In 2014, Rajeev Behera, Erick Tai, and Jimmie Tyrrell founded Reflektive to bridge the feedback gap between managers and employees. Reflektive has since become a recognized leader in performance management by G2, Brandon Hall Group, TalentCulture, and Gartner. Forward-thinking companies such as Allbirds, FabFitFun, Grubhub, and Protective now depend on Reflektive to align goals and scale constructive, ongoing conversations that increase their employee engagement and productivity by 2X.

Today, Reflektive enters the next phase of its innovation and growth. Learning Technologies Group plc (LTG), the parent company of PeopleFluent, has signed an agreement to acquire Reflektive. Reflektive’s complementary performance management capabilities will be part of PeopleFluent’s talent management portfolio, enhancing its engagement and analytics capabilities. 

Addressing the Modern Talent Journey

The shift to remote work due to COVID-19 has meant adapting to business today by reimagining the customer experience for tomorrow. As part of PeopleFluent, our customers will be able to utilize a single solution for recruitment, talent mobility, performance, compensation, succession, and learning, as well as organizational charting. The Reflektive and PeopleFluent solutions will work together or separately to connect the modern talent journey – to recruit top talent, identify skills gaps, provide opportunities to learn, and define paths for career growth. 

People analytics presents one of the most exciting innovation opportunities for the combined companies. This last year, people leaders looked to use data to inform employee engagement; employee experience; diversity, equity and inclusion; and remote work. Integrating Reflektive and PeopleFluent technologies will bring together a comprehensive view of the employee experience to measure progress and engagement. Richer data of over 25 million users will also accelerate artificial intelligence-based predictions and automated processes. In the future, PeopleFluent customers will be alerted about risks and opportunities in their organization, such as a potential drop in engagement within a department or an employee at risk of leaving. 

Part of LTG

As part of LTG, PeopleFluent offers world-class service and an unparalleled ecosystem of partners to more than 1,500 customers across more than 200 countries worldwide, including NBCUniversal, Schwan Foods, Johnson Controls, Comcast, and Shell. PeopleFluent’s resources and global scale will support the growth of Reflektive customers.

We are excited about this opportunity and what it means for Reflektive, PeopleFluent, and our joint customers. Our combined technologies are poised to transform talent management so our customers can transform their businesses.

Learn more about our acquisition by reading the LTG and PeopleFluent press releases, and for our customers, stay tuned for updates from your customer success team.

Calibration. A big word for a complex process. 

Whether you’re aligning on performance reviews or selecting future company leaders, calibration is often an emotionally-charged term. Calibration has historically been a manual, frustrating process for all involved. And it often doesn’t accomplish its objectives — eliminating biases, addressing ratings inconsistencies across teams and managers, and adding clarity to talent management decisions.

For years, companies have either endured the time-consuming and sometimes ineffective process – or scrapped it all together.

It’s no wonder that calibration brings frustration and fear to mind — when was the last time a calibration session left you feeling empowered?

A New Start: Calibration in 2021

But what if we turned traditional calibration into a modern, data-driven process—one that not only saves time, but also incorporates multiple data sources to create a more complete, unbiased view of performance and talent? 

We’re excited to announce Reflektive Calibration is coming soon! 

This solution helps HR teams by:

• Improving calibration quality with helpful information all in one place
• Ensuring rating consistency and data integrity, so organizations can make the optimal talent management decisions
• Saving time for HR professionals and managers, so they can focus on other strategic priorities

What makes our solution unique is that it incorporates employee feedback and recognition, so managers have a broader understanding of performance over time instead of anchoring on the most recent performance anecdotes. Reflektive Calibration supports annual, quarterly, monthly, and even on-demand calibration sessions. 

We’ve heard from several customers that they appreciate having one go-to place for all performance data. Specifically, they like being able to:

• Visualize distributions for performance and talent ratings, including the 9-box grid
• Have easy access to decisions and comments from calibration sessions

Our early adopters have also benefited from the solution’s ease of use and time savings. Per Taylor Orr, Learning & Org Development Program Manager at Dropbox, “The ROI of Reflektive Calibration is definitely there for me. With our previous manual process, I had to export all our data, blend it with demographic data, upload it into our calibration system, and export the results to be uploaded back into Reflektive. It was a massive effort, and a huge time drain. With Reflektive, I didn’t have to do manual work — instead I was able to spend more time enabling HRBPs to have successful calibration sessions.”

But technology alone can’t drive an improved calibration process — it takes effective leadership and communication to ensure that performance and talent planning are equitable. Below are some common questions we receive from customers, and the best ways to drive calibration forward.

Calibration FAQs

Interested in early access to Reflektive Calibration? If you’re already a Reflektive customer, reach out to your customer support team. If you’re not currently a Reflektive customer, schedule a chat with an expert.

Author: Marc Caltabiano, Chief Product Officer

FabFitFun is a lifestyle membership company that delivers well-being and happiness via their iconic box. We sat down with Will Feng, Director of Learning and Organizational Development, for a discussion on how he’s boosting employee morale, engagement and performance at FabFitFun during these changing times. Will shares a number of best practices, and closes with important considerations when launching new people programs. 

Interested in learning more about how Reflektive can support your business? Schedule a consult with an expert.

Despite the events of 2020, the global economy – including the US – is projected to grow this year. This means that new companies will pop up, and existing organizations will become more complex. They may expand to different locations, develop new processes, and add nascent teams. The question remains: how can companies grow in a scalable way?

We may be biased here, but we believe that continuous performance management plays a huge role in helping organizations drive alignment and accountability during times of growth. The data speaks for itself:

• 69% of employees surveyed said that company-wide goal alignment is paramount to their success
• 72% said that constructive feedback helps their team execute on their business strategy more effectively
• Those who have visibility into other teams’ goals are 81% more likely to agree that there is good cross-functional alignment at their company

Given the power of performance programs, we’ve aggregated best practices to drive accountability, development, and alignment for growing organizations.

