Impact of a 360-degree professionalism assessment on faculty comfort and skills in feedback delivery

BACKGROUND: Professionalism is identified as a competency of resident education. Best approaches to teaching and evaluating professionalism are unknown, but feedback about professionalism is necessary to change practice and behavior. Faculty discomfort with professionalism may limit their delivery of feedback to residents. OBJECTIVES: A pilot program to implement a 360-degree evaluation of observable professionalism behaviors and determine how its use impacts faculty feedback to residents. DESIGN: Internal Medicine (IM) residents were evaluated during ambulatory rotations using a 360-degree assessment of professional behaviors developed by the National Board of Medical Examiners (R). Faculty used evaluation results to provide individual feedback to residents. PATIENTS/PARTICIPANTS: Fifteen faculty members. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: Faculty completed pre- and post-intervention surveys. Using a 7-point Likert scale, faculty reported increased skill in giving general feedback (4.85 vs 4.36, p < .05) and feedback about professionalism (4.71 vs 3.57, p < .01) after the implementation of the 360-degree evaluation. They reported increased comfort giving feedback about professionalism (5.07 vs 4.35, p < .05) but not about giving feedback in general (5.43 vs 5.50). CONCLUSIONS: A 360-degree professionalism evaluation instrument used to guide feedback to residents improves faculty comfort and self-assessed skill in giving feedback about professionalism.