TEAMS 360 degrees Feedback offers varied ways to create feedback surveys - software package from TEAMS Inc - Management of HR Systems

HR Magazine, Nov, 1993 by Debra J. Cohen

TEAMS 360 |degrees~ Feedback is a software package from TEAMS Inc. that measures employee behaviors. This program is based on the company's belief that an organization can work to develop or change employee behaviors once they have been measured. TEAMS does not tell you how to change behaviors, but it will show you what the behaviors are by asking for and combining responses from people who work with the individual being rated.

In 1990, after 15 years of field testing, the TEAMS 360 |degrees~ Feedback system was introduced as a measurement-process tool to help managers make decisions more fairly. Its primary use is to collect and organize information for an evaluation from multiple sources such as supervisors, colleagues, direct reports and customers. An assessment such as this is designed to present a full, all-around view of a person's behavior.

TEAMS Inc. has upgraded the software four times since the product was introduced in 1990 and is continually working on upgrades to enhance the product; they expect to introduce a Windows version by the end of 1993.

What it does

The TEAMS 360 |degrees~ Feedback system allows an organization to customize feedback surveys to fit their specific needs, or to choose pre-designed surveys. The software is flexible and allows the user to create surveys in a variety of ways:

* Paper and pencil.

* Scan forms.

* Floppy disks.

* Electronic mail.

The software also allows the user to get general feedback by providing rankings, profiles, perspectives and comment reports.

Moreover, the software produces charts that can be used for presentations. These can be used for:

* Performance assessment.

* Climate and culture analysis.

* Training-needs assessment.

* Quality assessment.

* Customer-service assessment.

In terms of the assessment, you can profile one person, one department, an entire level of managers or line employees on behaviors that reflect your organization's values and goals. Easily used pop-up menus provide the principal means of accessing features and allow you to set up and process your assessment. The software can handle up to 100 survey items and an unlimited number of respondents.

How it works

The scores that are generated in the reports and charts represent a consensus of the multiple raters in which both the high score and the low score are discarded. This creates what is called "trimmed mean" and represents a more accurate assessment of the individual being rated--a consensus on his or her behavior and development needs. If the system were used for management development, for example, you might collect responses from the person being rated, the supervisor, two or three colleagues, two or three direct reports and either internal or external customers. As a result, you might have as many as eight to 10 completed surveys associated with one individual.

The responses can be collected by passing a diskette around, collecting surveys on scannable forms, electronically mailing completed surveys or using the traditional paper-and-pencil forms. The forms also allow for narrative comments by all respondents. The response data are then entered into a central location.

What I like

Perhaps one of the best features of this software is that for each of the criteria selected, the survey, whether custom-made or predesigned, can be written to indicate both the importance of the criteria and the individual's performance. For example, if a person is being rated on 10 to 15 different criteria, it is likely that not all are of equal importance. An individual may be rated a 6 (out of 10) on his or her ability to furnish creative solutions to problems, but the importance of this criterion may only be rated a 5 (out of 10). At the same time, someone may be rated a 7 (out of 10) for goal-setting ability, but this item may be assigned a 10 (out of 10) in its importance.

With this capability, both the ratings and the importance level can be changed for individuals being rated. Hence, if you are using this system for performance review or management development, each application can be personalized. Since performance reviews and development tools should be tied to the job description, rather than the person, this allows for customization.

Other positive features are the software's ability to track raters and the portability of files. Raters can be tracked by name, or more often, by ID number, and their responses can be analyzed for potential problems with rater bias. Feedback on evaluators not only serves as a safeguard for fairness, it also provides respondents with an analysis of their valuative judgments compared to others who provide feedback for the same person.

The survey data files are portable and can be combined with an organization's HRIS or payroll system. This allows an organization to use existing demographic or employment data and to perform various statistical analyses either with a spreadsheet program (such as Lotus or Excel) or with a statistical package (such as SPSS).

Installation is not difficult, but it does require on-site training and consultation by a TEAMS Inc. staff member. The manual is quite helpful in terms of spelling out how to follow the pop-up menus; however, there are some nuances about the system that need to be explained initially. Copies of the screens and examples are provided in the manual, but it is likely that the user of this system will want to capture some of its power by going beyond some of the basic capabilities that are outlined in the manual. Current users of the system seem generally pleased with the program, and base their evaluation on several years of continuous use of the system.