They'll pick their mates!

Who picks the respondents/raters is another classic debate we get into when setting up an online 360 degree appraisal system.  The organisation's culture drives much of the debate and the answer.

Our baseline position is that the recipient should pick the respondents. They are best placed to understand who can give accurate feedback on themselves and engaging them in the process is crucial to overall success and ensuring a high response rate.

Many clients believe that recipients will pick their mates - pick people who will give them favourable ratings.  Frankly, our experience is different to this.  We find that people are (generally) looking for accurate feedback and do select a sensible and appropriate group of respondents.

The purpose of the 360 will be influential. If there is any link to pay then the 'rating' on the 360 becomes something of value outside of the intrinsic development process. The recipient has an interest in getting high 'scores'. We would recommend avoiding such a link but if it does exist then some form of managerial review of the selected respondents is inevitable.

But, all of our experience is that people approach this from a development perspective - and actively seek balanced feedback - as long as the systems / processes surrounding the 360 are supportive and used for development rather than evaluation. If you see 360 as a long-term process then even those people that in the first year are suspicious and load their selections with favourable colleagues, over time they will move to selecting an appropriate mix of colleagues and direct reports.

Brendan