Drive Company-Wide Goal-Setting

The best way to boost alignment and ensure that employees are prioritizing the right projects is through goal-setting. We recommend starting with company-wide goals. Executives, finance leaders, and HR leaders should determine one or two key organizational objectives, such as “Increase ARR by 20%” or “Improve customer satisfaction by 30%”. These objectives should be cascaded so departments, teams, and individual contributors can support the goals. For best practices on how to successfully roll out company-wide goals, see this article from NextRoll.

We still recommend that employees have development-focused goals too. These personal objectives help employees build skillsets that can benefit their careers — and help fulfill company needs. More development best practices are available in this article.

Discuss Careers in 1:1 Meetings

Development and advancement opportunities are crucial for retaining top talent during growth periods. In fact, 34% of employees said they have left a job in the past because they wanted more career development opportunities. HR teams can support employee growth by developing career paths and offering learning programs. As your organization grows though, managers become an invaluable resource for scaling developmental conversations.

Equip managers for success with specific recommendations for career conversations. Should discussions happen annually, bi-annually, or quarterly? What topics should be covered? What resources can be provided to employees? HR teams can further guide a successful dialogue between managers and employees by providing curated Conversation Starters. Some of Reflektive’s career Conversation Starters are available below:

• What job activities have you enjoyed the most and found most interesting? 
• What are your career goals for the next 3-6 months? What about the next 1-2 years?
• How can I help you grow your career?

Encourage Continuous Feedback

Another way to scale employee development is with continuous feedback. Team members can gather helpful insights from managers, peers, and cross-functional colleagues to learn where they’re excelling, and what they can do to improve. A best practice is to request feedback after a work milestone. Some events that should be followed by feedback are available below:

• A new partnership is live
• A new product is launched
• Meaningful improvements have been made to internal technology or processes
• A deal is closed
• A customer renews or expands
• A new market is entered

Gather Employee Sentiment with Engagement Surveys

As your organization becomes larger and more complex, it may become more challenging to capture up-to-date employee sentiment. Enter engagement surveys. Surveys provide a scalable way gather insights in an ever-changing environment. What’s more, HR teams can focus on a specific domain (e.g., DEI) to gather data on that topic. If you’re looking to assess sentiment on performance programs, we recommend including the following questions in your survey:

• “I like our processes for reviews, feedback, and goal-setting.”
• “I know how to do well in my job.”
• “I am paid fairly for my job.”
• “I understand how my work is evaluated.”

Track Progress with People Analytics

While engagement survey data can give you powerful insights on how employees are feeling, a people analytics dashboard is invaluable for more specific insights on your performance programs. HR teams can track progress on the aforementioned programs – such as goal-setting and 1:1s – in a glance. By looking at adoption and utilization rates, HR teams can make informed decisions on launching internal campaigns, tweaking existing programs, and implementing other tactics to support their performance strategy.

Recommended metrics for HR teams looking to scale their programs include:

• Total active goals over time
• Goal completion rate over time
• Number of 1:1 conversations over time
• Performance ratings by department, team, or other demographic
• Feedback trends over time

Looking for more ways to support your growing company? Schedule a chat with an expert.

Communication is one of the biggest challenges that we see at companies today. Whether it’s leadership sharing major updates, managers having candid discussions on promotions, or colleagues sharing peer feedback, communicating effectively is often difficult to get right.

What’s more, organizational transparency plays a large role in key business outcomes, meaningfully impacting retention, engagement, and productivity:

• 70% of employees stated that they were most interested and engaged when their leaders communicated company information and results on a regular basis
• 35% of employees said they were likely to leave their company because of they don’t trust their manager
• 50% of employees felt that their employers were not giving them all the information they needed to be successful in their jobs

Results from Reflektive’s 2020 Performance Management Benchmark Report also indicate that employees aren’t receiving enough information from their company:

• Only 19% of employees agree that their organization is transparent about upward mobility opportunities
• Only 21% agree that their organization is transparent about potential salary freezes and pay cuts
• 25% of employees do not know how to request feedback at their companies

These data points contrast sharply with employee needs, which include more visibility. In the same benchmark report, Reflektive uncovered that employees want more support via:

• Consistent communication from leadership
• Consistent communication from colleagues
• All-Hands meetings
• Recognition for hard work and successes
• Regular feedback

So how can organizations provide consistent communication, including recognition and feedback? Our recommendations below include actionable steps that HR teams, leaders, managers, and employees can take to make their company a better place to work.

HR Best Practices

There are several policies and programs that HR teams can launch to drive organizational transparency. We recommend that companies of all sizes start with the following best practices:

• Have the right tools in place to boost communication. Ensure that all employees have access to email, a messaging platform such as Slack or Microsoft Teams, and a video tool to communicate effectively. Ideally, employees can provide recognition and plan for 1:1s on these platforms too. 
• Establish work norms. By setting guidelines early on, employees are more likely to stay connected and productive. We recommend the following best practices for all employees:
  • Use project planning tools such as Wrike, Asana, or Jira to clearly define and communicate responsibilities and timelines
  • Ask peers how they like to communicate, such as their preferred channels, level of detail, and level of informality
  • Instill your workplace culture by celebrating work anniversaries, business milestones, and other accomplishments
• Promote an open-door policy. Offering an open-door policy for communication is key to creating a psychologically safe workplace environment. Employees need to know that their voice will be heard when they approach their manager with whatever it is they are struggling with at work. Whether it’s a sexual harassment complaint, a request to work in a different office, or a roadblock with a project, it’s important to take on each conversation with empathy and an open ear.
• Use a goal management system to create accountability and transparency. Platforms for goal management enable employees to see key priorities for the organization, and learn what their leaders, managers, and colleagues are working on. What’s more, the ability to view goal completion rates helps employees have candid, productive conversations on what’s working and what isn’t, and helps team members improve their performance. For instance, Reflektive’s Goals solution enabled HelpSystems to achieve key organizational objectives through improved alignment and tracking; the company increased international software bookings by 30%, and boosted new product revenue from existing customers by $3 million.

