Making Multi-Rater Feedback Work in Professional Services Firms May 10th, 2007

David

Professional services firms suffer from a unique challenge at employee performance appraisal time… Consultants, accountants, architects and lawyers typically work on many different accounts or projects, continually moving on to new teams with different leaders. For many firms, continually moving people on to new projects under different leaders is the only possible way to operate. But the implication is that the traditional boss is missing. When it is time to give formal feedback to employees on how well they are working, the fact that the boss has been missing undermines the process. This is why multi-rater feedback from project heads, partners and peers is essential.

Before jumping into a multi-rater feedback (a.k.a 360 degree feedback) program you need to consider:

- Do you use multi-rater feedback only for developmental feedback or do you also have it affect someone’s performance appraisal and hence their compensation and career advancement opportunities?

- Do you use upward feedback where the employees rate their bosses?

- What sort of technology do you use to make the administration fast and easy?

We’ll explore each of these questions in upcoming posts. Let us know if your organization uses multi-rater feedback, and how it works for you.

Tags: employee performance appraisal, HR, multi-rater feedback, professional services