There can often be a conflict between what the organisation needs and what an individual wants from performance review or 360 degree appraisal.

The organisation is often looking to evaluate individuals to determine pay increases, promotions, or in the current climate discriminate between people to determine who should be made redundant.  The individual may know that game and be seeking to ensure their success within it but they are also seeking feedback on their performance for developmental purposes. 

This particular difficulty struck home in a recent debrief.  The individual scored themselves very highly.  When challenged on this they described the inner work game and how they believed they needed to present themselves to win the game.  But, they were highly self-aware and used the 360 feedback very effectively to understand the impact of their behaviours.

I also saw a dilemna posted to a forum where a HR person was wrestling with ensuring scoring was calibrated across managers.  A particular manager appeared to be lenient.  But, that manager had a high performing team.  At a developmental level it is clearly unimportant how that manager is scoring - and their approach was being successful with the team.  But the organisation was paying wage increases from the scoring - and so uniformity of scoring was essential.  Somehow the best manager had become a problem!

When designing appraisal processes of any description I would work hard to avoid creating these conflicts between the organisational need and the individual - for example, I would not normally link 360 feedback to pay reviews.  If that conflict is unavoidable then recognising it early and putting in place mitigation strategies will make a big difference to ensuring both the organisation and the individuals benefit from the process.

Brendan