias and Discrimination
One person performance appraisals are subject to claims of bias or partiality. Unlike the
360 degree appraisal, there are many people involve in giving rating and opinion.
Research done by Parker T.R(1998) indicate that the more appraisers an employee has,
the more likely the biases of the raters will tend to cancel one another out, and the more
their perspectives will combine to give a complete, accurate and honest picture. For
example, if there is only one person who rate the performance, the person tends to be
bias or prejudice to the people he appraise. The appraiser may give high marks for
employee he likes and if the appraiser disliked the individual they may decide that this is
a good time to get even by giving low mark for the employee. According to Frank
Snyder, it can reduce the possibility of discrimination of race, age and gender in
organization as feedback come from diverse group of people in different job function.
The "horns and halo" effect, in which a supervisor rates performance based on her most
recent interactions with the employee, is also minimized. Besides that, the feedback that
comes from multiple sources also has a more powerful impact than information from a
single source. People cannot ignore if there is many people has same opinion.
5.4 Motivate Employees and Enhance Self-Development
Feedback get from appraisal is more likely to lead to specific developmental actions. The
motivational component here is particularly important, because no matter how accurate
the feedback actually is, little will be gained unless it results in positive change and
development. Employers will be more strongly motivated to change work behaviors to
obtain the esteem of their co-workers. Feedback also may be motivating for people who
undervalue or underestimate themselves.
There are a number of ways in which emotions, or the affective states, are involved in
the motivation of behavior. Motivation is the force that energizes, directs, and sustains
behavior. Being receptive to feedback is clearly an important gateway to learning and
practicing strategies for personal improvement. Staying out of defensive modes is
essential to moving on and changing behavior. In order to be persistently successful,
people and organizations need to adapt continually to their environment .This requires
information from the environment. The more active and open the feedback loops, the
more effective the adaptation and change can be. If employees are motivated, they will
be willing to enhance themselves.
5.5 Richer Understanding of Performance
The 360 degree appraisal allows participants to gain valuable insight into how their
performance is perceived across different groups. People will behave differently when
interacting with different groups and even the same behaviors could be perceived
differently. Understanding these differences across roles can be very helpful in
developing, or more consistently engaging in, certain behaviors in certain situations. 360
degree gives clear understanding of personal strength and area that need improvement.
It is aimed at improving performance by providing a better awareness of strengths and
weaknesses.
The employee receives feedback from multiple sources in anonymous form, compares
them with self-ratings, gets limited coaching and sets goals for improvement. When it
provides more rounded feedback from all levels of the organization, the teams become
more efficient as member learn how to work more effectively together and they become
more accountable to each other and can provide valuable feedback to each other on
how they are performing (Frank Snyder, 2005).
5.6 Reinforce Organization
360-degree performance appraisal has the greatest impact when used to evaluate and
improve the performance of whole organizations. Companies can use data collected
from the programs to monitor consistent patterns or areas of weakness for employees
within the organization. Organizations also can develop more effective training programs
targeted at collecting common areas of weakness for employees throughout the
organization or in specific departments (Neil,1999). The 360-degree feedback method
may provide a more objective measure of a person’s performance. Including the
perspective of multiple sources results in a broader view of the employee’s performance
and may minimize biases that result from limited views of behavior. 360-degree
feedback focuses on skills needed across organizational boundaries (Hillary,1999).
When the employee of the organization completely know about the process and the
determination of this appraisal program, they will put more effort to make a good
relationship between not only just their peer but will give their fully attention of
responsibility towards all the top manager, subordinate, and the team member because
they know this all person will evaluate them in this 360 degree appraisal program and
indirectly will effects their working performance. At the end will make the organization
more productive.
6.0 DISADVANTAGES
The 360 has its own disadvantage over the other types of performance appraisal. Some
of them are as follows.
