360 Feedback Blog

At the end of a recent episode of the Apprentice USA, Donald Trump, having pointed his pistol finger and fired the first candidate, concluded his remarks by saying ’she had to go…people don’t change’.

Is he right?  Are people just the way they are, or can they change their behaviours if they really want to?

I think DT has a point: the person he fired ignored all the feedback from the other candidates which was telling her that she didn’t listen and that she was a disruptive influence.  Her response was that people (especially women) were intimidated by her.  She would not, or could not, hear the feedback.  I have come across people like this and I don’t think they can change.  Because they don’t want to.

People who really want to change, though, will do so.  At an exreme level, you can see this in people who take on new religious beliefs in adult life can can often change their lives completely, and those of the people around them.  Maybe because their will to change is so profound and internalised…

As a people development professional I have also seen people take painful but ultimately successful journeys to change their behaviours.  I have reviewed my own behaviours at certain times in my life (after some 360 Degree Feedback) and made a decision to do some things differently.

What’s the view from people development professionals out there?  Can people really change?

‘What organisations increasingly need is a cost-effective way of developing the leadership skills of large numbers of managers in a way which moulds them into the type of manager best suited to the organisations’ needs – and preferably, without taking them away from their day jobs – ideally through, an approach that allows them to dip in and out when time and opportunity permits’.  View this article on localgov.co.uk

I would add that effective learning should be all about learning through the medium of the individual’s day-job. By focusing on 360 Degree Feedback and coaching, as in this great example, individuals can reflect on how they do their job, what they need to change to improve, and then do it, in the context of their workplace and their colleagues.  The regular 360 Degree Feedback and coaching is so important because it’s easy for busy managers to forget about what they are learning, and their learning targets - 360 feedback and regular coaching keeps them focused. 

On the point of ensuring that the organisation gets the skills improvement it needs (as well as individuals improving personally), it’s critical that the 360 Degree Feedback is aligned to the organisation’s learning objectives, which in turn must reflect the skills and behaviours it requires in its people in order to meet its business objectives. 

In this blog on Training Zone I discuss some recent research on how well employers support new managers, and what they could do to improve in this area.
http://www.trainingzone.co.uk/blogs/joayoubi/360-degree-feedback-and-talent-management/how-effective-are-employers-supporting-new-

In this article in Training Zone the author discusses the way technology is changing the way individuals learn, develop and manage their careers.

Individual learning and development does indeed translate into ubiquitous performance support, and e-learning and other online forms of learning are brilliant for doing this.

Whilst the individual is certainly responsible for building their personal brand and their skill set, organisations that employ individuals need (now more than ever) to link the performance support they provide to the skills and performance that the organisation needs to succeed.

For the organisation to provide the right performance support, it needs to:

1. Identify the critical skills the organisation needs in order to achieve its strategic goals
2. Identify who the key people are who are going to deliver those goals - These are not necessarily the top
teams - a study by a global courier company found that the key people for them were their delivery drivers
3. Measure the strengths of those critical skills in the key people or group
4. Concentrate on filling the critical skills or competence gaps in the key groups (using both development activities and on the job experience)
5. Consistently and regularly measure the results and refine the training and refine development activities based on those results.

For more information on online tools and support for talent management, visit
www.tracksurveys.co.uk

In this debate in Training Zone there are some great nuggets about how to create a coaching culture.  We would add:

And then how do you know if it’s working?

Once all these key training and cultural changes are put in place, how well are we measuring the effects? I.e. as Trevor says, where is the evidence?

The only way you will know is by measuring, before and after the
manager training, coaching or other intervention:

• What are the changes in observed behaviour?
• What are the changes in results?

It’s not difficult, nor does it need to take lots of time, especially now when everything can be doneonline, consistently and confidentially.

It could be as simple as an online questionnaire that the coachee sends to their all colleagues every 3 - 6 months saying, for example:

How am I communicating?
How am I managing?
How am I sharing information?
How am I whatever I am working on with my coach….?

Easy to respond to, easy to score…and easy to measure the results and pull out
the key messages.

Oh and make sure your staff survey asks some specific questions about the quality and frequency of manager coaching.