Employee Engagement Survey

Today we are putting up a beta HR-Meter Employee Engagement Survey to collect some basic benchmark data on these modules.

If you've got a couple of minutes and are interested in filling out an interesting survey concerning employee statisfaction then click here.

You'll even get an opportunity at the end of the survey to request that the results be sent to you when they become available.

Click here to fill out the new Employee Engagement Survey

If you have any comments or suggestions on how we could improve this survey, please let us know!

Culture Wars: Driving a Positive Change in your Corporate Culture

It may be 10 months or 10 years since starting your company, but somewhere along either that short or longer road you have come to realize the culture that distinguishes your business isn’t up to par with your vision and expectations.

Defined by the values and practices shared across-the-board by staff, company culture is essentially the manner in which an organization exhibits behavior. And while every company culture contains some elements of uniqueness, all have two basic qualities – character and personality.

Company character is a reflection of the commitment and engagement employees have to an organization’s value system; company character becomes evident in numerous areas, including customer responsiveness, innovation, team interaction and daily job performance.

Company personality is somewhat less tangible, presenting itself in the attitude and tone exhibited by employees. As examples, some organizations are known for their open and friendly aura while others are best described as competitive. One is not necessarily better than the other; businesses can have a successful personality if built upon the right character foundation.

Be advised – if you’re looking to re-define your company’s culture, it won’t happen overnight. Certain steps must be carefully taken in order to build a high performance culture.

First, identify the results you want to achieve. How do you want your company to be perceived? Isolate the potential obstacles that might impede your company culture vision and work toward their elimination while establishing the strengths upon which you can build right now.

It’s vital to clearly communicate your plan. Make sure your entire executive team and all employees understand your vision, and then seek their feedback. This important information will help, not hinder culture creation.

Build a rewards structure that reflects your culture model, including mission, values, strategy, roles and expectations and then foster that structure to best advantage.

High performance cultures can translate into company value that can exceed that of competitors and often even your own expectations. But this cannot occur in the absence of commitment and engagement from everyone within your organization – starting at the top with you.


About our Benefits Installment Author:

James E. (Jim) Moniz, CEO of Northeast VisionLink, a Massachusetts firm that specializes in structuring executive compensation. James E. Moniz is a national speaker on the topic of wealth management and on executive compensation. Jim Moniz will be presenting at this years SHRM conference in Phoenx, be sure to check out our presentation: “Creating and Sustaining a Competitive Advantage, The Role and Impact of Effective Compensation and Rewards Strategies”

Do your employees know where they stand?

Sure... right? We do our annual reviews. We sit down with our employees and we say, "good job with this or that" or "we'd like to see some improvment on your TPS reports". Of course our employees know where they stand.

Ok, and if I were to ask you, say, "what percentage of your employees is uncertain about their job security?" or perhaps something a little more specific like, "what percentage of your employees thought they were on the right track for a promotion right up until they didn't get one?" and "how did not getting that promotion affect their performance?", "did they start looking for another job?", "do they think you care?". You might say something like, "I'm not sure. But, more importantly, I'm not sure it matters"... and I'd believe you. And you'd have to also give me that your employees don't know where they stand; that you don't know where your employees stand; that maybe you don't know where you stand.

It starts to look somewhat amazing that the company functions. Of course, if you were to ask around, folks would say, "ahh, but we are such a dysfunctional, uncooperative, catty, bunch." He knows it, she knows it, I know it and you know it.

If you're a mamanager, start scheduling some time, right now, for each memeber of you team to come in and talk to you about "things". Maybe type up and distribute a little survey and put a box outside your door or cube or tent. Make it a "check yes or no" survey and pass it out. Get some feedback. Ask your team if they want to do a little survey too. Ask HR if you can do a big survey. Ask HR to ask if you can do a really really big survey. Ask some questions.

+25% of Employers Think Employees Fake Illness to Explain an Absence

More Than A Quarter of Employers Think More Employees are Calling in Sick with Fake Excuses Due to Stress Tied to the Recession, Finds CareerBuilder’s Annual Survey

Chicago - While the cold and flu season serves as a primary culprit in workplace absences, the economy may be a factor as well this year. CareerBuilder’s annual survey on absenteeism shows nearly one-third (32 percent) of workers have played hooky from the office this year, calling in sick when they were well at least once. Twenty-eight percent of employers think more employees are absent with fake excuses due to increased stress and burnout caused by the recession. The nationwide survey included more than 4,700 workers and 3,100 employers.

