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Some observe that certain large, well-known organizations such as General Motors Co., Citigroup, Ford Motor Co., Nationwide, and IBM have adopted a hybrid model of working as they see it as the trend of the future. Having mentioned this, there are many other companies that are going fully remote. Currently, both trends are gaining traction after the pandemic. The hybrid system is becoming a more accepted form of a working model, as it allows an employee to work from home on certain days and go to the office on the remaining days.
Also, as aforementioned, there are many employees who want to work from home. It is expected that most of the workforce will prefer to work remotely by 2028. Thus, remote and hybrid models of working are growing in popularity and are here to stay.
Though hybrid and remote working models are necessities of the present times, organizations will have their own set of challenges in training employees for these models. One of the major challenges is providing constant feedback to the team members to ensure that all are on the same page. This is where a 360 degree review survey can be a handy review system that would ensure that timely feedback is provided to the employees, irrespective of adopting any working model.
One can also use a 360-degree feedback software as offered by Engagedly, which offers the feature of providing real-time feedback to employees who work in a hybrid or remote work environment.
This blog post will focus on what is the 360 degree feedback process; why opt for a 360-degree feedback system for hybrid and remote employees? How to employ a 360-degree feedback system in hybrid and remote environments, and its benefits.
360° feedback system focuses on employees’ feedback; colleagues’ feedback; a manager’s feedback, and customers’ feedback. One of the best aspects of the 360° feedback mechanism is that it is impartial as it offers feedback from all avenues.
The 360-degree feedback system plays a big role in identifying and nurturing future talents; bringing collaboration among the employees and managers, and fostering an open and transparent workplace culture.
In the present hybrid and remote working age, a 360-degree feedback method provides employees with the required insights into their performance and helps them to improve themselves, aligned with the company’s objectives.
Managers can bolster hybrid and remote employees’ productivity in several ways by using the 360-degree feedback review mechanism, as described below:
A company can lose billions of dollars in profits if it ignores disengaged employees’ concerns and feedback. This is where a 360-degree feedback system can help a manager understand his team‘s concerns and suggestions so that the team‘ productivity can give consistently increasing outputs. As per a research study, employees who feel their voices are heard are more likely (4.6 times) to feel encouraged and would give their best efforts. This holds true for both hybrid and remote employees.
The current workplace scenarios are such that a lot of work has to be done in less time period. In such situations, employees may get stressed and may not have enough time to spend time with their families. This is where managers can act as a coach so that employees can learn to complete their work in less time and maintain a work-life balance.
Thus, the 360-degree feedback system helps managers to identify if an employee is finding it difficult to balance or draw a line between his personal and professional life. 96% of employees are of the thoughts that caring and empathic managers can increase employee retention.
There will be a high level of absenteeism in the workplace if employees are overworked and they have the feeling of being isolated and disengaged. This is highly prevalent in a remote working model wherein the employees feel they have to work more to prove to their efficiency and productivity to their managers.
With the use of 360-degree feedback review, managers will come to know about the level of stress experienced by an employee, through the employee himself and his colleagues. Managers can guide the remote employee and address his fears.
Sometimes, unfortunately, hybrid or remote employees may not get the desired reviews or may be the subject of biased reviews from the managers for their performance. This may happen as managers may not be aware of the remote or hybrid employees’ contributions as much as they have knowledge about in-house employees’ contributions. So remote employees can feel helpless and isolated, and they may leave the company.
When a 360-degree feedback system is implemented, it can eliminate such a biased nature of the review, as colleagues and clients take part in the review process.
A 360-degree feedback process is undoubtedly an effective means of enhancing employees’ performance and productivity. However, this is only possible if you implement the 360-degree review process correctly. You can follow the below techniques to implement the 360-degree feedback process for hybrid and remote teams.
The best way to communicate with your employees is by talking to them face-to-face. Sending feedback through emails can be cold and impersonal and may give a feeling to the employees that their managers aren’t open to the idea of addressing their issues.