6.1 Time Consuming
This evaluation may absorb vast amounts of time and resources, and they make virtually
everyone unhappy. In terms of time, it may be conservatively estimated that it takes
three or four hours a year to formally evaluate each employee. Their emotional
significance spreads far beyond the few work hours they take. This evaluation process is
more administritively complex. This evaluation requires many raters unlike the traditional
evaluation, and therefore requires more time on the part of the entire organization. The
giving and receiving of feedback can intimidating to some employees and therefore
requires significant training of both the persons conducting the rating as well as those
receiving the evaluation. This training also adds to the time the organization must invest
in order for this system to be a success.
6.2 Dishonest Feedback
Employees also may not feel comfortable offering honest feedback of supervisors. This
same dilemma could exist in employee-to-employee evaluations. Without an anonymous
system, backlash from supervisors or retaliation from colleagues could limit workers'
willingness to share true feelings in the feedback process (Neil,1999). In some
instances, managers control virtually every aspect of the appraisal process and are
therefore in a position to manipulate the system. For example, a supervisor may want to
give a pay raise to a certain employee or the supervisor may just “favor” one worker
more than another. In order to justify this action, the supervisor may give the employee
an undeserved high performance evaluation and perhaps a less favored, but productive,
employee a lower rating, or he supervisor may want to get rid of an employee and so
may give the individual an undeserved low rating. In either instance, the system is
distorted and the goals of performance appraisal cannot be achieved. In addition, in the
latter example, if the employee is a member of a protected group, the firm may wind up
in court. If the organization cannot adequately support the evaluation, it may suffer
significant financial loss.
6.3 Elements of Sabotage
Ilene Gochman, director of Watson Wyatt’s organization effectiveness practice, says,
“We’ve found that use of the 360 is actually negatively correlated with financial results.”
(Patrick J. Kiger, 2006) GE’s former CEO Jack Welch maintains that the 360-degree
system in his firm had been “gamed” and that people were saying nice things about one
another, resulting in all good ratings. (John F. Welch Jr, 2001) Another critical view with
an opposite twist is that input from peers, who may be competitors for raises and
promotions, might intentionally distort the data and sabotage the colleague. Yet, since so
many firms use 360-degree feedback evaluation, it seems that many firms have found
ways to avoid the pitfalls. The value of the responses from a 360 degree will depend
largely upon the question that are asked. Individuals need to feel comfortable with the
process, they need to believe they will be rated honestly and treated fairly. If these
assurance are missing, implementation problems may occurs. Managers may attempt to
sabotage the process by pressuring their peers and subordinates into refusing to
participate in the rating process. Grievances (or even lawsuits) may be filed if ratings are
used for decision about raises or promotions. Dissatisfaction with the process may be so
great that it takes a toll on morale. (HR Magazines, 1998).
6.4 Issue in Confidentiality
Many firms outsource the process to make participants feel comfortable that the
information they share and receive is completely anonymous, but the information is very
sensitive and, in the wrong hands, could impact careers. Another common error is not
protecting the confidentiality of the people interviewed. It is critically important that both
the feedback results and the source of the feedback remain anonymous. Breaching
confidentiality can destroy the integrity of the system. Effort should be made to keep all
other information anonymous. If respondents believe that specific answers may be
attributed to them, they may not be as honest or objective as they should be. They need
to be assured that their responses will be delivered to the employee in a constructive
way, so that the employee will be able to incorporate the feedback into his or her
developmental improvement plan.