While the majority of employers said they typically don’t question the reason for an absence, 29 percent reported they have checked up on an employee who called in sick and 15 percent said they have fired a worker for missing work without a legitimate excuse. Of the 29 percent of employers who checked up on an employee, 70 percent said they required the employee to show them a doctor’s note. Fifty-two percent called the employee at home, 18 percent had another worker call the employee and 17 percent drove by the employee’s house or apartment.

"Longer hours and heavier workloads are common in the current economic climate and employers are becoming more flexible with their time off policies," said Rosemary Haefner, vice president of human resources at CareerBuilder. "Sixty-three percent of companies we surveyed said they let their team members use sick days for mental health days. If you need time to recharge, your best bet is to be honest with your manager."

More than one-in-ten workers (12 percent) who played hooky admitted to calling in sick because of something work-related, such as to miss a meeting, give themselves some more time to work on a project or avoid the wrath of a boss, colleague or client. Others missed work because they needed to go to a doctor’s appointment (31 percent), needed to relax (28 percent), catch up on sleep (16 percent), run personal errands (13 percent), catch up on housework (10 percent) or spend time with family and friends (10 percent). An additional 32 percent just didn’t feel like going to work that day

When asked to share the most unusual excuses employees gave for missing work, employers offered the following real-life examples:

• I got sunburned at a nude beach and can’t wear clothes.

• I woke up in Canada.

• I got caught selling an alligator.

• My buddies locked me in the trunk of an abandoned car after a weekend of drinking.

• My mom said I was not allowed to go to work today.

• A bee flew in my mouth.

• I’m just not into it today.

• I accidentally hit a nun with my motorcycle.

• A random person threw poison ivy in my face and now I have a rash.

• I’m convinced my spouse is having an affair and I’m staying home to catch them.

• I was injured chasing a seagull.

• I have a headache from eating hot peppers.

Amazing.

Here is the link to the original release. Thank you CareerBuilder for always amusing us!

Don't Mistreat Job Seekers

Alison Green of U.S. News and World Report recently compiled a list of 5 ways companies mistreat job seekers.

1) "Having no regard for the candidate's time."

2) "Not sharing their timeline."

3) "Refusing to share their salary range, but asking for yours."

4) "Misrepresenting the work."

5) "Not notifying candidates that they are no longer under consideration."

The full article and some expansion on each of these items can be found here.

2, 3, and 4 are downright shameful and there is no plausable excuse for them. Often times, however, we've found that 1 and 5 are accidental and are caused by time and volume pressures.

That's no excuse. It hurts your company's reputation.

Take a look at your process. If you find that you are guilty of 1 and 5 above, ask yourself if these are simply being overlooked. That is, are you unintentionally disregarding the candidate's time or not notifying them when they are chucked from the pool? If the answer is yes and you think it's because you are buried in work, then something is wrong with your recruiting process. Maybe it's time you looked into ways to simplify or streamline your process and give up the notion that you can handle it all yourself.

ePraise

I just heard about a silly new form of "around the office praise". It's called ePraise. ePraise is a kind of eCard that is designed for the sole purpose of praising the performance of a coworker. For those of you who don't know, an eCard is just like a real card except that it is sent to your e-mail box instead of your real mail box...

Anyway, ePraise is a free service from Baudville.com and, while it's silly, I think it has it's place.

These ePraise cards don't take themselves seriously, so hopefully the sender doesn't either. Rather, it seems to me that the ePraise serves as a kind of lighthearted supplement to broader "around the office recognition" programs or initiatives that hopefully all companies attempt to implement (even if only in a limited way).

They're good because they show that someone has taken a moment to personalize and send them. They show that someone recognizes the work someone else has done and they're kind of funny so they lighten the mood.

Lots of ePraise for Baudville.com

The Trouble With HR

Today we present an article by guest Coaching Author, Wendy Reeves.