Executive Best Practices

Leaders play a key role in shaping an organization’s culture of transparency. We encourage executives and HR teams to partner together to bring these practices to life:

• Hold regularly-scheduled All-Hands meetings to share updates. At Reflektive, we have a monthly All-Hands meeting that accommodates employees across different time zones. We’ll share major developments, and executives will highlight key accomplishments and learnings during the past month. We always make sure there’s time for Q&A, so that employees can ask questions that may be top-of-mind for their colleagues too.
• Gather regular feedback from employees. Executives can learn about employee sentiment after major events, as well as ongoing company programs and policies. These insights can help them continuously improve their communication, and they can learn how to better support their workforce during times of transition. At Reflektive, we use our engagement surveys to gather sentiment on leadership communication, and we also send polls after our All-Hands meetings to learn how we can continuously improve them.
• Schedule skip-level meetings. Leaders can further improve corporate transparency by having 1:1 meetings with managers and individual contributors. Not only do these syncs provide an opportunity for executives to share more information on their key priorities and projects, but leaders can also learn from employees on what’s going well, and areas of improvement for the company.
• Celebrate & recognize wins! Hard work and project milestones should be recognized to boost both visibility and morale. Use Slack / Microsoft Teams, email, and your public recognition wall to make those exciting moments visible to everyone. Companies can also glean meaningful business results with their recognition culture; Brad’s Deals’ new check-in and kudos programs helped decrease turnover by 76%!

Manager Best Practices

Managers are a key partner in scaling organizational transparency. They can communicate company-wide updates in a personalized way, and they shed more light on promotion and pay raise decisions. Some key best practices for managers are available below:

• Schedule recurring 1:1 meetings with all direct reports. There’s no better way to drive ongoing manager-employee communication than with weekly 1:1 meetings. Not only are 1:1s an excellent forum to discuss organizational updates, but they also enable managers to provide timely, relevant feedback. 1:1 meetings also build comfort levels in the manager-employee relationship, as both parties become accustomed to interacting and discussing a wide range of topics. Physicians Insurance encourages employees to cover professional growth and performance expectations in their 1:1 meetings.
• Hold 2-3 team standups each week. These team meetings provide support, alignment, and visibility. Managers can ask team members what they accomplished and what they’re working on now. Standups are particularly valuable when employees are remote, as they provide a forum for social connection too.
• Be transparent in performance conversations. While many organizations separate performance and pay conversations, transparency in both is critical. Share the criteria in which the employee was evaluated, and the specific reasons for decisions on the rating, promotion, and/or pay raise. This clarity will help instill fairness and transparency into the performance conversation.

Employee Best Practices

All employees can contribute to an open, accessible workplace culture! With feedback and regular communications, they can improve work life for themselves and their peers:

• Request and provide feedback after major work milestones. To boost professional growth and development, all employees should request and provide feedback from peers. The feedback will help people collaborate more effectively, and identify areas of improvement for future projects. Team members can request feedback after a new product is launched, a new partnership is live, or a deal is closed.
• Overcommunicate on collaboration tools. Staying connected and aligned can be challenging, especially in an era of remote work. Provide reminders of upcoming events and deadlines, and let team members know what you’re working on. In some collaboration tools, you can pin phone numbers, documents, and other helpful information for easy access! 
• Document everything and make it easily shareable. This helps your peers easily get caught up on your projects. At Reflektive, we ensure that most of our work is in the Shared drive so folks can access it, and we have a great record of our accomplishments over the years!

If your organization is looking to boost transparency, accountability, and alignment, schedule a consult with a Reflektive expert.

Creating a strong employee experience is a top priority for HR leaders in 2021. Per Gartner, 28% of HR leaders, 31% of CHROs, and 46% of Diversity & Inclusion leaders believe that the employee experience is crucial to get right. While there are myriad recommendations on how to build an ideal employee experience, many companies consult with Reflektive on how to measure sentiment. What metrics are most important to track? How can HR teams view their progress? Check out our recommendations below on making the employee experience quantifiable. But first…

What is the Employee Experience?

Per Gallup, the employee experience is “the journey an employee takes with your organization. It includes every interaction that happens along the employee life cycle, plus the experiences that involve an employee’s role, workspace, manager and wellbeing.” 

The breadth of the employee experience means that it can’t easily be captured in one metric. HR teams should look to domain-specific data to better understand their current strengths and areas for improvement. The components of employee experience are:

• Recruiting
• Onboarding
• Performance Management
• Manager Relationship 
• Talent Development
• Communication & Collaboration
• Well-Being
• Workspace

How should HR teams evaluate the Employee Experience?

For quantitative insights on the employee experience, we recommend that HR teams evaluate four data types: employee survey responses, leading indicators, lagging indicators, and business KPIs. Together, these metrics create a holistic picture of the employee experience, and help you better identify areas for improvement. A refresher on the differences between leading indicators, lagging indicators, and business KPIs, is below:

• Leading indicators are used to predict other outcomes and metrics
  • Example: the number of RSVPs you receive before a marketing event indicate your overall attendance rate
• Lagging indicators reveal past performance of your program
  • Example: the overall attendance rate of past marketing events
• Business KPIs indicate overall organizational performance
  • Example: the number of new deals sourced by the marketing team

To measure the employee experience, employee survey responses as well as some leading and lagging indicators can be sourced from engagement surveys. Other indicators and business KPIs are available from your finance team, people analytics solution, and software tools used by your business.

HR teams can also conduct employee interviews for qualitative insights. This article will focus on quantitative data that can easily be gathered by companies of all sizes.

Recruiting Data

To ensure that your recruiting process is equitable and inclusive, ask candidates questions around respect and professionalism of the team. You can further slice survey data by candidate demographic (such as age, ethnicity, gender identification) to see if there are any biases in your recruiting program.

Recommended metrics include conversion and retention, which indicate fairness, transparency, and efficacy of your recruiting program.

