How to Build a 360 Development Plan with Checkpoint 360 and Everything DiSC
Did you know that one in five 360-degree feedback sessions will provide little to no benefit to the organization that conducted them?
Depending on the number of raters involved, this could equate to hundreds of hours of wasted time.
However, did you also know that this rate of failure is largely preventable? Research suggests that a 360-degree feedback process may not be effective due to the concept itself, but rather because of its poor execution.
In this article, we outline how to utilize two tools to run a more effective 360-degree feedback process.
If you are new to running a 360-degree feedback, we suggest starting with our 360-Degree Feedback guide. This article will not delve into some of the standard processes you should implement when running this process. Instead, we will examine how these two tools can be combined to create a development plan that you can implement immediately with managers or leaders without spending hours creating your own unproven content.
How Checkpoint 360 Sets-up a Successful Development Plan
Checkpoint 360 is a 360-degree feedback assessment published by John Wiley & Sons (the publisher of Everything DiSC®).
The tool was initially developed in 1992 and measures eight core leadership competencies essential for leaders across any industry. We have found that this tool has stood the test of time. Technology, politics, and society as a whole have undergone significant changes since 1992, but the eight leadership competencies and 18 key skill sets remain essential for any leader today.
360-Feedback Leadership Competencies
The assessment takes 15-20 minutes for all raters (including the leader) to complete. Because the assessment is standardized, it ensures every rater has the same experience taking the assessment.
Here is what Checkpoint 360 measures:
| Leadership Competency | Skillset |
|---|---|
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Communication |
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Leadership |
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Adaptability |
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Relationships |
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Task Management |
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Productivity |
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Development of Others |
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Personal Development |
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Create a Development Plan - Not a Single Review
One of the most significant values in using Checkpoint 360 is the ability to benchmark a leader’s development journey.
This feature will play a key role in your development plan. Rather than going through the motions and checking a box that someone has completed a 360-degree feedback process, you are setting them up on a development journey with clear goalposts.
The Checkpoint 360 comparison report enables you to assess how effectively your leader responded to and learned from your development plan. Additionally, it informs your leader that you are committed to their professional growth. This should help ensure that your development plan is taken seriously and, ultimately, is successful.
Personalized and Automated Development Callouts
The Checkpoint 360 report offers many pages of graphs and data points to help the leader understand why they received the ratings they received.
This information is crucial. However, it can be challenging to take action based solely on the data. Fortunately, Checkpoint 360 helps kick off your development plan by identifying the areas where there are significant gaps between how a leader rates themselves compared to how their peers, bosses, or other raters rate them.
There are 18 personalized Areas of Focus that can be pulled into a leader’s report depending on their 360 results:
- Listening to Others:
- Processing Information
- Communicating Effectively
- Instilling Trust
- Building Personal Relationships
- Delegating Responsibility
- Adjusting to Circumstances
- Thinking Creatively
- Providing Direction
- Facilitation Team Success
- Working Efficiently
- Working Competently
- Taking Action
- Achieving Results
- Cultivating Individual Talents
- Motivating Successfully
- Displaying Commitment
- Seeking Improvement
These areas of focus offer a great callout, but it doesn’t offer an experiential learning opportunity. This is where Everything DiSC can help you build your comprehensive 360-degree feedback development plan.
The Checkpoint 360 Areas of Focus can offer an starting point or emphasis in your 360 development plan. Next, we will show you how this all connects.
Leverage Everything DiSC to Create a 360-Degree Development Plan
Everything DiSC has a proven track record of success.
Today, the tool has taken its highly rated content and evolved into an interactive platform that enables more customization and experiential learning. The Everything DiSC on Catalyst platform enables self-directed learning, complemented by facilitator-led sessions.
With the addition of one-hour leadership training modules, you can go further than ever with DiSC. These one-hour, skill-builder modules are part of an Everything DiSC Product called Everything DiSC Worksmart. Worksmart is designed to focus on specific management skill sets that are crucial for a manager’s success.
With our 360-degree feedback development plan in mind, DiSC now offers a strong foundation of engaging training materials to build out your 360-degree feedback development plan.
Below is a chart outlining how each module can support all development areas identified by Check Point 360. To help break down these connections, the areas of focus are divided into different category groups, which can also aid in the 360-degree development plan.
Directing, Delegating, and Execution
The skills are grouped by the core management function they support, aligning with the Everything DiSC Management and Worksmart modules. This group focuses on the mechanics of task management and ensuring clarity and action:
Delegating Responsibility: Delegate essential and appropriate tasks to the lowest possible level to maximize management time, share accountability, and demonstrate confidence in direct reports’ abilities.
Providing Direction: Managers must clearly communicate goals, expectations, policies, and the rationale behind their vision, ensuring direct reports understand their responsibilities and the standards used for performance evaluation.
Taking Action: Avoid projecting a lack of confidence by overcoming the fear of risk, coordinating with other work groups, and providing clear, decisive direction and appropriate authority to empower direct reports to implement the plan.
| Checkpoint Area of Focus | DiSC Training Module |
|---|---|
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Delegating Responsibily |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 3: Direct & Delegate |
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Providing Direction |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 3: Direct & Delegate |
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Taking Action |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 3: Direct & Delegate |
People Development and Growth
This piece of the development plan focuses on teaching how to coach, encourage, and cultivate team member potential.