* * *

As a former HR manager, and latterly in my employment as HR director, I know only too well the pressures and the difficult assignments that befall the corporate HR department.

The key function of good HR is to provide a service to the organisation and its staff. The workforce, from the top to the bottom, need to be treated as ‘the customer’, supporting and delivering to that customer as required. I have always believed in HR operating an ‘open door’ policy to anyone within the organisation. An accessible and visible HR department creates trust and confidence, and cohesion. Not always easy at the best of times, and in this current economic climate beleaguered HR personnel are beginning to suffer.

Cut backs and waves of redundancies are currently on businesses’ agendas, as they fight to survive the credit crunch. Head office functions and responsibilities such as marketing, are being removed and re-assigned to be delivered by line management, and effecting the change that these situations bring not only for those leaving, but also for those remaining - often requires HR input. And frequently when all that is done, it’s the turn of HR being the last to go. If your boss asks you for details of the redundancy process, be wary.

At my last employment the company was working towards floating on the stock market, and the share options awarded to me at the time of my directorship would turn in to ordinary shares, which I could cash in. It was at this stage that I made the decision to make some life changes as this windfall would support and help me move forward to a new chapter in my life. Part of the company’s preparation to float was to tidy up the management structure, which fell upon my department. Even though I was preparing my own exit some months ahead, it came as a huge shock that I was included in that tidy up process – they didn’t require an HR director going forward. Thankfully, the timing of my redundancy hit three years ago when the economy was buoyant, and receiving a redundancy package as well as the payout from the shares did ease the blow. I was lucky. But at the time, being forced out of a job you’ve given many years to is never easy to face, no matter what the circumstances.

So, who looks after the wellbeing of HR during these difficult times?

In my coaching business I have come across many HR people who are really struggling to cope under these current pressures. Their sense of self preservation buckles as they try to deal with making their colleagues redundant - colleagues whom they’ve known over a number of years and who perform well with an excellent record of conduct.

Before we can attempt to minimise the stress and pressures we first need to recognise that we are suffering from it. The next step is to realise what the triggers are. Stress comes in two directions; internally – the stress we create…pressure we put on ourselves, and; externally – work, boss, family etc.

Here are some tips on how to deal with stress:

• Find a support network, either a ‘buddy’ at work, or someone outside whom you can talk to about how you are feeling.
• Build up a resilience to stress and implement the three “R’s” to help focus on things you can control
• Rest: For example, move away from your computer and do something different, such as getting a drink every 30-40 minutes.
• Relaxation: What can you do to chill out? Perhaps listen to music or meditate? Yoga or other holistic therapies can really help.
• Recreation: Physically being active in some way, walking, swimming or going to the gym. Don’t become a hermit - keep up a social life.
• Always aim to take a break for lunch. Taking time out during the day is very important if you want to stay fresh and recharged for the next part of the day. The mind has an opportunity to relax and think about something else, which helps improve the concentration. Change your state, go for a walk and get some fresh air to rejuvenate and restore energy, do something for yourself and fulfil a personal task. These small steps reap huge benefits – stress levels reduce, performance improves and you will feel a lot better.
• Stress can really effect how you sleep exasperating how you feel. Try and follow some basic rules; for example, avoid caffeinated drinks in the evening; go to bed when you are tired; relax before bedtime, many find taking a hot bath really helps relax both the body and the mind; exercise regularly (but not before bedtime) and stick to a healthy diet. By getting plenty of sleep you will be rewarded by performing more efficiently and sustainably.
• Mind Set: Think positive and focus on what you can do and influence, rather than on what you ‘can’t do’. Negativity is unhelpful and gets you nowhere. Ask yourself empowering questions. In the midst of a crisis, for example, don’t ask why you got into this mess; ask how you can improve it.
• Be self-aware: Stress and worry lead to loss of motivation and procrastination. If you feel you can’t break the stress cycle, seek help to get you back on track and in control.
• Consider the ‘what if’s’ and what your options are.

* * *

By HR-Worldview guest author Wendy Reeves, founder of LifeGoal.

Are Your Employees Afraid of You?

