Guidance for raters

If a colleague has approached you to take part in the 360 process this guidance will help you to understand the benefit and importance of the process and your contribution to it.

Understanding the 360 process

The 360 is an important stage in part of their leadership development programme, which your colleague is currently embarking upon. The 360 is an opportunity for you to provide feedback on your colleague's leadership approach against a set of pre-defined leadership principles. The online questionnaire will ask you to give a numerical agreement rating to a series of behaviours and values. There will also be the opportunity to provide open narratives to justify a particular rating choice. The questionnaire concludes with a number of open questions about how your colleague may be able to adapt and improve their leadership style in the future. The feedback received via the 360 will allow your colleague to understand different perceptions of their behaviour and leadership style and ultimately understand the areas in which they can strive for personal growth and development.

Anonymity

It is important to understand that the feedback you provide in the 360 will be anonymous. All selected raters sit within a group; peers, reports or other. Each group will have an absolute minimum of two people, but will usually have more. When you submit your questionnaire the numerical ratings of everyone in your group are combined to form averages, whilst all the open comments in your group will be intermingled into one list.

Agreeing to take part in the 360 as a Rater

The colleague taking part in the 360 process will have picked between six and 17 raters to provide feedback. In inviting you to be a rater your colleague will hopefully have explained their reasons for choosing you; however it is fair to assume from their invitation that they do value your opinion.

The purpose of the 360 is to give honest but constructive and developmental feedback to the individual. It should not be seen as an opportunity to list grievances, so if you genuinely believe that you cannot give feedback that is truthful or constructive then it is best to politely decline the invitation to be a rater.

If you are feeling reluctant or tentative about taking part then remember that the feedback you give will be anonymised. If you already have concerns about your relationship with your colleague then view this as an opportunity to be honest about the quality of your working relationship. The 360 process provides a controlled and supportive environment in which difficult topics can be broached; if you are hoping for a change or fresh start in this particular working relationship then you should embrace the opportunity to participate.

When giving feedback try and be objective and draw upon a series of interactions you have had with your colleague, rather than focussing on one more recent interaction.

In agreeing to be a rater you will need to set aside just 15 - 25 minutes to fill in the online questionnaire. Following the initial conversation with your colleague you will receive an automated email inviting you to login to the system and complete the questionnaire. If you would like further guidance on using the system please see the FAQs.

After the 360

Your colleague will receive their 360 feedback report and go through it with the guidance of a coach from the Learning and Development team. The coach will help your colleague to draw out the highlights of the constructive feedback as well as produce a developmental action plan.

As a rater, your involvement in the 360 process will most likely end as soon as you submit your feedback. Occasionally the coach and the individual may decide that a follow up conversation with a certain group of raters would be beneficial. It is important to understand that the revelations of a 360 can be a tough process for the individual, so if you are approached, be willing to engage in an honest and open conversation and respect that it may be a challenging situation for your colleague.