Peer Review 360

Open questions
Trusted facilitator
Constructive suggestions

Feedback is a Gift and can positively change your life when given effectively and with care. Peer review is the term used for getting feedback from a sample of those people you work with. The 360 degrees implies that you have taken a sample of feedback from all the groups of people you work alongside including clients or patients or whoever you provide your service for. 180 degrees is sometimes used to refer to feedback from colleagues alone excluding clients.

Open questions

Feedback can just be verbal but peer review is often done as a a short questionnaire. Closed tick box questions allow comparison to others and are useful as a benchmark of how you are doing. Open questions allow more effective advice. Such questions usually have adequate space to write in and include “how am I doing?” “any suggestions for improvement?”

Trusted facilitator

Single words in written feedback can be misinterpreted and become an undue focus for attention. It is human nature to focus on criticism and then aim to counter it. This is unproductive when the intended aim is to look at improvement rather than waste time in tackling criticism.

For this reason it is strongly advised to always have a another person who collates the feedback and puts the comments in context. Someone who can give a more objective overview and remind you that single words or single opinions can be inappropriate. To advise you that it is the overall picture and the constructive suggestions which need your focus,  rather than the “off the cuff” comments by someone having a bad day.

Constructive suggestions

When giving feedback; write it a you would wish to receive it. There is no benefit in describing someones personality or using general labels. The gift of feedback comes in making practical suggestions in behaviour and approach which are easy to take up. For example, saying “you are a bully” may well achive little other than an angry response. Suggesting someone actively listens to others and makes sure everyone agrees with the decisions made is more effective advice.