5 Key Features of an Effective 360 Survey

74% of L&D professionals believe skill building is the most critical part of rebuilding for the future. There is hidden potential in every staff member, waiting to be fully developed. Training and developing existing employees is the most effective way to unlock every employee's potential, and there's no better way to go about it than a 360 survey.  

Also known as 360-degree feedback, the 360 survey approach provides a holistic competency review system that can help you see the complete picture of your people, which will help the organization retain talent and provide ample growth opportunities. In this post, we'll discuss some of the key features of 360 survey software that'll make it easy for you to implement the process within your organization. 

• Prebuilt Assessments

Prebuilt assessments are a critical component of 360 survey software. A good 360-degree feedback tool should come with a prebuilt survey template library, including reliable, valid, and ready-to-go 360 survey assessments for:

• Leadership Competencies. These assessments will cover the primary responsibilities of leadership in the modern business world. 
• Managerial Competencies. These will help you assess the essential management competencies required to make an effective manager.
• Individual Contributor Competencies. These will help you identify where your employees excel as individuals, from the technically gifted to natural leaders. 

Building comprehensive 360 assessments takes time, which a lot of organizations don't have. Having prebuilt 360 surveys can help save time, improve efficiency, and impact multiple groups within an organization.

• Custom Assessments

In addition to prebuilt assessments, you can also get custom templates to help tailor surveys to the needs of the organization. What degree of customization does the tool of your choice offer? This is a vital question to ask yourself when choosing a 360 survey solution for your organization. 

The right tool should give you the option to choose between your own competency frameworks and standard ones. Custom templates are made according to the competency framework required by your organization's unique needs. Competencies vary depending on the employee's level and job role. 

Assessments are conducted based on competencies that are specific to an employee's role. A survey that's not tailored to these aspects may not be useful. The right software should have an exhaustive list of competencies to choose from for every role and allow the organization to host custom assessments on the survey platform to make it easier to track results. 

• Customer Service

Customer support is one of the most important factors to consider when shopping for a 360 survey tool. If you are tasked with choosing a 360 survey software for your organization, be sure to select a tool that provides 24/7 customer support. Poor customer service translates to a bad user experience, which can hurt your employee development efforts.

Around-the-clock support is particularly important for organizations implementing a 360 solution for the first time. Like any other software, it may take time for users to get used to the new tool, and having a support team on standby can help with some of the problems they may encounter. 

As far as customer support goes, there are a few other important things to consider when choosing a 360 survey solution. For instance, what other options are there? Also, it'd help a lot to have software with proper documentation that employees and other users can refer to before contacting customer support. 

• White Labeling

Some organizations may want to white label their own 360 assessments. For them, having white labeling as a feature on their software is critical. White-labeled 360 survey solutions provide consultants, businesses, and organizations with customized assessments to bundle with their own branding. 

White labeling can turn a simple online assessment into a powerful branding opportunity, which you can and should use to communicate the positive traits of your organization. A well-implemented white label survey displays your brand message and ensures that it's well ingrained into the users' minds. 

White labeling and other forms of customization will make your surveys look and feel internal, increasing trust among participants. When the participants feel they can trust the survey, organizations are more likely to get constructive and actionable insights from 360-degree feedback. 

• Easy-to-Navigate

In a 360 survey process, everybody who interacts with your employees is part of the feedback. This includes supervisors, managers, peers, and in some cases, vendors and clients. Therefore, it's imperative that you select a tool that's simple and user-friendly. Users should be able to navigate easily when using the tool to: 

• Complete the assessment. The software's interface should be simple and not cluttered with loads of unnecessary information that prevents employees from completing the assessment with ease. 
• Customize assessment feedback. A 360-degree software should help users tailor their feedback. An easily customizable feedback solution can help your organization quickly address specific issues for a particular group of users. 
• Track assessment progress. Users should be able to track progress after completing the assessment. The software should clearly communicate the process, timelines, and expectations to give the user an idea of how long the assessment might take. 

Improve Your 360 Surveys

For this tool to be effective, all stakeholders — inside and outside the organization — should be able to use it without exhaustive training. With so many options to choose from, getting the right 360-degree software for your organization can be a challenge. 

With features such as a mobile-friendly interface, prebuilt templates, white labeling, and excellent customer service, TruScore checks all the boxes. Users have no reason to delay completing their assessments with a seamless 360 survey platform such as TruScore. Contact us today to get started, or browse our blog to learn more about our intuitive solution.