At a meeting in a manufacturing town in the old Soviet Union, the speaker was wrapping up his presentation. The factory had once again exceeded its goals for the five year plan, “Thanks to the wisdom and inspiration of our great leader, Comrade Stalin!” The audience leaped to its feet, shaking the hall with their clapping. The applause went on for a minute. Then two minutes. After five minutes, people started looking around to see who would stop first. After ten minutes, hands sore from clapping, old white-haired Ivan sat down. Relieved, the rest of the group settled back down in their seats.

Ivan didn’t show up for work the next day. No one seemed to know what had happened to him, but no one asked, either.

I was never that kind of leader, or so I thought. At a staff cocktail party after work, my fiancee pointed out that my staff members were really very good at sucking up to me without being obvious. “Nonsense!” I told her. “They don’t need to butter me up. They know they can say anything they want to me, good or bad.” She just smiled. I then realized that, while I genuinely liked my subordinates, I had power over them, even when I didn’t use it. I could put off that raise, delay that promotion, reduce that bonus, and not realize I was doing it. And then I saw I treated my boss the same way. I always held back a little, knowing that my career depended on his good opinion.

It’s hard to manage, even when you have good information to work with. But if your staff is afraid to deliver bad news, criticize your proposals, or argue with you over a decision, you’re operating in the dark. You may have already told your staff that you want to hear open and honest communication. But your message to them consists of more than words. All it takes is a frown or a roll of the eyes to let people know that what they just said was not welcome. Even worse, a comment like, “That’s a dumb idea” will shut down all but the most self-confident employee.

I was lucky. I always had at least one staff member who realized I would always be fair (see my other blogs on Trust.) They would alert me to my blunders. Find one of those folks if you can. In addition, there are some things you could do to keep the communication lines open:

• Have someone watch your body language in meetings. They should let you know what messages you’re sending without realizing it.
• Practice neutral language to handle ideas or comments from your staff when you really don’t agree with something they’ve said. Try, “Interesting idea, Ted. I’ll give it some thought,” instead of, “No, I don’t think that will work.” Follow up with a one-on-one session with Ted to let him know where his idea fell short - if it did.
• Put criticisms in a “parking lot” for later review, and let people know you’ll go over them later. Then give yourself time to react rationally rather than emotionally.
• Learn to listen. That means hearing what people say and mean, both verbally and emotionally. Mirror what they’ve said to let them know you heard and understood it, and to be sure you really got it right.
• Give credit where it’s due. Acknowledge the person who came up with an idea or a valid criticism.
• Acknowledge your mistakes and say what you’ll do to prevent them from happening again.
• Finally, say what you mean and mean what you say. If your actions match the words the use, your employees will learn to trust you.

George Krafcisin is President of Mosaic Management, Inc., where he does coaching and training for businesses and executives who want to become better leaders. He gives his services away to those who don’t have “profit” in their mission statements. Contact him at Mosaic_Management@mac.com, www.MosaicCoaching.biz, or www.LinkedIn.com/in/krafcisin.

The New First Class Compromise

When companies cut budgets, a typical target is anything considered to be a frivolous gadget. An unneeded gizmo. There certainly are a lot of frivolous gadgets and unneeded gizmos. It all makes perfect sense.

But then I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone when I talk to clients who have cut their annual or bi-annual on-line performance appraisals and assessments when I clearly remember them saying to me in the past that they don't know how their team, their department, even their business as a whole could continue to function and grow without them. 

They used to say stuff like “We were such a dysfunctional, uncooperative bunch.” 

So when the tools that 'functionalized' the dysfunctional and got the 'uncooperative' to cooperate are put to pasture, I always want to say “My word! Is it that bad? I hope you didn't have to get rid of the Tassimo coffee maker too!” But, inevitably, I get my head on straight and get with it again.

Here is what we need to do. 

If your team, department, or company as a whole is a dysfunctional, uncooperative bunch but you can't seem to find room in the budget for the tools and support that you need to 'fix it' then either you're company is not taking the 'human factor' seriously enough or providers are not taking your budgets seriously enough. It's probably a little bit of both.

They say that in money, a perceived need is as real a need as a real need. I don't know if they actually say that, but I think it's true. We were going in this direction anyway, and it is simply the case that the state of the economy has accelerated the HR market's need for easy to use (which is time efficient) and cost-effective (which is cash efficient) technology solutions. 

