11.16.17
EightSpokes introduces Peer-to-Peer (P2P) Feedback with its latest release of Enlighten, the world’s first cloud-based Enterprise Project Collaboration (EPC) solution. It enables real-time feedback from colleagues collaborating on a project – from drug development to commercialization. With P2P Feedback, users can ensure that every assignment achieves its intended outcome and that team members receive timely and relevant feedback to course-correct as needed, while it still matters. It also naturally propels organizations to continuously improve performance, ultimately ratcheting employee engagement enterprise-wide.
According to Gallup’s State of the America Workplace 2017, two-thirds (67%) of workers in the U.S. are not engaged with their jobs – and many of these are millennials, who now comprise the largest share of the American work force. This is a growing concern, especially in the increasingly competitive and complex life sciences industry where worker productivity has been steadily declining. In contrast, an engaged workforce results in 17% higher productivity, 20% higher sales, and 21% higher profitability.1
Tyson Bertmaring, Momenta Pharmaceutical’s Director of Program Management Office referenced an internal survey of employees who cited the following elements as critical for employee engagement: 1) Feedback; 2) Individual recognition; and, 3) Understanding of how one’s work impacts the enterprise.
“Employee engagement is crucial to business success, especially in markets like life sciences that depend on the close collaboration of many different people,” added Bertmaring. “Timely feedback from peers is a powerful way to make sure the entire team understands the impact of their work on others and on the company.” EightSpokes’ P2P Feedback feature in Enlighten enables a cultural shift where employees have greater control over their success, feel appreciated, and are more invested in making continuous improvement.
Fortune 500 companies like Accenture, Adobe, and GE have overhauled their approach to performance reviews in response to the employee engagement crisis, but most life sciences companies still lag behind. Enlighten EPC leverages modern technology to provide companies with an easy, mechanized way to re-engage employees with open communication about the quality of their work, and recognition of their contributions.
How P2P Feedback Works
P2P Feedback allows colleagues to privately offer candid feedback to one another without reprisal from superiors for continuous improvement over the course of a project. In the Enlighten dashboard, all task assigners are alerted when a task is completed. Then, they are asked to rate the quality of the work completed using a simple scale of one to five stars. The tool then enables assigners to fine-tune their assessment using various attributes of work quality, such as accuracy, completeness, and resourcefulness. Last, assigners can provide freehand feedback to add clarity or provide suggestions.
“Enlighten is designed to make every project better than the last,” said Chris Meyer, sr. director of Program Management at Axial Biotherapeutics. “With the addition of P2P Feedback, companies have two-way accountability, and can conduct more meaningful performance reviews that are based on real-time data rather than subjective opinion.”
Enlighten EPC connects and aligns everyone who touches a project – from regulatory, medical affairs, market access, and supply chain stakeholders…to sales and marketing teams. It is an entirely new category of software, and unlike traditional project management tools in its ability to clearly show the many important interdependencies across teams around the world. With the integration of P2P Feedback, Enlighten helps improve the quality of deliverables at every step. “Enlighten is powerful, and can truly change the way we engage with each other and our work,” added Bertmaring.
“Constructive feedback is a gift typically bestowed in the workplace once a year,” explained Andy Mehrotra, CEO of EightSpokes. “But bringing a drug to market is a journey of a thousand miles that hinges on every small step along the way. Success depends on the quality of work of every member on the team across every deliverable and milestone. Any missteps jeopardize success. Enlighten drives quality throughout the journey and creates a much more engaged workforce.”
The latest Enlighten upgrade featuring P2P Feedback also includes a number of additional new features, and was made available this Fall in conjunction with the company’s five-year anniversary.
