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| One-sided performance reviews leave the manager and employee with just one side of the information. |
How are employee performance appraisals conducted at your organization? Do managers conduct their employee’s appraisals, with nobody else giving feedback on the employees’ performance?
One of the problems with this type of employee performance appraisal is that they often become very one-sided. However, feedback from other people is not only beneficial in terms of the employee’s perspective, it’s actually of great benefit to the organization!
The One-Sided Employee Performance Appraisal
While a one-on-one appraisal where the manager gives feedback to their direct report might be seen as the ‘traditional’ way of managing employee performance, it’s important to realize that times have changed. Performance appraisals conducted in this way are less effective and can have a negative impact on performance.
This type of performance appraisal only works if every manager is achieving their goals in managing their direct reports. Unfortunately this isn’t always the case. Employee performance should be shaped by everyone involved in that person’s day-to-day role. Even though the employee is of course mainly responsible, their line manager must accept some accountability as well. If a manager is failing to motivate, train, and successfully manage someone, that employee can’t be blamed for failing to perform adequately.
Additionally, a one-sided performance appraisal often leaves the employee demotivated and feeling as if their opinions aren’t important. Demotivation leads to poor performance, and the process that was put in place to improve performance ends up having the opposite effect.
The Benefits of Using 360-Degree Feedback
Appraisals based on 360-degree feedback make for much higher standards of performance. Every employee – whatever level they are at – will receive feedback from their managers, peers, and direct reports.
- Reliable. Each employee is receiving feedback from their peers and direct reports, as well as their manager. This makes it easier to rely on them as accurate.
- Objective. Because appraisals aren’t just based on one person’s opinion, the overall feedback can be more objective. With 360-degree feedback, other people’s views are taken into consideration. It is still essential to have feedback from an employee’s immediate manager, but a manager’s feedback on its own has its limitation.
- Forward-thinking. It’s also much easier to plan future development using a multi-sided employee performance appraisal method. Rather than a one-sided look at the employee’s performance in the run up to the appraisal and nothing else, 360-degree feedback looks at the employee’s overall strengths and weaknesses. It makes it easy to uncover opportunities for development and strategies to involve the employee in achieving business needs.
Overall, using a 360-degree feedback model for employee performance appraisals gives an organization a more broad and unbiased view of performance. By using anonymous feedback from each employees’ direct reports, peers and managers, performance can be evaluated in a much more successful way. Using a system such as Primalogik 360 makes it even easier by automating the process. Sign up for a completely free 30-day trial.