(http://www.boston.com/jobs/hire_authority/110606.shtml). Part of this involves ensuring
that the process maintains high levels of confidentiality so that the individuals feel can be
and excuse the cliché which is open and honest. It is important that anonymity and
confidentiality of 360 Raters be guaranteed to ensure that they cannot be identified by
the Appraisee. Without this assurance, Raters may either not responds, or they fudge
their responses to avoid potential friction. (http://www.appraisal-smart.com/360-Degree-
Feedback-Appraisal-FOQs.htm)
6.5 Employee Interpersonal Conflict
There is a conflict between an individual’s desire for personal growth and the wish to
have one’s self-image affirmed. People want to feel good about themselve, they
naturally strive for personal excellence for what they believe will work best for them (Lee,
2006). If the feedback is positive, it affirms their self-concept of competence and
success. Positive feedback serves to reinforce the current performance. If the feedback
is unfavorable, to minimize its importance they may engage in defensive behavior for
example is not ‘hear’ it (denial), they will be demoralized, and apportion blame
elsewhere, example someone else didn’t do their part, the system was flawed, the
supervisor misunderstands or is too critical or biased. Self-development requires
openness and “hearing” constructive feedback, and willingness to experiment and
change. However, openness to criticism may conflict with one’s objective of receiving
raises, bonuses, and promotions when they are tied to one’s performance appraisal
rating. Our internal communications are very important as they play vital roles in
determining our self-esteem and self-perception. If you apply yourself, it is possible to
improve your intrapersonal communication to assist in altering and improving both of
these, thereby improving your confidence and therefore your quality of life. (Sheryl
Faber, 1998) According Robert R. Wright M.S. (2010) Conflicts with peers at the
workplace are escalating in both rate of occurrence and intensity among nurses (referred
to as horizontal violence), especially among new nurses. Conflict with nurse peers
seems to have more detrimental effects on nurses than conflicts with others because
nurses cannot simply withdraw from interaction with ‘difficult’ colleagues. As such,
conflicts with other nurses are a substantial source of conflict in the workplace for nurses
and are a major contributor to negative workplace environments.
7.0 360 DEGREE PERFORMANCE APPRAISAL IN YUM BRANDS INC.
Yum! Brands Inc. is the organization which owned and franchised the KFC, Pizza Hut,
A&W, Long John Silver and Taco Bell brands worldwide. Yum! management faced the
challenge of spreading their "customer maniac" philosophy to 850,000 workers as Yum!
Has 33, 000 restaurant that serve 22 million customers around the world each day and
plans to open 1000 restaurant per year. Customer maniac is a term coined by Yum
management to describe what they are after in employee performance.
In order to achieve its goal of turning its workers into customer maniacs, Yum! has
identified customer-oriented dimensions such as speed, cleanliness and hospitality. The
performance criteria most valued at Yum! are teamwork, communication, and
leadership. Therefore, in order to roll the 360 degree system out to worker, Yum!
decided to hire a company called Kenexa to developed a new version of Yum's appraisal
tool. This web-based 360 degree system works in 50 different languages and it is easy
to use for manager around the world. The system collects evaluations and feedback on
worker’s performance from peers, managers, subordinates and customers. The web-
based forms emphasize written feedback to workers and the focus is on the
development of workers into customer maniacs.
To begin the process, an email is sent to employees asking them to submit a list of
people who could serve as raters. Supervisor review the list and settle on about a dozen
f people. Then, questionnaire is sent to the rater. Their rating and comments are use to
make a report. Manager and employee then will have discussion on the result, with the
manager taking the role of coach. (http://www.swlearning.com) This system is not only
use by the worker but also use by the CEO to get feedback. When Yum! CEO, David
Novak asked people for his performance feedback, 120 employees responded and the
report was 65 pages long. Like everyone else, he uses the information to improve his
future performance. All the data is collected at Yum's headquarters, giving the company
a valuable snapshot of the capabilities of its management and where organizational
development efforts should be focused.
CONCLUSION
Unlike traditional approaches, the 360 degree feedback focuses on skills needed across
organizational boundaries. Also, by shifting the responsibility for evaluation to more than one
person, many of the common appraisal errors can be reduced or eliminated. Software is
available to permit managers to give the ratings quickly and conveniently. The 360-degree
feedback method may provide a more objective measure of a person’s performance. Including
the perspective of multiple sources results in a broader view of the employee’s performance and
may minimize biases that result from limited views of behavior.
Having multiple raters also makes the process more legally defensible. However, it is
important for all parties to know the evaluation criteria, the methods for gathering and
summarizing the feedback, and the use to which the feedback will be put. An appraisal system
involving numerous evaluators will naturally take more time and, therefore, be more costly.
Nevertheless, the way firms are being organized and managed may require innovative
alternatives to traditional top-down appraisals.
To be effective, 360 Degree Feedback needs an environment and culture of openness,
trust and mutual support. If the organization sees learning and the acceptance and
management of change as keys to business success this can also help. In such an ‘open’
culture the 360 system can operate anonymously and confidentially. For 360 Degree systems to
be successful, people have to feel able to speak freely without fear of reprisal. Managers in
particular need to be willing and open about receiving upward feedback.
