Which Online 360? A 10-step checklist

Which Online 360? A 10-step checklist

Which Online 360? A 10-step checklist There are a number of different options, and many different systems, for delivering 360 Degree Feedback to support strategic leadership and talent development. How you choose your 360 delivery system will depend on your objectives, the importance and profile of the development programme, and the culture and processes of your organisation. In this short paper, we have listed the main options available and what to consider when choosing a 360 delivery system. Customised or Off-the-Shelf Content? 360 Degree Feedback is normally used in one of 3 ways: To support individual coaching and mentoring activities As an input into regular or annual performance review process, or As an integral part of strategic change programmes, embedding consistent behaviours, values and capabilities, and identifying, tracking and developing talent Off-the-Shelf 360 Degree Feedback tools are excellent tools supporting individual coaching and development, providing both psychometric and 360 models which can help individuals understand their styles and preferences, and how these are reflected in the perceptions of their colleagues. Where however, you are looking at using the multi-source feedback model for embedding organisation change (whether at team or wider level), bespoke 360 Degree Feedback can be a highly effective tool. For example, one organisation has been able to assess the success of its global management development programme through designing a 360 that is fully aligned to its behaviour change outcomes. Using the 360 before and after the year-long training programme, the organisation has been able to measure the real change in those behaviours. Once you have decided that the bespoke route is what you are looking for, the next consideration is what you need to customise, and how. How much Customisation? If you decide that customisation is the way to go, then you should consider customising the elements of the 360 to align as closely as possible with the learning and business outcomes of your development programme. The more closely you can align these, the more meaningful and relevant the 360 will be to the participants, and the more engaged the whole organisation will be with the process. Customising the content for example, feedback on the behavioural elements that you will focus on in the development programme will also allow you to track the progress of participants over time, check for any group or organisation areas for development, and integrate the data with other key metrics for the purposes of succession planning and resource planning. Broadly there are three areas that you may wish to customise: Content, that is, your 360 capabilities or competencies, questions, rating scales and reporting relationships. You may also wish to customise the online screens with your organisation s branding, or the branding of your strategic talent programme if this is relevant Process, that is, how the 360 is managed, who chooses raters, how many raters are chosen, whether raters are identified, etc. This may seem rather detailed, however, each organisation will have its own culture and way of doing things; the more you can align your 360 process with your own processes, the easier it will be to embed and obtain engagement. 2 3

Reporting- if you are using the 360 for ongoing development of talent and senior personnel, you will want to ensure that the design, wording and content of the 360 flow through into the reports. You may also want to match the 360 reporting to your organisation s branding and design templates. Remember that even for highly sophisticated participants, the 360 reports should be simple and easy to interpret, and should report as much data as possible using graphs, rather than a lot of textual explanations, or too many statistics. Check with your current or prospective 360 system provider what customisation they can provide for you as a standard, i.e. included in your setup pack, what is available at standard customisation rates, and what can be done but is special and charged at day rates. What reports will be generated? Your 360 system should make the reporting part of the process easy and seamless, whether you run this in-house or your provider manages report production for you. The benefit of online 360 is that you should be able to cut the 360 data in different ways to increase the insights from feedback that is generated. Your participants and their colleagues will be spending valuable time in self-reviewing and providing feedback; make sure you get the most flexible reporting possible from your system. Reporting options should include aggregate reports (showing group trends), time-based reports (i.e. aggregating results over a specified time-period), demographic reporting (e.g. by grade, location or other criteria that are relevant to your organisation s needs), and comparative reporting (mapping current and previous results). Finally you should be able to extract the data from the system to enable you to use it with other metrics for additional insights. One client we have worked with was able to use 360 feedback data, together with development centre data and other measures, to create a map of potential leadership candidates in their organisation. Fully-managed or in-house system option? Another critical decision to make is to decide whether you want to use the 360 system in-house or as a fully-managed service from your provider. A fully-managed service normally means that the 360 provider will set up your online questionnaire and other content (emails and guidelines) upload participants set the project parameters (dates, settings etc) manage the process while the feedback is being gathered provide you with regular progress updates answer user support queries and generate individual and other reports. You may prefer to use this type of option if you are short of resource and time. It may also be more appropriate if your organisation wishes to keep the feedback process external for confidentiality purposes. It is a good idea to understand exactly what the provider includes in a fully-managed option. Some providers will be able to offer a self-managed or DIY option. This will involve you or your team having access to the 360 system and using it in-house. The benefit of this type of option is that the 360 process is entirely in your control; it is also likely to be a lower cost option that the fully-managed offering. However you will need to set this against the time you will need to set aside to set up your 360s and manage the process. Your provider should be able to provide training on the system, and also to estimate how much time you will need to dedicate to this. 4 5

