Alright, 360 Assessments do not fall into the testing category that you can “Ace”, however there are steps you can take to ensure that you are getting the most out of your 360 Assessment. Here’s one question to get you started:

Which of the following will help you get the most out of a 360 feedback program?

Acknowledge the Process – Feedback is a positive thing and should be used as a development tool. If you go into a 360 assessment with this in mind, you will get out of it what you put into it, which should be a clear and concise view of your strengths and weaknesses within your organizational culture. Feedback will tell a story, not fiction, and it’s up to you to listen to it. But awareness is only the first step.

In most relationships, people want to have trust—with a romantic partner, with a family member, with a doctor or a dentist, with a mechanic or a plumber. In those relationships, without trust as a foundation, much can fail. Shouldn't we see it the same in the workplace? After all, a company’s success is based on trust—consumers must trust the brand, and employees, who, in essence, sell trust to consumers, most definitely need to trust their leaders. CommuniCon, Inc., says that “high-trust organizations have increased value, accelerated growth, enhanced innovation…and improved collaboration.” So why is it that, according to the 2013 Edelman Trust Barometer, 82% of people don’t trust business leaders to tell the truth? If you’re a leader in your company, that statistic should be alarming.

Luckily, it’s never too late to start building, earning, and increasing trust, and one basic building block is communication. Note that word well, though, because too often, leaders confuse the skill—communication—with its vehicles—communications. Gaining trust is not about which channels you use. It’s about the messaging—and the truth behind it—itself.

Written by Mary Schaefer – President, Artemis Path, Inc.

You can make sure your people are using their natural strengths. You can focus on job fit and culture fit. Is that all there is to ensure motivated employees?

When I think of supporting employee motivation, my thoughts go a slightly different direction. What if you demonstrate that their contributions make a difference? You can do this through empathy. Yes, empathy.

If you want to cultivate motivation, don’t do this.

There are those times when employees are put in the position of dealing with disappointment or being denied an opportunity to contribute. Management calls a project to a halt. A budget cut sends employees’ current job assignments into a spin, perhaps impacting the trajectory of their careers. This gnaws at people. I don’t often see attention given to addressing the meaning employees assign to such changes. They end up feeling bad because of what it means to them. They are expected to roll with the punches. After all, “It’s just business.”

Many people agree: a workplace culture of fear limits employee engagement, productivity, and retention—and by turns, the bottom line. But often, leaders aren't cognizant that they've created that environment. However, Gallup surmises that lost productivity due to lack of employee engagement costs U.S. companies $300 billion annually. Other studies show that happier—and therefore more engaged—employees are more likely to be more “creative, productive, and committed.” In other words, good leadership doesn't have to be with an iron fist—in fact, more often, it shouldn't include iron or fists at all.

One way for leaders to ensure that they aren't creating a culture of fear is to consciously do the exact opposite—create a culture of happiness and fun. Which can be daunting; after all, to some leaders, “fun” might seem frivolous, and other leaders might see “happiness” as the employee’s responsibility. However, just a few changes to the environment can make all the difference to an employee’s productivity.

In summertime especially, it’s easy to let the lure of everything outside the office (blue skies, birdsong, vacation plans) distract you from being productive in the office. Luckily, summer is also the best time to start taking steps to develop new habits that can last throughout the rest of the year.

To bolster productivity, try these tips:

Get up earlier. Giving yourself even just an extra 15 minutes in the morning can make a huge difference to how the rest of the day plays out. It might allow you to fit in a balanced breakfast, leave home without being in a stressed-out rush, and get to the office in time to set an attack plan for the tasks of the day. If getting up early scares you a little, try small increments at first, like five minutes earlier per week until you've gotten to 15—or more. Starting this habit in the summer is easier because of the amount of sunlight in the mornings; by the time winter (with its dark mornings) hits, you’ll already be acclimated to your get-up-earlier routine.

Thanks to the ongoing Values campaign from Foundation for a Better Life, folks across the nation have been supplied with tidbits from the lives of the famous and the not so famous—snippets that, through inspirational messaging, provide motivation to dream, to do, and to hope for what might seem like an impossible success. The billboards, TV commercials, radio spots, and videos remind us of the historic trials—and, in fact, the failures—of arguably rather successful people. Like Abraham Lincoln, whose story was riddled with personal pain, sacrifice, ups, and downs before he achieved the ultimate success of becoming the 16th President of the United States. Or Thomas Edison, who purportedly failed thousands of times before he created a successful light bulb.

In both cases, these men could have done what many human beings do: they could have shied from the risk of trying again. They could have taken the safe route, the well-traveled path, the life of complacency. Instead, both men continuously took both personal and professional risks to keep doing what they believed in. And, ultimately, through all of the risks, they were both remarkably successful. Had either been content to remain in his comfort zone, imagine what might be different for our country or our lifestyles today. Should it be any different for corporations?