Executives Get Performance Review -- at Home

Jan. 16, 2007 — -- You've probably had a performance review on the job. But did you ever imagine what it would be like to get rated on the job you're doing at home? What if your spouse and kids were giving the feedback?

Hundreds of executives are now finding out how they're performing on the home front by undergoing a Family 360. It's an extension of a familiar concept: the Management 360, in which executives get feedback from the boss, their peers and subordinates.

The idea is the brainchild of two human resources executives, Ben Porter and Perry Christensen, who offer Management and Family 360s through their firm, Leaderworks.

"We find that most people define success all around work and that most of their accomplishments are around things that they have achieved on the work front," says Porter. "One of the things that we try to do is get executives to redefine success to include meaningful family relationships as well."

Lee Bird recently got the results of his Family 360. The 42-year-old president of Nike spends 40 percent of his time on the road away from his family, and he worries about shortchanging them. He readily concedes that it was an emotional process.

"I was pretty nervous about how the results would come back," says Bird. "You get the people who matter so much to you telling you things that are a little hard to hear but are true."

Porter conducted Bird's feedback session and has done Family 360s for executives at IBM, Honeywell, GM, DuPont and other companies. He says one thing he hears a lot from spouses and children is "quit treating us like subordinates: we're not your employee."

"A lot of this is manifested when the individual comes home from work," Porter says. "They're used to having people jump through hoops for them … so they start barking out orders."

Porter says it can be a heart-wrenching experience for many executives.

"They've focused so much on their career and their work but at the expense of their family," Porter says. "For some of them it is a big eye opener."