HR needs to start making the case that these tools are as necessary a part of the frictionless functioning of a business as the workstations, the network bandwidth and the Tassimo. Uncooperative people don't just start cooperating especially when they are afraid that their jobs are on the line. No company would sell all of their workstations and replace them with typewriters to save money. It would end up being more expensive... that's why we have computers. The best question to ask is, “How is that any different than getting rid of the other tool that time and again has provided stability and openness to the workforce?” 

At the same time, HR solutions providers need to start innovating and moving away from the old model that companies don't see room for in their budgets. Solutions providers cannot just weather the storm and when the skies clear up approach their clients with the same garbage that got tossed at the first sign of trouble. That is about as backward as selling off workstations for typewriters. HR solutions providers need to learn that HR is now going to want more control over implementation and management of these systems. It's a particular brand of protectionism. HR solutions providers need to have a whole new game that's easy to learn. The products need to be better than they were before and we can actually define what we mean by "better": easy to integrate into company culture, easy for the client to learn, easy to use, quick to deploy, stable, error free. Of course, some HR solutions providers will be quick to say “oh but our systems have always been like that”. But, if that were true then we wouldn't be having this conversation.  

Results: 360 Degree Feedback Systems

Year after year, companies treat their 360 Degree Feedback process as a routine. They claim they are happy with it. We have never encountered a 360 Degree Feedback program that is perfect. There is always significant room for improvement.

I want to thank all of you who participated in our survey to study the perceived effectiveness of 360 Degree Feedback projects within companies. This has been just one of many studies conducted by HR-Meter and HR-Worldview into the effectiveness of 360 Degree Feedback.

Here are the main results:

• 45% of individuals surveyed believe that their current tool is not time efficient.
  
• 38% of individuals surveyed say that their current report types are not easy to read.
  
• 46% of individuals surveyed said that their tool did not ask the relevant questions.
  
• 68% of individuals surveyed said that their tool would profit from more customization to their job.
  

For the full report, Click the Report Button below

or just click here

Survey: 360 Degree Feedback Systems

Have you participated in a 360 Degree Feedback Project in the last year?

We are gathering information about the perceived effectiveness of various 360 Degree Feedback Systems.

Please take a moment to think back on the last 360 Degree Feedback project you participated in and answer the following questions as if they were about your specific project.

Click the Start Button to take this survey

or just click here

We will make the results of this survey available to those who request them

Confronting the Problem

By HR-Worldview Regular Columnist: George Krafcisin

* * *

At one time in my career, I inherited supervision of a group of consultants. I was happy to manage the crew, who were for the most part seasoned veterans who knew their jobs better than I did. Except for “Jane.” She had been in the same job for over twenty years, and I could see from the reports of her consultations with clients that she was still doing the job the way it had been done when she started. My budget for red ink went up as I rewrote her reports before our clients could see them. On the other hand, she was a dependable worker, very pleasant, and clients liked her. Heck, I liked her. But she clearly couldn’t handle the changes in the profession, and she was a drag on our success.

Her prior supervisor - my boss - had always given her a pass on appraisals, so the safe thing would be to ignore the issue. Her performance review date was coming up soon, so I had to fly out to her office on the East Coast and do something. So was I going to be the hard-hearted axe-man and just fire her? What would that do for my reputation with the rest of the staff? I could just spend some extra time rewriting her reports. Was that fair to the rest of the staff, and to me? Maybe I could offer her extra training and hope that she could turn around twenty years of underperformance. I knew that wasn’t going to work. So what to do?

I didn’t really have a plan, other than to lay out what I thought was wrong with her work, and see what happened. With my usual good sense of timing, I flew out two days before Thanksgiving for the confrontation. I got out the report drafts from the last few months, went through all of my notes highlighting the problems. Jane didn’t say a word. When I was done, I asked, “OK, so where do we go from here? Do I just keep giving you grief until you retire?”

In retrospect, I can see what I had done right - and wrong. On the good side, I had decided to do something, rather than ignore the situation. It wasn’t fair to Jane, to me, or to the company to tolerate performance that just wasn’t acceptable. I had also set up a good, objective set of criteria that defined “good performance”, and had documentation of the shortcomings, so there were no arguments about that.

