In the strengths-based approach, we always start with talent, and finish with strength. This is where the role of 360 feedback becomes powerful. Although the tool is named StrengthsFinder, what the results really tells us is our talent themes. To develop those talents into strengths, we need to invest time by practicing them, and building into them the correct skills and knowledge. Feedback allows us to know how our talents are showing up, and what we need in order to build them into strengths.
The Challenge – Self-Awareness
As stated in some of the earlier articles, self-awareness is an extremely important element in generating growth. Most of us forget that we are really looking through our own perception filters, even if we know it is there. Self-reflection is a great step in helping us understand ourselves – understanding what is meaningful/energising for us, and what is frustrating for us and help us to better understand how we are naturally wired. Even then, we may not be aware of our impact on other people until they tell us; this is why feedback is important, and 360 feedback is a great way to approach it.
The 360 Feedback Idea
How it started
A fellow Strength Coach who is also a pastor from a church approached me with an idea – to help the church leadership deepen their understanding their own theme maturity levels and help them develop their talents using a 360 feedback within their teams. This is even supported by the Senior Pastor of the Church! What an amazing willingness to engage and develop the leadership team!
The Method
The idea was simple – To have each member of the team rate each other’s theme maturity on a scale of 1-10, and to also rate their own theme maturity on the same scale. To give them a handle on how to rate the theme maturity, a short description of what the talent in its raw and mature form was given as a reference.
That was it! We wanted to keep the information as confidential as possible, and having qualitative feedback may actually review who gave the feedback. The reason that I was asked to facilitate this entire process was also to ensure data confidentiality. Having such a simple format made it easy for each member to provide their feedback, and also gave us an extremely high response rate – close to 100%. Only those who were overseas did not respond, and even then we collected their feedback when they were back.
Although the idea was simple, it has great potential! How we we put this data together in a way that was insightful, and also how do we facilitate the sessions so that the leadership can both understand their talents better, use it to foster greater teamwork, and also use it for all the leaders in the church.
Some Interesting Insights from the 360 Feedback Exercise
We do not have any sophisticated data collection system, so all feedback was collected, computed and analysed manually. Based on the information collected, we could already see some patterns emerge.
- Range of Perception – Some people had fairly wide range of scoring from the team. This reminds me that interactions with people are often complex and is dependent on both parties. We have to remember that this is a perception survey, and nothing is objective. Some people may think that they are fairly mature, but if we find out that there are a few people whom we are having a less positive impact on, wouldn’t it be useful to find out why and what we can do about it then to be happy that your theme maturity is a 7/10?
- Our Perceptions are a reflection of ourselves – Although the members are rating other members in the team as part of the survey, the score which they give others could, in fact, be a reflection of themselves more than it is a reflection of person they are rating. A person high in the Analytical theme has a higher chance of rating someone’s Activator theme low because they have different needs. This is a great opportunity for the person who is giving the score to self-reflect and understand why they gave such a score for the other person.
- Overly Inflated/Deflected Self-Perception – In a few cases, we have had some cases where people rated themselves way below / above what others have rated them. This can be a lack of self-awareness, and this is exactly what this 360 approach is designed to reveal as well. By addressing this sensitively, we can help the person understand how he/she is being perceived by others in the team. Those who rated themselves way below their average rating are generally not recognising the contributions they are making and this can be extremely encouraging for them as we get the rest of the team to affirm them for their contributions. Those who rather themselves way above their average ratings may in fact be overusing their talents, and are invited to examine the impact of their actions on the rest of the team.
The Result
The team walked away from the sessions with a greater understanding and appreciation for their own talents as well as that of their team members. Many of them gained insights on how to work with each other, what each others needs are as well. At the end of the session, each of them created their own Strengths Development Agreement which both highlights that their strengths contribute and needs, what their basement behaviours look like and a request for specific steps the team members can do when they see these basement behaviours exhibited. It’s an agreement that requires some level of confident vulnerability to write honestly, but would create a great impact on the team.
Interested in building a more effective and cohesive team?
Email me to arrange for a no-obligation discussion on how we can do this together.
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