Development and validation of a 360-degree-feedback instrument for healthcare administrators

Multisource or 360-degree feedback has become a widely used component of leadership development in many organizations, and a growing body of research supports its use for this purpose. Unfortunately, most commercially available multisource surveys were developed in private-sector corporate settings, making their transferability to healthcare settings less than straightforward. This article describes a research project undertaken to develop a job-relevant, commercial-quality multisource feedback survey for use in health administration settings. Using critical incident methodology and enlisting the help of subject matter expert groups (i.e., executive search consultants, human resources executives, leadership development consultants, and administrative fellowship supervisors), a competency framework was developed containing 26 competencies arranged according to seven clusters. A third survey was then conducted with incumbent leaders to populate the competency framework with behavioral descriptors. The end result was a survey consisting of 128 total items that, when matrixed across four relationship types, create surveys ranging from 36 to 95 items in length. Two pilot studies were then conducted to assess reliability as well as validity against other measures of leadership ability. Results from these studies suggest that the instrument can provide reliable and valid assessments of leadership effectiveness for development purposes.