The company I work for has a well-entrenched culture of 360 degree feedback. Five years ago, this feedback was often pointed and tended to emphasize the negatives. But it was genuinely helpful in helping managers poinpoint the skills/ behaviours their people needed to develop. Today, the same process spews out feedback that rarely rises above the level of anodyne praise.
What’s changed?
Five years ago, feedback was typically anonymous. Today, the norm is to copy the subject of the feedback on the feedback. Could that be the culprit?
I was around when the culture of copying the subject in on feedback started. The Senior Vice President who ran our department believed “if you’ve got something to say about a colleague, be man enough to tell him face-to-face.” That made sense. It prevented people from abusing the system by using feedback to vent, or to settle personal scores. It felt right. Initially, it seemed to be working well, because some old habits persisted and the feedback remained pointed. We didn’t imagine that the quality of feedback would diminish. But five years later, feedback clearly is a blunter instrument.
The other plausible explanation is a change in the company’s life stage. Five years ago, we were a young, fast-growing company. Employees were paid stock options. Promotions happened frequently. Now, we are a mature company that pays dividends, growing at about the same rate as the economy, where promotions are rare and precious.
So why would the slower corporate growth impact the quality of feedback? It takes a fair bit of work to write accurately-observed, balanced, insightful, constructive feedback. That effort is worth it if the feedback is acted on, and colleagues change their behaviour for the better. In a slow growth environment, improved behaviours don’t materially change the likelihood of getting promoted. With small or no incentives, people don’t respond to feedback with behavioural change. And so the effort that goes into writing high-quality feedback becomes as futile as writing a well-reasoned blog.
The loss of anonymity makes feedback risky. And the slower career trajectories make feedback futile. Which effect is more real? Without any scientific analysis, the loss of anonymity feels more specific/tangible and therefore more real. I suspect there is a grain of truth in both arguments.
Despite feedback becoming a blunt instrument, I still think it has a ton of value. My company has virtually no disrespectful or abusive bosses. People tend to treat each other as social equals across the hierarchy, despite very substantial differences in income. That is partly because a culture with 360 degree feedback self-selects leaders who conduct themselves in a particular way. 360 degree feedback just goes from being a tool that effects fine changes in behaviour, to being a tool that prevents grevious abuse. Sounds a bit like democracy.
3 comments:
I think that there are at least two other explanations, and 2 missing motivations :-
Cause 1 - When performance management properly allied to rating curves was first introduced there was a lot of folks who had been over-promoted and not called on it. There was a lot to catch-up to do, so it was a big focus for a lot of people. That is less true now.
Cause 2 - After several years of this, the lower performers at a level are no longer in that role. The higher performers have got promoted (in higher growth times). There is an external market to avoid the bar moving too far out of step with the market. So, finding increasing homogeneity in feedback should be expected mechanically.
On copying the subject in, I'm a pretty big advocate. You do get a more rosy picture than you might, but it's relatively easy to read between the lines. Better than anonymous feedback, where unless you know the person giving the feedback well, you don't have an easy way of calibrating. And, it seems a more mature way of interacting.
And the missing motivations? Here I agree with you in part, but here's other thoughts. Feedback affects ratings, and the market for jobs is larger than just the company someone works for - so, a good rating is valuable even if the internal opportunities are lower. That should cover the mercenary folks, though I accept not as well as internal opportunities. Second, many people want to improve for self-fulfillment as much or more than because it gives opportunities for advancement. This makes the quality of feedback even more important.
Last note - I don't know what it's been like this year, but I've seen all years prior to that. And, having just been through the same process in the company I've moved to, I can pretty safely say you are still miles and miles better off in quality and depth of feedback!
I agree with most of the comments.
The interesting line of thought (which wasn't obvious to me) is on the causes. A more mature performance management process, hence more homogeneity at each level, hence feedback is less useful day-to-day, but feedback still vital as a self-corrective mechanism. Sounds like a pattern that should work in many organizations.
The only point I'm not really up for is self-fulfillment (with no help from a rewards system...where prestige/ recognition count as rewards) as effective motivation. To be clear, I'm not a natural cynic. I've just seen this motivation for self-fulfillment fizzle out too many times in too many different walks of life. The clearest experiments involved non-credit students in university/ business school. They would be present in great numbers at the start of term, enthusiastic for all the right reasons, and would drop off as the ask got harder.
I think this happens because substantive self-development of any sort is hard work. The mind may need to see the credible promise of a psychic reward to get to work.
I now need to square that theory up with why I'm training for a marathon :)
360 degree feedback just is a tool that prevents grevious abuse, to being a tool that effects good changes in behaviour, 360 degree feedback system.
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