The Metiss Group's Blog

So you are ready to put a personal development plan together for the year and you may have some great ideas you want to do for yourself, but how do you know what your direct reports need or want from you?

360 degree feedback is an ideal way to gather the information if the tool and the process used are well constructed.  Surveys using Lickert scales (i.e. “on a scale of 1-5,”) may be easy to find but may not yield the clarity and accuracy of results you desire.  Challenges include the ease of gaming an answer, the scores usually reflect very recent observations or impressions — not behavior traits demonstrated over long periods of time, rater bias (my 4 may not mean the same thing as your 4, or I may never give a 1 or a 5, you may never give below a 3), and more.

Surveys using comparative statements eliminate those challenges, but they are a little more difficult to find, tend to require a little more financial and time investment, and may yield results that are difficult to swallow. 360 leadership tools that use a semi-ipsative format challenge respondents to choose and rank their behavioral and motivational observations.  This unique approach limits common forms of respondent bias, such as attempting to skew the results in a particular direction or making the same range of choices for all questions. The result is a more accurate and honest assessment.

The good news is, once you have the feedback, understanding your development needs from the perspective of your direct reports can make creating and implementing your development plan a lot easier, and very meaningful.

Empower your direct reports by including their needs in your development plan to create an environment for success.

This entry was posted on February 24, 2010 at 7:21 pm and is filed under Leadership, Performance Acceleration. You can subscribe via RSS 2.0 feed to this post's comments. You can comment below, or link to this permanent URL from your own site.