How much support is available? Whether you choose a fully managed or an-house option, it s really important to understand what level of support is available from your provider, and how quickly you, and your people, can get that support. Your provider should be able to tell you: To whom they will provide first line support, i.e. responses direct to the person requesting support What support is available to the in-house team if you are using the self-managed version of the system How quickly they can respond to support queries Whether they respond using a numbered ticket or other system, or direct by email It s also worth checking where the provider s support is based this may determine the speed and quality of the support you can expect, particularly if you are running a global or other dispersed 360 process. And of course, don t forget to check on what support is included in your costs and what is extra. If you are thinking about customisation, make sure that your provider is able to make any customisation or other changes themselves, and in a reasonable timescale. If a provider is reselling a standard 360 product, they may not be able to make your changes as and when you need them, and there may be additional costs involved. How is the cost of your 360 calculated? Your provider should offer the flexibility of cost and provision that suits your needs. Many providers now offer a cost per person plus an initial setup fee. There will probably be a benefit to buying in bulk, but make sure there s no expiry date on the licences you buy in bulk. If there is, you will need to make sure you use them before expiry date. But do check; not all providers licences expire on a specific date. You may wish to explore other options, such as an annual subscription, with the provider. This will depend on your plans for using 360 Degree Feedback in the future. Don t forget that, as with everything, the cheapest is not necessarily the best. The key is to know what elements are most important for you, and how your provider will deliver these. Buy the system, or Software-As-Service? Up to a few years ago, you had to buy a 360 tool out of a box and upload this to your company s servers. This is still an option and some organisations prefer this as it gives them a level of ownership and control. However, many 360 Degree Feedback tools are now available as Software- As-A-Service (SaaS), meaning that you effectively hire the system rather than buying it. You should still have complete control over the content, as well as confidentiality and security, so there is no need to compromise on these critical areas. The big benefit to using SaaS is that there is no cost of ownership, which in software terms includes maintenance, upgrades etc, and it also means that the cost is is a revenue rather than capital spend. On the practical side, apart 6 7

from checking to make sure people can access the secure software, there is no need for any resource from your organisation s IT department, and there are no software applications to download or manage (even with the in-house options described above). Finally SaaS allows you to get set up and your 360 running very quickly, rather than having to wait for a major install and implementation. How flexible and scalable is the system? It s important that the system you use can cope with the number of users don t forget that each 360 participant will be getting feedback from an average of 6 raters, plus their own self-review, so you need to ensure that the system can cope with the anticipated number of users at any one time. But even if you have a substantial number of participants and raters, it doesn t mean you have to have a huge system. Your system should be flexible enough that you can run a 360 for a small group, then upscale for a larger group easily and quickly. For bespoke 360s, which are often used as a tool for ongoing talent assessment and development, it s often a good idea to run a pilot with a number of stakeholders before rolling it out across the whole company.. Make sure you can put in your pilot content, run the 360 for your pilot groups, then, make minor adjustments to the content, scale up and run for the larger group, or the whole organisation, as and when you need to. Stand-alone or integrated? For larger organisations, there can be a question as to whether a standalone or integrated system is best. Many LMS or HR systems include a 360 element, but often do not offer the wider customisation options described above, or customisation may be available as a costly extra. Therefore a stand-alone system may be an option worth considering, even where you want to integrate the data into a larger corporate system. A stand-alone system that can be quickly customised will deliver your 360 in a shorter timescale, and without the additional cost, that upgrading an LMS or HR system can involve. Check with the provider that they can create a link into your LMS or HR system and that their 360 system can report in CSV or other reporting formats that can be transferred easily to another system, thus solving the integration issue. How easy is it to use? If there is one thing you do need to check and be happy with before you decide on your 360 delivery system, it s how easy it is for your people to use. Participants and their colleagues will be very busy and will have many tasks to complete; it s really important that they have fast access to the online questionnaires, that the screens are intuitive to use, and that it is very clear what they need to do. If the process is needlessly complicated, a number of people will drop out altogether, and they may also respond reluctantly to any future requests for feedback. Your provider should be able to provide you with live examples of online screens and demonstrate the navigation through the 360, including completing, saving and returning to the questionnaires. If you decide to run the 360 in-house, your online administration module should also be easy to access, intuitive to use, and allow you to create and re-use content, which will save you a great deal of time and effort for any future 360 projects. Many users will access the 360 on mobile devices, so it s worth checking that the 360 system works on a wide variety of devices, and using different browsers. 8 9

Brought to you by About Track 360 is the most customisable 360 Degree Feedback System ever. It s used by over 100 organisation worldwide, including Ernst & Young, Fujitsu, Nuffield Health, The Go-Ahead Group, John Lewis Partnership, BDO and a number of international law firms. For more information on how Track 360 could help you deliver your strategic 360 Degree Feedback programmes worldwide, contact us: By email: jo.ayoubi@tracksurveys.co.uk By phone: +44 208 360 4455 Website: www.tracksurveys.co.uk TrainingZone 2014. All Rights Reserved. No part of this report may be reproduced, copied, modified or adapted, without the prior written consent of the authors.