Onboarding Data

After the recruitment experience, the next major influencer of employee sentiment is onboarding. Not only does a structured onboarding process increase new hire productivity by 50%, but it’s also associated with a 58% higher three-year retention rate.

To assess the onboarding experience, ask new hires questions on the helpfulness of onboarding content, and their understanding of their new role. Helpful indicators include employee productivity and engagement.

Performance Management Data

Similarly, performance programs have a meaningful impact on the employee experience — and countless other business metrics. Some insights include:

• Employees who receive helpful feedback are over 3X more likely to recommend their company as a great place to work
• People who receive meaningful recognition when they perform well are almost 2X more likely to work at their company two years from now
• Those who like their company’s processes for reviews, feedback, and goal-setting are almost 3X more likely to work harder than they have at past companies

To assess employee sentiment on performance management, include questions about their role, and how their work is evaluated and compensated. Since performance is integral to organizational success, we recommend assessing metrics such as profit margin and market share as key outcomes.

Manager Relationship Data

Another key driver of employee happiness is the individual’s relationship with their manager. Per Gallup, managers account for up to 70% of variance in employee engagement. 

HR teams can assess manager impact – good or bad – by asking survey questions on manager support and leadership. Helpful indicators include engagement and promotion data for each manager.

Talent Development Data

While managers play a role in employee growth & development, company-wide processes also affect advancement. Are there distinct career paths for employees? How can workers pursue learning opportunities? 

To assess the experience around talent development, ask survey questions on employee enablement and current role satisfaction. For other helpful data points, look to internal mobility and performance ratings.

Communication & Collaboration Data

The ability to partner well with peers also makes a difference in employee experience. While it’s difficult for companies to make an instant impact on teamwork, they can encourage collaboration and build a culture of trust and transparency. 

HR teams can ask employees questions on peer interactions, and the input they receive from colleagues. Data points around innovation and operational performance help HR professionals assess collaboration.

Well-Being Data

Peer relationships and interactions also shape employee well-being, a topic that has become even more important to HR teams. As employee stress has increased this past year, companies are responding by offering more mindfulness programs (11% increase) and on-site stress management programs (13% increase). 

Additionally, well-being includes feelings of belonging and inclusion at work. Per Reflektive’s HR Trends Report, companies are responding to this employee need and over 90% of organizations are now making DEI a priority.

In your survey to employees, include questions about work-life balance and an appreciation of differing viewpoints. Common HR metrics – including engagement and retention – also indicate whether employees feel happy and healthy at work.

Workspace Data

Another element of employee experience that has been recently brought into the spotlight is workspace setup. Based on Reflektive’s Employee Sentiment Report, one of the most prevalent comments from employees is that their home office setup isn’t sufficient. With millions of employees now working from home, this challenge can meaningfully impact overall productivity and happiness at work.

We recommended including workspace questions in company-wide engagement surveys. Sentiment around productivity in the home office can shed a light on the employee experience. Data on IT and equipment requests reveal trends in employee workspace needs.

There are many facets of the employee experience that are important to track and measure. We recommend assessing these domains in your engagement survey, or following up on specific topics in pulse surveys. Additionally, having a comprehensive HR dashboard will allow you to view employee experience data in real-time.

Looking for more ways to improve the employee experience? Schedule a quick consult with an expert.

Performance reviews have a meaningful impact on employee motivation. In fact, people who like their company’s review processes are 2.9X more likely to work harder than they have at past organizations. So how can companies make performance reviews better in 2021? Read below for helpful information on how reviews can do more for you.

What is a performance review?

A performance review is a formal evaluation of employee performance. Reviews can be completed by managers, teammates, and cross-functional colleagues. The HR team provides reviewers with forms to assess the employee’s performance. Reviewers may be asked questions such as:

• What could this person start doing that would benefit their career and the company?
• What could this person stop doing to benefit their career and the company?
• What does this person do well?

The employee may complete a self-assessment as well, in which they identify key contributions and areas of opportunity. Once the reviewer and reviewee have completed their assessments, they meet to discuss the employee’s performance, and align on goals and skills that would benefit the individual and the company.

Why do performance reviews matter?

Reviews are a crucial element of a holistic performance program. Review conversations are an ideal forum to:

• Discuss performance, key accomplishments, and learnings
• Share the employee’s impact and contributions to the organization
• Confirm key work objectives
• Discuss career growth goals
• Share feedback from peers

What’s more, having an employee-centric review process shows that your company is committed to growth and development, and can result in higher employee satisfaction and retention. Those who like their review processes are:

• 3X more likely to recommend their company as a great place to work
• 2.4X more likely to work at their company two years from now

How can I make reviews better for employees?

There are myriad ways in which companies can improve the review process! We’ve bucketed them into the three categories below:

Enable Employees for a Successful Cycle

Manage employee expectations from the get-go. Include context on the upcoming review cycle by addressing the following questions in emails, intranet pages, or other employee-facing content:

• Why: Why is your company running this review/check-in?
• What: What are the benefits of the review cycle for the employee and the company? What is the process for the review cycle? What tool are we using for the review cycle?
• When: When are the following due dates?

• Self-assessment
• Manager assessment
• Peer assessment
• Direct report assessment
• Meeting between manager and employee

Adopt a Development-Focused Approach

Reviews are often perceived by employees as stress-inducing. And only 14% of workers strongly agree that their performance reviews inspire them to improve. Many companies are responding to this by creating review cycles focused on positive reinforcement and continuous improvement, rather than a “what went wrong” approach. This development-focused approach can be incorporated into review forms, where HR teams can add questions such as:

• What accomplishments are you most proud of?
• How can I better support you in your work?
• What skills would you like to use more of in your role?
• What growth opportunities are you most interested in?
• What do you want your next career step to be?

Gather Insights to Continuously Improve

After your review cycle, take a pulse on employee sentiment to learn what was most helpful, and what can be improved. Whether you gather feedback via a survey or poll, or through focus groups and interviews, ensure that you ask what went well, what questions were valuable, and what would make performance reviews even more productive. 