Clearly the 360 degree feedback process is popular. The perceived benefits of
implementing such a program will only be realized if it is utilized in the right organizational
climate with the appropriate expectations for success. In the wrong environment, without the
presence or proper training of feedback coaches and raters, the results can be injurious.
Organizations should carefully weigh all the costs, including process related as well as the cost
of behavioral outcomes. Success of such a program is predicated on implementing and
sustaining long term behavioral change and development. Careful consideration should be
given to the design of the process as well as to the implementation in order for the process to
drive performance behaviors and performance outcomes.
REFERENCES
Bohlander, G.W. & Snell, S.A. (2012). Principles of human resource management (16th ed.). Australia : Thomson South-Western.
Gomez-Mejia, L.R. et al. (2010). Managing human resources. USA : Pearson Education.
Hellriagel, D. et al. (2007). Managing : a competency-based approach. Mason : Thomson South-Western.
Pulakos, E.D. (2004). Performance management: a roadmap for developing, implementing and evaluating performance management system. USA : SHRM Foundation.
Dippe, S.E.et al. (1989). A peer review of a peer review organization. West Journal Med,
151,93-96. Retrieved April 23, 2012 from
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1026986/pdf/westjmed00119-0095.pdf
Grubb, T. (2007). Performance appraisal reappraised: it’s not all positive. Journal of Human Resource Education, 1(1), 1-22. Retrieved from http://scob.troy.edu/JHRE/Articles/PDF/1-1/1.pdf
McLellan, H et al. (2005). The place of 360 degree appraisal within a team approach to professional development. Journal of Interprofessional Care, 19(2), 137-148. Retrieved April 24, 2012 from http://www.indigoconsulting.org.uk/downloadlibrary/Published%20Article%20re.%20360%20Degree%20Appraisal.pdf
Alexander, D.M. (2006). How do 360 degree performance reviews affect employee attitudes, effectiveness and performance. Retrieved from http://www.uri.edu/research/lrc/research/papers/Alexander_360.pdf
Bailey, D. (2002). 360 degree feedback. Retrieved from http://www.dba.co.uk/tips/vol8/360_feedback.pdf
David Hakala. (2008). 16 ways to measure employee performance. Retrieve May 1,2012
Dockx, K. (2008). 360 degree appraisal. Retrieved April 13, 2012 from
http://www.silverlightshow.net/items/360-Degrees-Feedback-by-Kevin-Dockx.aspx
from http://www.hrworld.com
Gray, A. 360 degree appraisal. Retrieve May 16,2012 from www.roehampton.ac.uk/social/bct\
Gray, A. et al. 360 degree feedback: best practice guidelines. Retrieved April 15, 2012 from http://www.psytech.com/Documents/Guidelinesfor360Feedback.pdf
Kokemuller, N. (1999). Advantages & disadvantages of 360 degree feedback. Retrieve May 16,2012 from http://www.ehow.com
Lawler-King, E. Self-assessment and the quest for performance improvement. Retrieved May 23, 2012 from http://edweb.sdsu.edu/people/arossett/pie/Interventions/selfassessment_2.htm
Maylett, T. (2009). 360-degree feedback revisited: the transition from development to appraisal. Retrieved April 4, 2012 from http://www.decision-wise.com/pdf/Compensation-and-Benefits-Review-360-Degree-Feedback-Revisited-The-Transition-from-Development-to-Appraisal.pdf
Mclellan, H. (1999). The place of 360 degree appraisal within a team to professional development. Retrieve April 30,2012 from http://www.informahealthcare.com
Orr, D. (1993). Evaluating team performance: a report of working group on evaluating team
performance. Retrieved April 13, 2012 from
http://www.opm.gov/perform/wppdf/teameval.pdf
Wimer, S. (2009). 13 common mistakes using 360 degree feedback. Retrieved from April 13,
2012 www.360degreefeedback.net_media_13CommonMistakes.pdf