Ideally, 360 degree feedback surveys should never be used to determine compensation. 360 performance evaluations should be used for the following purposes:

It is important for employees to learn to separate their individual development from compensation. Top performers should be rewarded whenever possible. But every employee should be committed to their improvement. 360 feed back surveys should be seen by all employees as an opportunity to change, grow and improve. The workplace can offer more than one kind of enrichment.

The truth is that if an organization is going through difficult times, it is more vital than ever to give feedback to employees. Many employers feel an obligation to let employees knows whether they are meeting expectations. If employees are not given regular performance evaluations, they may come to feel that:

It’s easy to see how the workplace culture will start to suffer.

There are also more pragmatic reasons to gather data on employee performance. Such data is used to make informed decisions about termination as well as about salary increases.

Nowadays internships are not just about allowing the intern to gain professional working experience. More and more, the trend is for internship recruiting to replace entry-level recruiting. Forbes Magazine reports, “69% of companies with 100 or more employees offered full-time jobs to their interns in 2012, according to a[n] [Internships.com] survey.”

The trend toward internship-pool hiring is growing. In a competitive job market, companies need better ways to evaluate candidates. What better way to ascertain that an intern is a good fit for the workplace culture than by using a 360 evaluation? 360 surveys reveal aspects of an employee’s performance that traditional performance evaluations miss. An example is the candidate’s mindfulness of her impact on her co-workers. These additional factors can make all the difference when other factors are equal.

Furthermore, before you hire an intern full time it’s probably a good idea to give them a sense of what they’re doing right and wrong. If you give them a sense of how the people who work with them view them, all the better. Their 360 feedback will help them begin their tenure as a permanent employee at your organization on the right foot.

According to The Conference Board of Canada, the voluntary turnover rate in Canadian organizations continued to creep upwards in 2012-2013. The cost of turnover is well known. Yet not enough companies recognize the value of performing exit surveys. Exit surveys contribute toward improving recruitment and retention practices. You will never have a better opportunity to get honest feedback from an employee. The exit survey will allow you to identify problems with workplace culture. You can then develop an action plan for lowering turnover at your organization.