How often should companies have performance reviews?

We believe that formal performance conversations should be conducted on a quarterly basis. These can take the form of a manager review, 360 review, and/or a check-in. More details on the differences between these review types is available in Reflektive’s HR Guide to Designing a Reviews & Check-In Program.

What questions should be included in employee self-assessments?

We recommend the below questions based on the objective of your review cycle. In general, it’s best to keep your form short and limit it to 4-7 questions.

Building a culture of feedback

• Appreciation: What are 3-5 accomplishments you’re proud of?
• Alignment & Evaluation: 
  • Think about your main goals. How have you performed relative to these goals in the past quarter?
  • Think about the main responsibilities of your role. How have you performed relative to these responsibilities in the past quarter?
• Coaching: What is the most important thing you could have done at least 10% better last quarter? What would you do differently next time?
• Career: What do you want your next career step to be? What step can you take to get there?

Improving alignment

• Have your goals changed or should they change?
• What went well this quarter? 
• What could have gone better in the last quarter? List 1-2 learnings that can be applied going forward.
• What help do you need to make better progress toward your goals?
• Manager: Provide 1-2 pieces of feedback that could help this employee make better progress toward their goals.

Developing careers

• How did you grow your career here last quarter?
• What knowledge, experiences, and/or collaboration opportunities would benefit you in the next quarter?
• What do you want your next career step to be? 
• What steps can you take to get there?  What support do you need?

Improving performance

• Manager evaluates each value and/or competency and how frequently the employee shows the value

Informing talent management decisions

• What goals did you accomplish?
• What goals were you unable to achieve?
• How will you tackle goals differently in the future?
• What skills would you like to use more of in your role?
• In an ideal world, what would your next role look like?

How should companies launch review cycles?

Launching a review cycle requires the coordination of many different moving parts. The following launch plan can help companies create a streamlined process, and drive higher completion rates too.

Step 1. Get executive buy-in

Ensure the entire leadership team is aligned on your review objective and strategy.

Step 2. Share your plan with managers

Schedule a manager training session to share the review cycle timeline and process prior to communicating with the broader organization. Ensure that managers are equipped to answer their team’s questions.

If you’re unable to hold a manager training session, provide managers with information on a wiki or intranet site. We recommend holding office hours so managers can stop by with questions or get assistance on preparing for their conversations.

Step 3. Send a company-wide communication

In your launch email, include information on the “why”, “what”, and “when” of your review cycle. Encourage everyone to block time in their calendars for completing reviews so they can finish them before the deadline (HR teams can also send calendar holds for all employees!) Finally, we recommend office hours for individual contributors so they can ask questions on the upcoming cycle.

Step 4. Launch your review, and use nudges if needed

Nudges remind employees to complete their reviews. In fact, most Reflektive customers use three nudges per cycle. Additionally, you can get higher completion rates by partnering with managers. For example, managers can share with their team that they’ve completed their review, and lead by example. 

Step 5. Track progress!

Leverage a people analytics platform to keep track of completion rates and other KPIs.

Step 6. Ensure fairness by calibrating

Gather team leaders for calibration sessions. Adjust performance ratings to account for leaders who may be easy or hard graders.

How can HR teams best prepare for performance reviews?

HR teams can benefit from completing the below tasks prior to launching a review cycle:

Develop success criteria for the review cycle

We recommend setting a desired completion rate, and establishing baseline employee sentiment metrics that are assessed post-review. For the completion rates, see what percentage of employees completed their reviews on-time. For 360 reviews, assess peer completion rates too. Employee sentiment, on the other hand, can be measured with a poll or engagement survey post-review cycle.

Incorporate employee feedback, recognition, and goals into the review form

Build a holistic picture on employee performance by pulling in helpful data. These insights help foster a discussion on key accomplishments, and what can be improved moving forward. Tip: encourage employees to always ask for feedback after a project is completed to get timely learnings!

Ensure goals and action items are up-to-date

As business needs evolve at your company, make sure that employees and managers are updating their goals and key projects. To ensure that direct reports are staying in-sync with organizational objectives, encourage weekly 1:1s and a strong company-wide communication plan.

How can managers best prepare for performance reviews?

To help managers prepare for an upcoming cycle, we recommend the following best practices:

Keep Consistent Notes

Detailed notes are your best friend when it comes to review prep. Save, categorize, and view feedback from throughout the year, track employees’ goal progress, and review discussion topics from 1:1 conversations.  

Review Goal Progress & Establish Upcoming Goals

Evaluate your employees’ goals from previous reviews. Did they accomplish their objectives? If not, what could they have done differently? Based on their past performance, choose a handful of goals to discuss during the review. These can provide a solid framework to help the employee identify areas for improvement and establish goals for the upcoming 3, 6, or 12 months.

Provide Regular Feedback

When you regularly provide feedback to employees, preparing for a performance review doesn’t feel like a Herculean task anymore. The employee has a better idea of where they stand, and you have prior conversations to draw from when preparing for reviews. 

How can employees best prepare for performance reviews?

Employees can put their best foot forward for the upcoming review cycle by doing the following:

Ask for Feedback

Nearly 85% of Millennials surveyed said they would feel more confident if they could have more frequent performance conversations with managers. The easiest way to get that conversation started is simply to ask your manager for feedback—regularly, throughout the year, and not just during reviews. It demonstrates initiative and a commitment to growth. And the more frequently these check-in conversations occur, the less uncertain (and anxious) you’ll feel when it comes time for your review.

Be Prepared

Know the format of the review. If you want to discuss a promotion or raise, have a target in mind with compelling talking points to support your case. Make a list of accomplishments and positive feedback that you’ve received. Also, take time to self-reflect and identify weaknesses, so you won’t be blindsided by negative feedback. Preparation is the best way to eliminate nervousness.

What should people do after performance reviews?

