Assessing 360-Degree Assessment
You should be able to verify that a tool is useful. However, it's impossible to establish how a single factor, such as using 360-degree assessment, increases performance or productivity in an organization.
For one thing, the impact of 360-degree feedback on bottom line results depends not only on whether the technology is used, but on how an organization uses it. For example, were targeted developmental programs conducted after assessment? Were the behaviors introduced in these programs reinforced for a period of months until new skills were actually ingrained? Neither assessment nor training by itself can ingrain new skills. Training must follow assessment, and reinforcement must follow training; reinforcement contributes more than 50% to permanent changes in behavior. And another issue: did the organization make the error of linking 360-degree feedback results to personnel action?
More to the point, there are many other powerful influences on performance and productivity: incentive systems, the degree to which people are given the means to perform better, the design of the workplace, the technology of internal support systems, the market, the competition, and other factors too numerous to mention. This is why it’s inappropriate to single out any of these factors to establish its impact on the bottom line. No research can possibly define such a link.
Instead of evaluating whether there’s a causal link between assessment and the bottom line, it makes more sense to evaluate whether developmental programs are actually improving performance.
There’s an excellent way to prove whether training and development programs actually improve performance. The technique has been called “pre-test/post-test.” The “test” is a behavior-based assessment. In the case of technical skills: observe, measure and record individual performance. In the case of “people skills,” which are a huge component of leadership, team interaction, sales, service, instruction and communication: use behavior-based 360-degree feedback focused on the area of performance. 360 is the best technology for getting objective measurements of aspects of performance that are otherwise hard to measure. An identical assessment should be used both before training and after an extended period of on-the-job reinforcement, at which time it is presumed the skills should have been ingrained. If scores have improved to desired levels, the programs may be assumed to have actually improved performance, which is the real reason why organizations invest in these programs.
Assessment has a positive impact on training and development, because it allows an organization to focus on the areas of greatest need. It also defines desired behaviors for participants. Additionally, scheduling a post-test for after the reinforcement phase provides a positive motivational and accountability element. In other words, assessment not only establishes whether development works, it helps make it work. The Assessment-Training-Reinforcement formula can actually change behavior. Any of these measures conducted in isolation will have a much more limited impact.
Dennis E. Coates, Ph.D., CEO, Performance Support Systems
Dave Erdman, President, Vital Learning Corporation
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