On the bad side, I had caved on deciding what I really wanted to happen. I hoped for a good outcome, but I hadn’t really decided what I would do if nothing changed. Also, I had implied that I would like Jane to retire and that would have gotten me in hot water if she decided to make an issue of it. And I hadn’t separated myself from my emotional need to be nice to a nice person. So I had crossed my fingers and hoped for the best. And I had no idea what Jane thought - I’d given her no feedback on what her review might contain, just copies of rewritten reports.

Jane’s response? She said, “I’ve been thinking about this situation for some time. I’m tired of doing this same old job. I’ve met someone special, and we’re thinking of getting married. I would like to work a few more months, and then retire. Would that fit in with your plans?”

Which leads me to a checklist for dealing with those conversations you wish you didn’t have to have:

1. Decide in advance what you want to happen with the “problem”. What outcome do you want to see? Shoot for a “win-win” if you can.
   
2. Do your homework and define the facts - not your feelings. What is the problem? Can you document it so there’s no argument about it?
   
3. What are your feelings? You need to know what they are to understand how they are influencing your actions.
   
4. What is the other person’s view? Do you know? How can you find out? How might that change the situation?
   
5. Lay out the problem in objective terms and avoid criticizing personal traits. Say, “Your reports don’t meet standards,” rather than “You can’t write good reports.”
   
6. Get a clear agreement from the other person as to what will happen by when. And follow up on it.
   

As for Jane? Happily married and retired. She asked if I wanted to join her and her fiance for dinner next time I was in town.

About Our Columnist:

George Krafcisin is the President, coach and trainer of Mosaic Management, Inc. He writes regular installments on the topics of leadership and management here on HR-Worldview.

His last article "Play Now, Pay Later" can be found here.

Employee Relations: Survey

Many companies fail to properly account for the social relationships that form in the workplace as well as to account for the fact that these social relationships directly affect the performance and the psychological health of their employees which ultimately affects the performance of the company as a whole.

So, does your company take social relationships at work into account?

Please take 30 seconds to answer 5 multiple choice questions. We will post the results to this blog as well as e-mail them to those who would like them.

Click the Start Button to Take this Survey

Or just click here

How do you conduct 360 Feedback Follow-up? (Part 2 of 2)

As we pointed out earlier, a 360 Degree Feedback project that lacks a consistent and structured follow-up is going to lack any real and meaningful value not only for the employees who participate in it but for the company as a whole. In short, failure to properly follow-up on a 360 Degree Feedback project results in lost opportunity and wasted money.

So, as promised, we're going to point out a few steps that absolutely must be taken as a follow through or follow-up to a 360 Degree Feedback project.

Step 1) Every focus person must sit down with his or her manager to discuss the outcome of the project. During this discussion, the focus person and his or her manager need to come to agreement on a number of areas that that need to be improved upon. These areas should be easily identifiable if the 360 report is any good.

Step 2) The focus person and his or her manager must work out a "to-do-list". This should be a list of things the focus person can start to concentrate on on a daily basis that will result in improvement in those broader areas worked out in Step 1. This is the step that is almost always ignored which results in negligible improvement for the focus person.

Step 3) The employer need to work out a system to help each focus person track his or her completion of the "to-do-list". If you are a manager, this could mean routinely e-mailing the focus person to let them know that you have noticed that the focus person has been doing a great job on some items of their to-do-list and a poor job on others. Or, the employer could use a tool like HR-Meter's advanced "performance tracker system" which allows a focus person's rater group to continue to comment on his or her progress between 360 Degree Feedback projects. Step 3 keeps each focus person engaged and on top of their own improvement between 360's. This allows you to spread out the time between 360 Degree Feedback projects, save money and improve efficiency.

Step 4) Knowing that between 360 Degree Feedback projects steps have been taken to capitalize on the information gathered in the previous project, each subsequent 360 Degree Feedback project should be adapted to reflect each stage in the company's performance evolution. You should not be doing identical 360's time and time again.

If you implement these 4 simple steps after your next 360 Degree Feedback project, you will have added considerable value and meaning to your project and will have saved yourself and your company time and money.