The below best practices help companies drive improved employee productivity, performance, and development after their review cycles.

1. Canonize review program requirements and best practices
   If you haven’t already, make sure your review requirements – including self-assessment, meeting with your manager, etc – are documented and always available to employees. Include a reviews “Best Practices” section in your documentation as well — check out this article for ideas!

2. Send an engagement survey or poll
   There are so many learnings that HR teams can generate from the performance review experience! We recommend sending out a survey or poll that covers the performance appraisal process and follow-up. Include questions such as, “Was information in the performance conversation valuable to you?” and “Do you feel that your performance has changed?” Insights from the survey will help you make continuous improvements that ultimately boost productivity.

3. Hold a review post-mortem
   Conduct focus groups – and use pulse survey insights – to learn what went well in this review cycle, and what can be improved. Once your data is gathered, schedule a post-mortem with your HR team to shape plans for future cycles. 

4. Document and share changes for future review cycles
   Once your HR team is aligned on the changes to be made for future cycles, document them and share them with employees. Let employees know when the next review cycle will be, the modifications you’re making, and why. This information can live on a wiki or intranet page, and should also be proactively shared with employees via email and all-staff meetings.

5. Reward high performance
   Are employees knocking out high-priority deliverables left and right? Reward them! Whether employees are incentivized by food delivery or donations to their favorite charities, we also recommend sharing public recognition to build a culture of praise.

6. Have managers follow-up on areas of improvement
   Conversely, if an employee is struggling with their objectives or developmental plans, encourage managers to speak openly with them and engage in problem-solving together. Bosses can also drive the importance of accountability for achieving team success.

7. Encourage employees to get feedback after every project
   To drive continuous development, encourage employees to request feedback after major projects and milestones. By learning from teammates about what went well and where they can improve, employees will receive relevant (and timely!) insights that will help with future projects.

What other tactics can help employees improve performance?

Performance reviews aren’t the only way to help employees do better in their jobs. We recommend the below programs to complement reviews and equip workers for success.

Encourage more frequent 1:1 conversations

Weekly or bi-weekly 1:1s with managers help employees work towards the right objectives. While we generally recommend that 1:1s are employee-driven, manager-driven 1:1s are also appropriate for driving alignment and following up on important business updates.

Boost company-wide recognition

To drive awareness of wins across the organization, we recommend more frequent employee recognition. HR teams can create a contest or a challenge to encourage kudos from workers.

Encourage employee-driven feedback

Between review cycles, employees can proactively request feedback from managers, peers, and cross-functional colleagues. This will help them grow professionally and develop core skills. Additionally, if your HR team is overburdened and cannot run reviews now, employee-driven feedback can replace reviews.

Modify goals as needed

Finally, to ensure that employees are set up for success in an ever-changing environment, enable workers to adjust goals as needed. Additionally, if it’s too difficult for certain employees to work towards numeric results, managers can create qualitative scorecards to reward employee behaviors. 

To build a successful performance review program, HR teams should think through their high-level objective, and the strategy and tactics that will help them achieve that goal. Building an employee-centric review process – focused on growth & development – will make review conversations even more valuable to workers. To craft the right program for your organization, schedule a consult with an expert.

We’re excited to announce that Reflektive received seven Leader awards from G2, and the Silver award for Best Advance in Performance Management Technology from Brandon Hall Group. 

Brandon Hall Group has been in existence for 27 years, and it offers data, research, insights and certification to executives and organizations. The Excellence in Technology Award was given based on program design & delivery, measurable benefits, and overall impact.

G2 is the world’s largest tech review marketplace, with over 1 million reviews from users. The seven G2 Leader awards that Reflektive won span performance management and employee engagement, and include:

• Performance Management
• Employee Engagement
• Mid-Market Performance Management
• Mid-Market Employee Engagement

Per Barbara Competello, Chief Customer Officer at Reflektive, “We are very happy to be recognized for one of Reflektive’s core values: relentless customer commitment. Reflektive was built to drive outcomes that matter – including improvements in retention, engagement, and productivity – and receiving this validation from third parties and from our customers is always exciting to hear.”

If you’re interested in learning more about what Reflektive customers are saying, check out our G2 reviews.

The holidays are the perfect time to show your employees how much you value and appreciate them. To get into the spirit, here are some top ways to say “Thank You” to your team members.

A Simple “Please” and “Thank You”

In a fast-paced workplace, manners can sometimes fall by the wayside. So, this is the perfect time to remember what your parents taught you—a simple “please” and “thank you” can make a huge difference when communicating with your coworkers.

Publicly Recognize Their Work

Praise your employee’s efforts at an all-hands meeting, departmental meeting, or on a public recognition wall. Share specific helpful behaviors, and give kudos on projects they rocked. Doing this publicly will also encourage others to share positive feedback, and it’s a great note to end the year on.

Give Them A Little Extra Time-Off

Take the stress out of the holiday season by being flexible on scheduling. Allow employees to leave a couple hours early, or give them a half day off on the Friday before a holiday weekend. Show them that you value their work-life balance and time spent with family and friends.

Personalized Gifts or Handwritten Cards

Give employees an end-of-year gift with a handwritten thank-you card acknowledging all their work throughout the year. Again, point out specific actions and behaviors that you feel are their strengths. Let them know why they’re so valuable to the team.

Feed Them

Hey, who doesn’t love food? You can bring in catered lunches for office-based staff, or ship treats to folks working from home. Food delivery gift cards are a favorite among Reflektors!

Provide Growth Opportunities

The greatest gift you can give employees is demonstrating that you’re invested in their long-term development. So, give them the chance to lead a meeting, attend a virtual conference, deliver a company-wide presentation, or represent the team on interdepartmental committees. It’ll set an exciting tone for their growth in the year ahead.

Newport Group helps companies offer their employees a more secure financial future through retirement plans, insurance, and consulting services. With 1,500+ employees and 26 offices, Newport needed a performance management strategy that aligned with how the company conducted business and offered employees frequent career and growth conversations. Below is our Q&A with Jackie Ward, CHRO at Newport Group, about how they transitioned from an annual look-back on performance and to more continuous conversations. 