Sending feedback through the email over a longer duration can make employees feel they are not a part of the team and their contribution to the company is insignificant. Thus, it is always better to talk to the employee on a one-to-one basis during the review process. For remote employees, a face-to-face conversation can be carried out over a video call embedded within a 360-degree performance review software.
The agenda of the 360° feedback review process should be made clear to the employees so that they feel that the review process is for their own good. If your employees don’t understand the scope and purpose of the survey, there is a possibility that they may shy away from sharing the relevant information with you. Thus, before the review process, communicate to the employees that this feedback will improve their performance and help them reduce their workload and stress. For remote employees, you can use performance review software for conveying the agenda.
Most of the companies implement a 360-degree feedback system in an anonymous fashion so that employees may not have to fear their feedback will be leaked out of the discussion room. For implementing the anonymous review feedback, use Engagedly’s 360-degree performance review software which allows the employees to share their feedback and concerns with their higher management on the software itself.
There is always a possibility that a manager may prefer certain employees for promotion over others, which may lead to a biased review. When performance review is conducted using a performance review software that allows feedback to flow in from managers, colleagues, and clients, it can prevent such biased decisions. Interestingly, a system like this should also help employees to bond better, since employees who deserve credit will receive appreciation from their colleagues.
You, as a manager, need to ensure that your feedback is easy to understand for your team members. This is possible when you use a 360-degree performance review software that allows you to demonstrate your ideas for improvements using charts and graphs. Once you have explained the areas of improvement to your team members, you can explain a defined plan for their self-improvement and suggest baseline employee performance for the company’s growth.
The 360° feedback review system would help managers to understand what processes are working and what are not working and, they can tweak them so that the overall productivity increases. Importantly, the feedback review system would bring better transparency and would make communication among employees easier within hybrid or remote work models.
Given below are some benefits of using the 360° feedback review system for hybrid and remote employees.
A 360-degree feedback system helps employees to understand when they are going wrong and how they need to improve. They come to know the areas for improvement from their managers, peers, and clients. This way they can self-understand their limitations and develop their skills as per the company requirements. Further, employees become more productive and efficient because of self-awareness.
Since the covid-19 outbreak, communication and collaboration have been challenging for various businesses. Managers and subordinates find it difficult to build close relationships when working remotely. Sometimes, managers make use of certain jargon during a long-distance video call that employees may not understand. Here is where 360-degree feedback can help managers to understand various communication challenges that employees face and jargon that should be avoided so that it doesn’t cause problems for the employees.
Remote or hybrid working employees may feel that employees who work on the site daily often receive more benefits than them. This kind of perception may affect the overall productivity of the company. In order to avoid such circumstances, managers can make use of a 360-degree feedback system to provide clear communication and maintain transparency among employees.
360-degree feedback evaluates an employee’s performance individually and as a team. The 360-degree evaluation ensures that employees’ efforts are aligned with the company’s mission, objectives, and vision.
360-degree review surveys are meant not only for employees but also for managers too. Reviews offered by employees help managers to improve their leadership skills. Through anonymous survey platforms as offered by Engagedly’s performance review software, employees need not fear about their reviews being read by managers. Thus, employees can freely express their opinions regarding a manager’s team handling capability and performance to higher management. This may help managers to develop even their own leadership skills.
Engaged employees can be highly efficient and productive. They’re even ready to go that extra mile to achieve their goals. With the use of a 360-degree feedback survey, you can get to know as a company what you should do so that employees will be highly engaged and motivated to do their jobs. Again here, you can make use of Engagedly’s performance review software to carry out anonymous surveys.
As hybrid and remote work environments become more prevalent, 360-degree feedback should become the norm. Management needs to adopt an innovative technical solution, such as Engagedly’s 360-degree performance review software, to understand the challenges faced by the employees and boost their performance.
Our 360-degree performance review software gives employees and their managers insight into their progress toward goals and key results. The solution can also help you to break down a larger goal into smaller ones that can be tracked and monitored. This would ensure that the employees are making advancements in the right direction.
Want to know how Engagedly can help you manage your hybrid employees better? Request us for a demo.