How do you conduct 360 Feedback Follow-up? (Part 1 of 2)

A big question that companies need to ask themselves after "completing" a 360 Degree Feedback project is "what should we do with the results?". Far too often what ends up happening is that each employee gets a copy of a virtually illegible 30 or 40 page report and is told to look it over. Of course, that report finds itself in the waste bin while its clone is filed away to be compared with the report generated by the next 360.

A process like this leaves employees feeling like the 360 Degree Feedback project was A) just a formality and B) a waste of time. Either no emphasis is put on improvement or (if on the off chance that desire for improvement IS communicated at all) no methods, approaches, goals, etc are laid down upon which the employee is to improve. 

"It's just something that we do once a year."

This is a waste of time and a waste of money and if this is the way your company is conducting 360 Degree feedback or multi-rater feedback projects, you might as well stop doing them all together.

Does the above sound familiar to you?

360 Degree Feedback Month

For the month of February, we will be running a series of articles on the topic of 360 Degree Feedback. We're kicking the series off today with the introduction to a Research Study that we recently conducted into the soundness and reliability of 360 Degree Feedback projects.

It only seems natural to start at the beginning: To define what a 360 Degree Feedback process is.

Best practice in 360 degree feedback

Results and experiences from practice

“The concept of 360 Feedback makes a lot of sense and, if used well, should have a great deal to offer. It seems to suit the move towards the less hierarchical, more flexibly structured an knowledge based organizations of the future” – Dr. Clive Fletcher 

Companies are shaped by the goals they have, the people they work with and the contemporary texture in which they are embedded. Several decades ago, organizations were modeled upon hierarchical frameworks which, inevitably, rendered a very clear and precise organizational model. With the wave of lean management came the toppling of organizational hierarchies and the installation of more interlaced, dynamic organizational settings focused upon cross functional and project based corporations. These new organizational settings have proven to be more conducive to a setting in which projects and goals arise and are tackled by team based structures rather than hierarchical ones. Within these new frameworks, team oriented goal setting flourished, in part, because of the dynamic relationship between managers and subordinates. These structures create a broader span of control for leaders making it indispensable for them to use more systematic leadership instruments like MBO processes and performance feedbacks. Besides the evaluation of productivity and the reaching of certain goals, the so called “social and networking skills” of employees gained a once unnoticeable relevance. It has been found that these, “social skills”, can be measured through 360 degree feedbacks. Behind this assertion lies the assumption that both personal and operative competencies contribute to the success of a manager and that these competencies are vibrant enough for assess

ment.

In the meantime there are a wide array of studies and experience reports proving the effectiveness of 360 degree feedbacks for both individuals and companies alike.

I: Definition: “What a 360 Degree Feedback really is”.

A 360 degree feedback is based on several opinions about the contributions and behavior of an employee as well as his or her own assessment through a structured procedure. A proper 360 demands that third party evaluations come from groups with a variety of relationships to the focus person: i.e. peers, managers, subordinates external suppliers and customers. The various viewpoints of the different feedback groups within 360 degree feedbacks contribute to comprehensive and authoritative results based on average values.

360 degree feedbacks are methodologically diverse and can, according to what is ultimately sought after, point to an equally diverse range of goals. Nevertheless, there is one guiding principal involved: good feedback should be precise and behavior focused and that focus should be value neutral. Assessments should yield positive change and depict relevant behavioral alternatives that the focus person can implement. Besides the goals deducted for the company setting, a good multi-perspective feedback instrument is especially instructive for the personal development of employees.

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In February, we will be putting up many more posts on this topic as part of our "360 Degree Feedback Month".

PLEASE NOTE: On February 20th 2009, the President and CEO of HR-Meter International, Christina Dietzsch-Kley, will be hosting an informative Webinar on the topic of 360 Degree Feedback implementation and follow-through. 

To attend this event or to request a copy of our 360 Degree Feedback study:

Crisis of Confidence: Averted

Morale is low in a lot of workplaces. Employees are worried about losing their jobs. They are wondering if the good, hard work they are doing is being noticed by managers. Managers, are worried about numbers (sales, leads, budgets, etc) and are not particularly worried about their employees... That is worrisome.

It's funny how, in times like these, the hierarchy gets magnified. Everyone looks up. All eyes to the top. When you see the eyes going up, you can bet the morale is going down.