Reflektive: Can you tell us about your team at Newport and how you support the company’s performance management programs?

Jackie: Our HR team has thirteen employees, and we cover core HR functions, learning and development, talent acquisition, and engagement (diversity and community work). I spearheaded the Reflektive decision-making process back in 2017 and oversee the partnership, with my team members driving the day-to-day operations. 

Reflektive: What was performance management like prior to using Reflektive?

Jackie: Reviews happened once a year, and was a look-back on past performance. Compensation was often too closely connected with reviews, and became the focal point of the conversation. I also wanted to explore disconnecting pay from the conversation to give employees and managers an opportunity to speak to career and growth. The experience was very rigid and not beneficial for our employees. 

Reflektive: Why did you decide to make a change to your performance management program?

Jackie: When I first joined, the company was undergoing a period of substantial growth. Newport is agile and fast-moving, and I wanted our performance management strategy to align with our culture. We also had a number of exciting acquisitions, so we wanted to ensure that employees had the opportunity to develop relationships and have ongoing conversations across the company. Our CEO is a strong believer in continuous conversations, connections and building relationships.  

Reflektive: When reviewing, why did you decide to go with Reflektive?

Jackie: We reviewed a number of different platforms, and it came down to:

• Productive conversations with the entire Reflektive team. As I was exploring different vendors, I was impressed with the product knowledge and understanding of my challenges, that we were able to dive into productive conversations quickly. 
• Product flexibility offered us breadth to engage in ongoing conversations.
• Enablement of continuous conversations for employees.
• Moving away from the annual look-back review to more frequent conversations with quarterly check-ins, and the change management support. 

Reflektive: How is your company using Reflektive?

Jackie: Reflektive offers our employees the structure for more continuous conversations. Employees are encouraged to have casual 1:1s at least monthly, a more formalized quarterly check-in and annual skip level conversations. The process is well received and we average a 97% completion for our quarterly check-ins. 

Our culture has always been keen on promoting kudos and shoutouts. With Reflektive, I really like how Recognition is pulled into check-ins, so managers can avoid any recency bias and pull in all the great work their teams are doing. 

We’re also regular users of Goals. We set goals on a quarterly basis, and the product allows employees the flexibility to adjust and update should anything change. 

Reflektive: How do you educate employees and drive adoption of Reflektive?

Jackie: Reflektive is integrated into a number of our onboarding and training programs. During employee onboarding, we have a dedicated training for all new employees. We also host a number of 2-3 minute videos on our Intranet that offers a refresher of different aspects of the product that employees regularly use. 

Following each quarterly check-in, we share completion rates in our All-Employee meetings. My HRBPs attend management meetings, and take each business leader through their team’s results and future improvements for conversations. 

Reflektive: With COVID-19, what changes have you implemented?

Jackie: Pre-COVID, our workforce was across 26 offices and we still needed to connect with one another. A silver lining of COVID is it made our workforce much more comfortable engaging in meaningful conversations over video. 

In April, we ran the Coronavirus Sentiment Survey and earned a 91% favorability among our employees. The survey offered us timely data points on what’s going well, what employees needed to be successful, and deeper insight into their challenges. The key themes that emerged were: 

• Space restrictions at home: Not being as productive at home due to lack of suitable space for a temporary home office 
• Technology: The inconvenience of not being able to print or scan and having internet that is not as fast or reliable as in the office
• Childcare: Productivity affected due to caregiving responsibilities
• Team Meetings: Some managers are not having team meetings, which hinders feelings of connectedness
• Missing the office environment: A lack of connectedness due to missing in-person interaction with colleagues or just the normal way of office life

We’ve fed the responses back to the employees, followed up with several individuals, took action to provide more information on childcare and shared the data with business leaders so they can continue to follow up with managers who may not be doing such a good job of staying connected to their people.  

Reflektive: As we look ahead to 2021, what are your priorities?

Jackie: My priority will be around what the future of our workforce will look like. We learned from engagement surveys that employees crave connectedness and relationship-building. Our company will likely stay remote for most of 2021, but we’re starting to have a lot of conversations around the reality of what it’s going to look like as employees are able to return to the office.

All of us love the feeling of being appreciated. It lifts our spirits, and makes us feel like valued members of our team. And recognition goes even further than that — people who receive meaningful recognition are 3.6X more likely to work harder than they have at past companies and 3X more likely to recommend their company as a great place to work.

So how can tech companies motivate their very busy employees to take a few moments and provide kudos? Below are best practices from Reflektive customers Enquero, Alfresco, and Brad’s Deals on how they’ve built a culture of appreciation across their tech-savvy workforces. 

Best Practice 1: Set Recognition Goals

Start by setting a company-wide recognition goal. Having a north star – and one that’s measurable! – will help better guide team and individual efforts to provide more praise.

So how can tech firms best set recognition goals? Enquero’s goal was to “create a culture of thanks”, and they measured their success by analyzing the percentage of employees that received recognition (77% shortly after their launch!) 

Other ideas for quantifiable recognition goals include:

• The percentage of employees who provide recognition every month or quarter
• The average number of recognition posts per employee
• The percentage of recognition posts that incorporate company values (this is easy with hashtag usage in Reflektive!)

Best Practice 2: Incorporate Recognition Into Existing Programs

Tech companies can boost their culture of appreciation by including recognition in 1:1s, check-ins, and other programs. Alfresco encourages employees to ask questions such as, “What am I doing well?” and “What do you like about my work?” in their 1:1s with managers.

Brad’s Deals enhanced their check-ins with “shout-outs” from Reflektive. Within the check-in form, managers can see all of the recognition (or “shout-outs”) that the employee has received. This added information provides a holistic picture on employee performance, and helps eliminate recency bias. “Shout-outs have been instrumental for us as we’re looking to enable the most robust performance conversations,” said Jessica Adams, Brad’s Deals’ VP of People.