Cultivating Individual Talents: Shift away from a command-and-control style by demonstrating confidence, making time to coach, giving positive reinforcement, and encouraging direct reports to take appropriate risks without fear of retribution
Achieving Results: Overcome obstacles by treating them as opportunities to build leadership, identifying what is impeding progress, pulling the work unit together to brainstorm solutions, and identifying risk areas during initial planning.
Thinking Creatively: To nurture imagination and originality, managers must constantly look for new opportunities, organize existing elements in different ways, and provide direct reports with the creative freedom and resources they need.
Seeking Improvement: Turn mistakes into learning opportunities by taking personal responsibility, admitting errors freely, and immediately withdrawing and re-evaluating poor decisions in light of newly gained information.
| Checkpoint Area of Focus | DiSC Training Module |
|---|---|
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Cultivating Individual Talents |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 5: Develop Talent |
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Achieving Results |
Everything DiSC Worksmart on Catalyst: Empowering Your Team |
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Thinking Creatively |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 5: Develop Talent |
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Seeking Improvement |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 5: Develop Talent |
Interpersonal Communication and Relationship Management
The saying goes, “People don’t quit their jobs, they quit their bosses”. This section focuses on how you relate and communicate with your team and peers.
Communicating Effectively: Convey information clearly. Understand how to do this in a way that connects with the other person.
Listening To Others: Managers should patiently listen without interruption, actively solicit diverse input by asking open-ended questions, and create a non-judgmental environment to gain maximum benefit from others’ contributions.
Building Personal Relationships: Maintain high morale by showing consideration, complimenting successes, and making time to address concerns.
Facilitating Team Success: Approach conflict as an opportunity to strengthen relationships by carefully listening to and restating all viewpoints to define the problem and ensure the resolution process is fair.
| Checkpoint Area of Focus | DiSC Training Module |
|---|---|
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Communicating Effectively |
Everything DiSC Worksmart on Catalyst: Giving Constructive Feedback |
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Listening To Others |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 2: People Reading |
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Building Personal Relationships |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 6: Manage Up and Module 1: Your Management Style. |
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Facilitating Team Success |
Everything DiSC Worksmart on Catalyst: Managing Conflict |
Motivation Trust, and Adaptability
This section of the development plan focuses on the foundational culture you create for your team.
Motivating Successfully: Apply the principle that you get more of what you reward.
Instilling Trust: Build trust by keeping all promises, informing stakeholders immediately if a commitment must change, and treating others fairly to encourage open sharing of information and support effective delegation.
Adjusting To Circumstances: Realize that contrasting work styles can complement one another, and be flexible by involving diverse groups in problem-solving and objectively examining the reasons people approach tasks differently.
Processing Information: It’s essential to research and analyze all available data to identify the core element or underlying cause of an issue before directing efforts toward a solution.
Working Competently: Demonstrate mastery of both the technical fundamentals of the job and essential “soft” leadership skills, such as listening, delegating, and mentoring, while ensuring continual learning to adapt to a changing workplace.
Displaying Commitment: Maintain a consistently high energy level by prioritizing a healthy lifestyle, managing stress, surrounding oneself with energizing people, and constantly learning new ways to do things to remain invigorated.
| Checkpoint Area of Focus | DiSC Training Module |
|---|---|
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Motivating Successfully |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 4: Motivation and/or Everything DiSC Worksmart on Catalyst: Motivating Your Team |
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Instilling Trust |
Everything DiSC Worksmart on Catalyst: Empowering Your Team |
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Adjusting To Circumstances |
Everything DiSC Worksmart on Catalyst: Helping Your Team Navigate Change |
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Processing Information |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 1: Your Management Style |
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Working Competently |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 1: Your Management Style |
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Displaying Commitment |
Everything DiSC Managment on Catalyst – Module 1: Your Management Style |
Get started using DiSC in a 360-degree development plan
Hopefully, by now, you can see how DiSC can help with a majority of the items covered in a 360-degree feedback process when you use Checkpoint 360.
Here are the steps you can take to implement these two tools together.
Products to purchase: Checkpoint 360
Checkpoint is sold based on each leader’s assessment. It includes all of the leader’s raters’ assessments in the cost.
To take advantage of the benchmarking ability of this tool, you must purchase the leader two assessments (starting/ending evaluations).
Price: $300 per assessment. Quantity discounts available.
Products to purchase: Everything DiSC on Catalyst
Catalyst will act as your Leader’s go-to development platform. They will learn their DiSC Style and leverage it during live leadership workshops.
Price: $270 per leader. Quantity discounts available.
Products to purchase: Training Curriculum
All of the DiSC training materials are included in a comprehensive subscription product called the Catalyst Practitioner Experience. Includes powerpoints, videos, handouts, and activities.
Price: $2,200 Activation Fee / $900 renewal fee after first year
If your organization lacks an internal talent development team or the necessary resources to implement these tools, please get in touch with us to request a proposal on how we can assist.
Have a large group of leaders that you want to go through a 360 feedback process? Our sales team can provide volume discount pricing based on the size of your group.
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Sources:
Tornow, W. W., & London, M. (1998). 360-degree feedback: All the right angles. Jossey-Bass.