looking at performance assessments
When was the last time you understood the potential of those working around you? Tricky question, huh. Since the time when the world slipped into a work-from-home mode, there has been a significant change in everything work – from hiring to work culture to performance reviews. With the situation beginning to change and offline work kickstarting around the world, ‘physical’ workspaces are definitely heading for improved productivity.
While there is no definite explanation as to when this will happen, we can look for options to improve the process of attaining better workplace communication, engagement, and productivity.
What is a 360 evaluation tool?
A 360 evaluation tool, a.k.a 360-degree evaluation tool or 360-degree feedback tool helps organizations gather meaningful and real-time feedback on employee performance to help improve employee productivity and growth. 360 evaluation involves assessments by peers, subordinates, and superiors combined while maintaining the anonymity of the evaluator. The subject is evaluated on the basis of certain parameters such as leadership, communication skills, teamwork, interpersonal skills, etc. The right mix of rating questions and open-ended questions gives way to effective 360-degree feedback.
But why use a 360-degree feedback system?
Providing feedback and appraisals gives employers a clear idea regarding employee strengths and weak points. The role of such an evaluation process is vital when it comes to employee experience, development, and growth. Using a 360-degree feedback/ appraisals system is one of the most efficient ways for organizations to measure the performance of employees, listen to their opinions, cultivate self-awareness and ensure their motivation, growth, and development. After all, an organization that invests in its employees wisely is one that succeeds!
Considering its increased importance, organizations have begun looking at 360-degree evaluation as more than an annual procedure. But is it enough to use any tool to measure employee performance? Clearly, no.
Using a tool with the best features to drive employee engagement and growth is important when it comes to performance appraisals. You should be on the lookout for customization abilities, inbuilt portals, efficient reports, and more while shortlisting 360 evaluation tools. While choosing any tool, it is also crucial to keep in mind the objectives you’re looking to meet as an organization. Before you arrive at any conclusions, take a look at one of the best 360 evaluation tools available.
Meet SurveySparrow – An Omnidirectional Employee Feedback and Review Tool
From letting organizations create customizable forms with advanced automations to generating reports, 360-degree feedback software such as SurveySparrow makes performance evaluations easy and efficient. Let’s now take a clear look at all the features which make SurveySparrow the go-to platform for effective performance assessments and reviews.
- Engaging assessments with respondent anonymity
With SurveySparrow’s 360-degree feedback software, you can build conversational, highly customizable forms which align with your brand. Even the domains can be customized and made in line with your brand. Using the several types of questions available, you can choose to create sections and even personalize surveys according to your team or department. The survey takes a holistic approach with respect to its subjects as well as the questions involved. This ensures a balanced view as well as a lack of bias. The responses are completely anonymous. SurveySparrow also offers email customization abilities as well. The forms created can be shared through multiple channels.
- Organized feedback
You have the option to create sub-accounts and organize your employees into different teams through separate folders. You get to organize your audience through audience management. With SurveySparrow, you can easily create and share surveys for different departments like the HR and marketing department and access them through a parent account.
- Rich insights through 360-degree reports
While the process of evaluation is important, equally crucial are the reports generated. Reports help us reap value from the evaluation process. SurveySparrow’s customizable reports offer its users the ability to add different filters such as partially evaluated, evaluation complete, self-assessed, report ready, report pending, etc. Using these filters, one can keep track of the assessment status seamlessly. SurveySparrow lets users customize 360 performance feedback reports and evaluation emails through the usage of the brand logo, colors, and fonts. The reports contain various sections which help employees improve their productivity. Managers can fill in personalized comments in the personal development plan section of the report.
- Dedicated employee portal
SurveySparrow offers an employee portal exclusively for every employee in an organization. All tasks and activities related to performance management can be tracked in the portal easily. The dedicated employee portal lets managers and admins track 360 evaluation status. It also facilitates easy monitoring of both the open and closed tasks of each employee in the evaluation process. Employee portals, hence, optimizes the process of assessment tracking and leads to better outcomes.
- Invite employees for evaluation
You can easily import employee data using CSV with SurveySparrow. Add their contact information and then invite any employee by sending out an email. There is also the added ability to identify and set approvers for employees so that they can accept or reject the review reports.
- Manager dashboard
Staying true to the 360-degree spirit is the manager dashboard which helps managers get a holistic view of their team’s progress. Accordingly, the manager can identify different categories of performers, analyze their competency levels and determine training needs for employees. Manager dashboards facilitate easy identification of team strengths, weak points, hidden strengths, and blind spots. The average of competency values derived from the dashboard can be visualized in the form of a graph through a Bell Curve. These features make it easier for managers to formulate a personalized development plan for each employee.
- Admin dashboard
Admin dashboard is an exclusive dashboard that helps admins assess detailed performance evaluation reports. It facilitates easy analysis of competencies at various levels – team, department, or country. Metrics such as score frequencies and limits can also be identified through the same dashboard. The dashboard consists of custom reports which provide a visual representation of employee competency at different levels in the form of a Bell Curve or Stacked Chart.
- Widgets in 360 evaluation reports
Widgets facilitate easy analysis of 360 review reports. As mentioned above, SurveySparrow’s reports come with various widgets to guide admins and managers on the right track. Bell curve lets one analyze team-wise average scores pertaining to each competency. Stacked charts help admins analyze department-wise average scores relating to each competency. You also have the ability to further assess averages on the basis of contact properties like location, name of the manager, customer type/ division, and more.
- Automations
You can automate the 360 performance appraisal process using SurveySparrow and determine whether you want to send it out to your employees on a quarterly basis or bi-annual basis. With this feature, you get to automate and share recurring surveys according to your organization’s needs and receive responses in real-time. Organizations can also set reminders and cut-off dates for the evaluation process. Another attractive feature is automatic scoring for each section of the survey.
Tapping into 360 evaluations the effective and productive way
It is well known that honest, transparent, and unbiased feedback does wonders for the growth of a business and its employees. Combined with the right features, 360-degree feedback stands out as the most effective way to improve employee engagement, motivation, happiness, and productivity. Choosing online survey tools like SurveySparrow is your best bet at achieving higher revenue and soaring greater heights.