Busy tech employees are also more likely to provide recognition when it’s built into their existing workflows. In fact, employees who use our email and chat integrations generate 3X more feedback. Enquero employees provide recognition with Reflektive’s Microsoft Teams integration, while Brad’s Deals team members use Reflektive’s Slack integration.

Best Practice 3: Use Other Channels to Bring Recognition to Life

Finally, Reflektive’s technology sector customers have gotten creative with additional ways to make recognition front and center. Alfresco uses a variety of tactics to make kudos more visible and drive their culture of appreciation:

• Employees use Reflektive’s recognition wall to drive public praise
• Managers send congratulatory emails to employees after big accomplishments
• Alfresco includes recognition content in their manager trainings to ensure that bosses give kudos when appropriate

Additional ideas to encourage appreciation?

• Create a company-wide recognition campaign, by rewarding employees that provide or receive the most kudos
• Let new hires know about your feedback culture by building recognition training into employee onboarding
• Share praise for individuals and teams during All-Staff meetings
• Send out a weekly recognition recap email to highlight major accomplishments (this email is automated with Reflektive!)

Looking for more insights to help your tech company launch a recognition program? Chat with an expert.

Old Second National Bank has served the Chicago area for almost 150 years by providing communities with a full array of consumer and business products and services. The company has injected the same principles of dedication and continuous support in their employee programs too. In 2017, Old Second partnered with Reflektive to provide employees with tools that support continuous feedback, and ultimately drive more equity and inclusion. Read our below Q&A with Heather Anderson, Human Resource Business Partner, to learn how Old Second boosted its corporate culture with Reflektive.

Reflektive: Can you tell us a little bit about Old Second?

Heather: For nearly 150 years, Old Second has been a pillar in communities, meeting the banking needs of Chicago-area businesses and individuals. Our employees and customers are at the core of our success. Backed by an unwavering sense of financial responsibility, we’ve persevered through the most challenging and rewarding economic climates, as well as more than two centuries of historical events. 

Reflektive: Why did the company decide to partner with Reflektive in 2017?

Heather: We wanted to drive talent management forward at the company, and we knew that leading-edge performance programs could help us do that. The ability for employees to gather continuous feedback from colleagues, and develop skillsets, was extremely important to us as we searched for the right platform. Another key goal for us was to evolve our performance management process to create an even playing field for all of our associates.

Reflektive: That’s so good to hear. Can you talk a little bit more about how you accomplished these goals with Reflektive?

Heather:  We actually were able to tackle a lot of these initiatives with our new performance review process:

• Gathering continuous feedback: Reflektive’s integrated solution enables our associates to view feedback at any time. In performance reviews, we could pull in all of the feedback that an employee received from managers and peers over the selected timeframe. This also supported our equity efforts, since it removes recency bias!
• Developing skillsets: We also pull Reflektive goals into our review forms to have another objective indicator of employee performance. We encourage all employees to have developmental goals, in addition to goals around work quality and productivity.
• Driving equity and inclusivity: Our directors aligned on a common set of competencies for our Retail team to help them be successful in their roles. These common goals and competencies allow managers to evaluate everyone based on the same skills, and build equity into our review process. By objectively evaluating associates, we’re supporting our company-wide inclusion efforts.

Reflektive: Are employees taking advantage of goal-setting opportunities?

Heather: Definitely! We’ve seen goal adoption increase from 30% in 3Q2019, to 84% in 4Q2019, and it’s currently at 94%. That’s an increase of over 200% since the third quarter last year!

Reflektive: How did you make such a large improvement in goals adoption?

Heather: I used a multi-pronged approach here, including:

• Consistent Communication Strategy: I developed a cohesive communication plan, focused on repetition! Specifically I:
  • Created a schedule of communications, to stay on track
  • Partnered with executives first, and then informed all employees about our Goals program. By working with execs first, I was able to gather their feedback and answer any questions they had.
  • Sent short, concise emails with clear action steps and due dates
  • Sent reminders in advance of milestones
• Partnership with Managers: I scheduled meetings with mid-level managers so they could better align with their teams on goals, and role model ideal goal-setting behaviors.
• Helpful Assets: To make things as easy as possible for our employees, I created custom screenshots on how to create and edit goals. Reflektive’s Knowledge Center was a really helpful starting place for me! Additionally, I developed a quick webinar series to provide more context on goal-setting and demonstrate how Reflektive was user-friendly and easy to navigate.
• Post-Mortem: I conducted an employee survey to gather feedback and learn what we could enhance in the following year.

Reflektive: That’s a very comprehensive strategy! Are there any additional tactics you’re using to drive a culture of continuous feedback at Old Second?

Heather: Yes, we use several channels to help employees grow and develop. Specifically, we:

• Encourage usage of Reflektive’s 1:1 solution to drive productive conversations between associates and their managers. 1:1 conversations also are great opportunities to cover growth and development, and boost employee sentiment around inclusion.
• Educate employees on the importance of requesting feedback from peers after projects have been completed — this helps them work better together in the future!
• Leverage our Management Workshop Series to teach employees about the value of seeking feedback.

Reflektive: You mentioned that 1:1s and reviews help drive positive sentiment around inclusivity — are there any other programs you’re developing to create a more inclusive workplace?

Heather: Yes, we’re doing a lot to support all of our associates. We established an executive DEI council that also includes employee ambassadors to incorporate different voices. The council identified five DEI initiatives that will commence in 2021:

• Employee Appreciation: Celebrate employees through subsidized activities that show appreciation, build morale and foster an inclusive workplace
• Coffee Breaks with Execs: Help employees get to know executives and senior managers; sponsor panels on career development
• Women’s Resource Group: Elevate women in the workplace through opportunities that enhance knowledge, skills and exposure to senior managers 
• Employee Events: Foster team-building across functions through subsidized activities and events
• Philanthropy: Build and enhance our brand in local communities through employee-centric, philanthropic activities