Your Birkman 360° Report

The Birkman 360 measures the perceptions of those who work with you by asking them how often you exhibit skills and behaviors ("competencies") that are critical to your work and to your organization's success. Critical competencies differ somewhat from one organization and from one role or functional area to another. But the Birkman 360 collects data on the entire range of competencies that characterize highly effective persons and their organizations.

You can significantly increase the value you derive from the Birkman 360 Report by meeting with your manager, Birkman consultant, or human resources professional to select the competencies that are critical to your organization and to your present and anticipated roles in it. (If you completed this step in advance, the competencies you selected will be marked with an asterisk [*] throughout the report.)

The Competencies

The competencies (exhibited skills and behaviors) are arranged in business process order - that is:

Those listed first have to do with strategic thinking and long-term planning for key business and organizational outcomes.

Subsequent competencies address the skills and behaviors you must have in order to enlist others' efforts in support of the goals and outcomes you have envisioned-- to communicate a vision of the future, build commitment to it, and assign responsibilities to those who will make it a reality.

Further on are competencies that enable you to hammer out decisions with others, manage resources effectively, and coach members of work groups as they develop the ability to take on additional responsibilities.

And finally, there are competencies that underpin the process as a whole, including the drive to pursue your own personal and professional development and to understand the organization, its customers, its culture, and its competitive environment.

1. If you provided Birkman with critical competencies prior to receiving the Report, the competencies you selected are marked with an asterisk in the table below. In most cases, you will want to spend most of your analysis and planning time on them.

2. Next, using the worksheet on the next page, collect your insights into the feedback on each of competencies you selected. (Be sure to include your self-evaluation (Self) as part of the feedback from different perspectives.)

3. Finally, use the Action Planning Worksheet below--or a similar form provided by your organization's HR group--to plan your response to the Birkman 360 feedback on each target competency. Remember, in the case of strengths, to ask how you will use the associated skills more consciously to deepen the organization's resources and increase your impact on key objectives and outcomes. For developmental areas, be sure to specify training and other resources you may need, including support from your manager or other managers in the organization.