But managers can do a lot to get their employees eyes focused back on their work by instilling some confidence. Remember, your employees want to know that the work they are doing is being noticed because their fear is, that if it isn't, then neither are they. And if they aren't being noticed, then they are just a drain in the budget and their time is limited.

So, at a minimum, take a moment to recognize the work that your employees are doing. Even better, do a survey to find out what is important to them right now. Ask them questions. When your employees see that you are interested, they will feel more motivated and less worried and their eyes will look down and refocus.

It's only a crisis because we call it a crisis. So, it's a crisis of confidence.

New Tricks

It's a cooling economy... sort of. It would be a stretch (though it's made everyday) to claim economic hardship across every industry. With these “troubled times” comes a series of booms and busts.

HR Vendors are booming. Why?

Employees are expensive (everybody knows that). But it is estimated that a new hire can cost around $5,000 in time and money spent. That's quite a bit of money and a lot of companies have decided that, given the way things look (with the fed estimating a stabilization of the markets sometime in the middle of 2009) they no longer want to throw that kind of cash around on straight gambles.

So, the old selection methods learn new tricks. Metrics and quantifiable analysis made possible by on-line reference checking systems (external 360's and the like) shave the “time spent” column down a hair while revamped internal performance assessments, employee and organizational engagement / climate assessments help manage, benchmark and improve existing “human capital investments”.

Firms are starting to see these methods not as new-fangled “techie” approaches, but as smart, cost conscious and effective reinvestments in their capital assets. The picture doesn't even have to look that sterile. When employers are viewed as caring about their employees, they are viewed as caring about their business just like when they take time to wash the windows and cut the grass, do the books, and send out their PR announcements.

How does your company reduce turnover, improve employee engagement, streamline performance reviews, etc.? To put it another way, what are your “new tricks”?

Speeds and Feeds

Computers are all about "speeds and feeds", right? Sure, but they all have "speeds and feeds" and they are all just about the same. Apple and HP have proven that you don't need to advertise the technical specifications of computers any more.

(This won't be a tech article, I promise)

Apple focuses more on looks and HP makes an effort to make the personal computer "Personal again". But inside, both machines run Intel or AMD, they have ram and HDDs. In effect, their guts have become commoditized. This is why Dell isn't number 1 anymore (though they have changed their marketing strategy to match Mr. Satjiv Chahil's at HP and may soon be back on top).

Before Mr. Chahil arrived at HP, the rules for marketing computers were dictated by executives at Intel and Microsoft (given that the vast majority of computers run on Intel processors and Windows). Mr. Chahil referred to the old marketing technique as simple: display the "speeds and feeds". Then he raised the question of how exactly is HP was supposed to differentiate itself from Dell when both companies offered computers with virtually the same "speeds and feeds"? He asked the executives at Intel and Microsoft and they just looked at him blankly and probably said something like "Intel inside make computer fast" and "Windows make home network easylike".

How do you resist the urge to commoditize your product (Dell claimed that the PC was a commodity!)? For Mr. Chahil, the solution was a simple one: stop advertising a PC as a box of "speeds and feeds" and start advertising it as a Personal Computer. And that is exactly what he did. He began by selling the Personal aspect of PC to his engineers and product developers. The first HP ads that ran under Mr. Chahil had no mention of Windows, Intel or any of the computers technical specifications. Instead, they were beautifully landscaped and featured flowers.

If he could not convince his own employees that the PC was not yet a commodity, how could he convince the consumer market? It required a lot of ingenuity to take a step back and say, "wait a second, the computer is still special". I think that when your business grows to the size and the importance that Dell and HP have grown to, you have a hard time taking that step back because all you can see is the other guy's numbers. What you don't see is that most "ordinary" people don't know what computer to buy because they all seem so similar. That's the brilliance in Mr. Chahil and his ability to motivate his company around that vision as quickly as he did. It is also testament to his intimate understanding of employee relations.

So, consider this: when the chancellor of the University of Massachusetts laid out his plan to increase the size of the student body by 15%, he didn't run out and snatch up more highly experienced, qualified professors (speeds and feeds), he went and hired a new head groundskeeper.