Can we offer some advice? Getting feedback from one person may be helpful, but feedback from more people can offer even more valuable angles of insight. Meet the 360 employee review!

A 360-degree feedback survey is a great way to regularly assess both employees and managers. Not only are employees able to gauge their own performance, but they also receive constructive feedback from their peers and supervisors.

However, writing an effective 360-review can be challenging. Even seemingly small things, like the length of survey or your respondents’ choice of review phrases can have an outsized impact on the value of results. A 360-review survey template can be a good starting point, but you should also learn the best practices for writing your own questions, in order to guarantee the best feedback.

Keep the survey short and direct

While it’s always tempting to ask dozens upon dozens of questions about every topic you can think of, doing so is guaranteed to cause “survey fatigue.” To increase survey participation and engagement, make sure your 360-review takes no longer than ten minutes to complete. Remove unnecessary or repetitive questions, leaving only the most essential ones.

It’s also important to use crystal clear language. Not only does simple and concise language speed up the process of taking a survey, but it also eliminates ambiguity and ensures that participants understand precisely what they’re being asked. Websites like Hemmingway App can help you develop simpler, clearer language when writing survey questions.

Use a rating scale with an appropriately wide range of answers

It’s important to home in as much as possible on your survey participant’s true feelings. That requires a high degree of specificity—both in the wording of the questions, and in the range of answer options.

For example, instead of only asking simple “yes” or “no” questions, you should try to provide a rating scale of possible responses.

So, for example, instead of asking about an employee’s initiative like this:

Does Tim take the lead on projects?
A. Yes
B. No

You could phrase the question this way:

How often does Tim take the lead on projects?
A. Never
B. Rarely
C. Sometimes
D. Often
E. Always

Break a question into its component parts

The more specific you can get with your questions, the more valuable the responses. By that same token, if the wording of a question is too broad, it will be difficult to glean any true insights from the responses.

For example, let’s say you want feedback on a manager’s interpersonal skills, so you ask:

How would you rate Sarah’s interpersonal skills?

Pretty straightforward, no?

In fact, it’s a bit too straightforward. If employees’ rate Sarah’s interpersonal skills fairly low, that may tell you that she needs to improve, but not what specifically she needs to improve on.

Consider breaking the question into a multi-part rating question, as below, with a range of options from Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree.

Please rate your level of agreement with each of the following statements about Sarah.
1. Fosters inclusion
2. Is sensitive to others’ feelings
3. Works well with others
4. Is friendly and easy to talk to

By having employees rate each individual interpersonal skill—rather than all of Sarah’s interpersonal skills as a whole—you’re able to better identify her unique strengths and weaknesses.

Avoid double-barreled questions

In the spirit of greater specificity, you should also avoid asking “double-barreled” questions, or questions that are actually asking two different things at the same time.

Here’s an example of a double-barreled question:

Does Richard prioritize his workload effectively and meet deadlines?

At first, that might read like a perfectly fine, straightforward question about an employee’s time management skills. However, it’s actually asking about two different skills that are not mutually exclusive.

Richard might be good at prioritizing his workload, but still a slow worker who occasionally misses deadlines. Or, Richard might have a very inefficient process for tackling his workload, but still manage to hit his deadlines at the last minute.

That’s why it would be better to break this double-barreled question in two:

Please rate your level of agreement with each of the following statements about Richard.
1. Prioritizes workflow effectively.
2. Meets deadlines.

Provide a balance of open-ended and close-ended questions

Asking close-ended questions with structured rating scales is a great way to get hard, quantitative data.

However, it’s also important to give employees the opportunity to provide you with open-ended feedback. Instead of asking all yes/no or rating questions, try to also ask open-ended questions that could prompt more constructive feedback.

For example, compare how this close-ended and open-ended question approach the same topic:

Do you think Paige is an effective communicator?

Versus…

What suggestions do you have for Paige to improve her communication skills?

Avoid leading questions

In addition to being clear and concise, the language of your questions should also be extremely neutral. You want to avoid any accidental bias or suggestion, which could unintentionally create a “leading question.”

Leading questions tend to have assumptions built into them—for example:

What makes Sarah an effective manager?

This question takes for granted that Sarah is an effective manager. A better question might ask the respondent to rate different aspects of Sarah’s management style, or ask the respondent how they would describe Sarah’s management style.

Sample 360-review questions

As you’re writing your 360-review, you may want to use the following example questions as a starting point for your own survey.

Motivation

Please rate your level of agreement with each of the following statements about Richard.
1. Turns mistakes into learning experiences.
2. Handles competing priorities effectively.
3. Regularly meets deadlines.
4. Makes an effort to increase their knowledge.

Does Richard motivate fellow team members? If so, how?

Work ethic

Please rate your level of agreement with each of the following statements about Richard.
1. Goes above and beyond what is asked.
2. Is focused on individual success.
3. Is committed to team success.
4. Regularly arrives to work on time.
5. Consistently achieves goals.

What are three things you believe Richard excels at?

What are three growth opportunities for Richard?

Leadership

Please rate your level of agreement with each of the following statements about Richard.
1. Takes accountability for their work.
2. Offers help to other colleagues.
3. Contributes in group settings.
4. Takes the lead in projects.

Would you describe Richard as a strong leader? Why or why not?

Communication

Please rate your level of agreement with each of the following statements about Richard.
1. Listens effectively.
2. Works well with peers.
3. Raises concerns in an appropriate manner.
4. Exhibits willingness to work with others.
5. Is sensitive to others’ feelings.

Are there things you appreciate about Richard’s communication style?

Do you have any suggestions on how Richard could improve his communication skills?

Designing wholly complete 360-reviews

Creating a strong 360-review survey is challenging. In order to be effective, these surveys have to cover a lot of ground in a relatively short amount of time, asking questions that are simple enough to understand yet complex enough to provide meaningful data.

There are a lot of factors to consider—too many to cover in just one article. If you’d like to learn more, check out our webinar, “Re-thinking 360s: How to Support Employee Growth While Avoiding Common Pitfalls.” And to find out how Sogolytics can help enable an effective 360-feedback program for your team, request a free consultation today.