Posted on Feb 25, 2014
Will 360 Degree Evaluations Help Army Leadership?
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I have heard talk about the army doing 360 degree evaluations, whats your opinion? Do you think it will help out army leadership and the draw down? <br>I had wrote a paper on this for my soldier of the quarter board, my CSM
asked me why i felt the way i did about soldiers having a say in their
leaders NCOERs and OERs, i said CSM i have had a few cases of where my
NCO wasnt good at all to me or other soldiers but nobody that saw it said anything and when i said something they didnt want to believe me and laughed it off. When he did get in trouble nothing happened to him. <br>
asked me why i felt the way i did about soldiers having a say in their
leaders NCOERs and OERs, i said CSM i have had a few cases of where my
NCO wasnt good at all to me or other soldiers but nobody that saw it said anything and when i said something they didnt want to believe me and laughed it off. When he did get in trouble nothing happened to him. <br>
Evaluations
NCOs
Drawdown
Officers
Posted 10 y ago
Responses: 9
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Not for NCOERs and OERs. If done team/co/bn wide anonymously so leaders can see how they are viewed then thats up to them, but not soldiers officially rating NCOs and Officers.
If you have good leaders there is no need for this anonymous rating either. (not sure if the MSAF360 is anonymous anyway) There should always be an open line of communication where soldiers can professionally let an NCO know that they are uncomfortable with this or that. Monthly counselings are a great time to talk as humans, doing away with senior to subordinate for a moment as long as it is professional and tactful.
I have been where you are SPC Peckham and felt the same way at times, however, you have to take into account that looking up you have a very small idea of what goes on. Rating "down" you have been in that position you understand why that NCO does what he does and you understand the effects. You understand what he was asked to do and what he actually did. As a soldier you dont really know why your NCO does what he does on a daily basis unless it pertains directly to you and your mission. So where you think your NCO is shaming he is really performing an additional duty or escorting a soldier to ASAP or some other tasks unbeknownst to you.
The other thing is lower enlisted soldiers would hold grudges, make false reports (which already happens) imagine the man hours spent investigating all the simple reports just to get a valid NCOER (SGT Snuffy comes in late everyday[maybe he has a valid reason, still have to investigate]). Imagine how pissed you would be if they didnt investigate and still closed out the NCOER ignoring your claim(or taking your word for it without investigating, equally as wrong). How would you validate these claims? Do we give soldiers the power to counsel NCOs when they do something the soldier deems unsatisfactory and then transfer it to their NCOER when its due?
Soldiers have a hard time separating correction from hazing/being picked on. Sometimes they dont understand the workload. Soldiers become angry for working late not realizing that four day the week before was in jeopardy and now you have to work 2 HOURS over to make up for 2 DAYS off. Maybe the NCO doesnt even know that so he cant tell you, but you think its his fault and rate him badly?
Its best to leave the ratings to the highers, they know the full picture, because they are usually the ones who issue the order and intent, so they know if it was conducted properly and since the decisions of their subordinates are not directly physically and mentally effecting them they can be fair and impartial as opposed to a soldier who is being directly effected by that NCO and may allow emotion to play a part in rating.
***To the point of an NCO treating you badly. There are already systems in place to counter such ill treatment.(COC, Open Door policy, IG, Sensing sessions and more) If it is brought forth and nothing is done then there are systems in place to address that also. If you feel you are being ignored exercise the right steps in order to have the problem addressed.
I will say that I witnessed an event take place(when i was there) where I thought an NCO went unpunished only to find out later that he lost pay and did extra duty. Sometimes punishment is kept out of sight, but it still happens. Sometimes unfortunately some go unpunished, but usually that is because the soldier took the wrong avenues of approach or had no backing to the claims.***
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SSG Christopher Peckham
i see your point, i agree but i also disagree, they should make the soldier ratings like something to hold the soldier accountable, example lying is UCMJ or something of the nature, and when my situation happened i was brand new didnt get no guidance and when i used the open door policy it just got swept away and battalion refused to take it higher. I just think that we should have some input. maybe not to make or break the NCO and his eval but maybe to help the raters get a full picture of who they are rating. I see that the rater can weed out the hate and grudges if its not going with what everyone else says.
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SGT (Join to see)
The senior rater should make his ratings based on their own observations, relying on the rater to do this is already a problem. Asking him to make his decision based off of even more peoples opinions will only cause greater problems. 623-3 speaks specifically about personal contact being used in order for the Senior Rater to make his assessment. If Senior Raters and reviewers are doing what they should we wouldn't even need to have this conversation. There is nothing wrong with the current system if we use it the right way. Im not firing off at you Im just kind of tired of the Army not fixing the problem but overlooking it by adding more. If we dont fix the foundation it doesnt matter how many bricks we add the house will still be rickety.
You can not assume that just because only one person says it it is not true, you have to investigate all claims of misconduct. Ive known of circumstances where everyone loved a certain NCO thought he was hot spit, but one female proved that was a front. Everyone said he would never do it, she was a liar, 9 months a divorce, and lost rank later they were all proved wrong!
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I think the 360 evals are a pretty good tool for leaders to get feedback from thier Soldiers and for Rater to get a feel of how the Ratee is viewed by thier Subordinates.....IF the eval is done honestly and with integrity! However I do not feel that those Evals should have and true weight when it comes to NCOERS and OERS because most of the Soldiers that are going to be conducting these assessments have no clue what an NCOER or OER is or the importance of it. I just feel it owuld be to easy for a good leader to get screwed because his or her soldiers do not agree with their leadership style or didn't "like" them.
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CW5 Sam R. Baker
Honesty and Integrity are essential and you are correct. I intentionally chose folks who do not "like me" for responses as I wish to get a myriad of actual feedback. Seems that folks who publicly may not "like you" actually like your leadership style and direction, but it just doesn't suit them. No one likes being told to go to the dentist over and over again.
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The short answer is that I think 360 degree evaluations can be a valuable tool both organizationally for the Army and individually for each leader. The long answer is that a lot will depend upon how 360 degree evaluations are implemented across the force and if/how the evaluations are used organizationally and individually. Organizationally, 360 evals are not much different from the peer evals that a Soldier receives in Ranger School. There are things that a spot light Ranger can hide from an RI that can not be hidden from fellow Rangers which is what makes peer evals effective. Individually, a person that does not normally solicit, listen to, and/or apply feedback from others will not do so with a 360 eval either but a person who normally does will with a 360 eval and it therefore becomes that much more effective. At the end of the day, individuals will have to make 360 evals work by providing quality feedback as a contributor and by assessing and using the evals as a receiver.
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