Consider this scenario: John Hopken is the new supervisor of a team of 12 computer programmers. He has been in his position for 10 months, after being promoted to his position from programmer (where he had been in place for 8 years). The promotion was hard-won; four others on his team also applied for the promotion, and when he got his promotion, the other four employees who didn’t get the position were rather disgruntled. One of them lashed out in a meeting early on and called him a yes-man, but otherwise most of the issues have been undercurrents and rumor based. These four employees are referred to as Competitors 1, 2, and 3 and Competitor Yes-Man for the purposes of this question.

During the year, five older members of his team resigned, four through regular retirements and one after being accused of falsifying expense reports. None of the five were in the group of four who had competed against him for his position. John filled all five position openings with outside hires. Three of them had similar backgrounds to John’s—they all went to his alma mater for their computer degrees and like basketball. In fact, last week John and the three of them attended a Bulls game together. These employees will be referred to as Bulls 1, 2, and 3. The other two employees were both females he hired because HR told him he had to. (Up till now, there were no females on the team.) We’ll call them Lady 1 and 2. They don’t like basketball. Lady 1 was hired 6 months ago, and Lady 2 was hired last month.

Now, it is performance appraisal time. Assume each of these employees does a similar amount of work, produces relatively similar amounts of code, and does a good job. None of them create waves, and the new people have gotten their work under way and are working hard. Other than the yes-man meeting and one comment on the men’s room wall saying that “Hopken is a jerk,” things have mostly gone smoothly. John figures that one of the Competitors wrote that.

John is told by HR he has to do performance appraisals this month. He is told to rate his people on a scale of 1–4, where 1 is “not meeting expectations,” 2 is “too new to rate,” 3 is “meeting expectations,” and 4 is “exceeding expectations.” HR said that he must have no more than two 4s, no more than eight 3s, and at least two 1s or 2s. He asks an HR representative what “too new” means, and she says it applies to anyone who has not been in the position for 3 months or more.

He looks at the paperwork and his list, and 20 minutes later has his ratings done with a paragraph scribbled out to provide to his workers.

Here are the ratings John gives his employees, as well as his support paragraph.

Bulls 1: 4: What a great guy—always comes through, works hard, fun loving, makes the day brighter for everyone

Bulls 2: 4: Team player; what a help—great worker and asset to the company

Bulls 3: 3: Always there for the work group—works steady and helpful to others, accurate coder

Lady 1: 3: Always there for the work group—works steady and helpful to others, accurate coder

Other 1: 3: Always there for the work group—works steady and helpful to others, accurate coder

Other 2: 3: Always there for the work group—works steady and helpful to others, accurate coder

Other 3: 3: Always there for the work group—works steady and helpful to others, accurate coder

Competitor 1: 3: Accurate coding and steady performer

Competitor 2: 3: Accurate coding and steady performer

Competitor 3: 3: Accurate coding and steady performer

Lady 2: 2: Too new to rate but next year should be great

Competitor YM: 1: Not a team player and can work harder to prevent discord

Please answer the following questions.

The day after the PAs are delivered, HR receives appeals filed by Bulls 3, Competitor 1, and Competitor YM. After listening to the employees, HR decides to do a 360-degree appraisal of John Hopken.

(1) What is the 360-degree appraisal? What are the pros and cons of this appraisal tool?

(2) Let’s say you are told you must implement this 360-degree appraisal on John. How would you go about doing this? What kinds of questions would you include on the appraisal, and who would you give it to? What kinds of feedback might you expect, and how might you use that feedback to help John with performance appraisals?

(3) Would you have recommended the 360-degree appraisal as a way to resolve this issue? Why or why not?