Performance Management App Overview

Performance Management

1. What it is

Performance Management runs employee appraisals: review templates, the reviews themselves, and the cycles that organize them. Around the review it adds optional modules for goals, 360-degree feedback, continuous feedback, competencies, development plans and merit planning.

Employees complete self-assessments and track their goals. Managers assess their teams and approve what is waiting on them. Admins configure the modules, templates, cycles and automation.

• Enablement: Performance Management is a licensed app. An admin enables it from All Apps in the admin sidebar.
• What it is not: Turning the app on does not turn on every feature. Only Performance Reviews and Goals Management start switched on. 360 feedback, continuous feedback, competencies, development plans and merit planning stay hidden until you enable each module.

2. Standing it up

1. In the admin sidebar, open All Apps, choose Performance Management, and enable it.
2. Open the app and go to Settings → Module Configuration. Each feature is a card with an Enable or Disable button; the Performance Reviews card shows Always On instead. Turn on the modules you plan to use. Admins also see Settings → Setup Wizard, which walks through modules, review templates, goals, users and integrations in one pass.
3. Go to Settings → Templates and create at least one review template. Use Create Template with Wizard for a full template, or Quick template for a one-screen version. A review cannot be created without a template.
4. Decide your review rules. On the Performance Reviews module card choose Settings, then set the Default Rating Scale and the Workflow & Approval switches (see section 5).
5. Create the first reviews. Go to Team → Team Reviews and choose Create New Review for one person, or More actions → Bulk Assign for a department, location or role.
6. Confirm it worked. Each employee sees the review under My Performance → My Reviews. Each reviewer sees it under Team → Team Reviews.

Who gets which tab:

Tab	Who sees it
My Performance	Everyone
My Rewards	Everyone, when the Compensation Management app is enabled
Team	Managers and above, Performance Management app admins, and anyone with direct reports
Compensation	Admins, HR admins and app admins, when the Merit Matrix module is on
Analytics	Admins, HR admins and app admins
Settings	Admins, HR admins and app admins

Silent-pairing notes — things that do nothing until a second thing is set:

• Merit Matrix needs Compensation Management. The module cannot be enabled until the Compensation Management app is on for your organization.
• Development Plans needs Goals Management. Disabling Goals Management also disables Development Plans.
• Automation rules need the master switch. Rules create nothing while Enable Automation is off, and it is off by default.
• Autonomous AI Capabilities need the AI mode. The four switches do nothing until the AI mode is set to Approve or Auto on the AI Console.

3. How it fits together

Modules — A module is one feature area you can switch on or off. Performance Reviews is the core module and is always on. The others are Goals Management, Job Duties & Responsibilities, 360-Degree Feedback, Merit Matrix, Development Plans, Continuous Feedback, Competency Assessment & Skills Tracking, Meeting Scheduling, Progress Tracking, Notes & Documents, Disciplinary Actions and ADP Integration. Predictive Analytics also appears as a card marked Coming Soon; it cannot be switched on yet. A module that is off removes its entries from every tab, so “I can’t find 360 feedback” usually means the module is off.

Template, review, cycle, element — These four nest, and each answers a different question.

• A template decides what a review asks and who fills it out.
• A review is one employee’s appraisal for one period, built from one template.
• A performance cycle is a dated container that organizes reviews, such as a year. Its type is Annual, Quarterly or Custom.
• An element is one round of reviews inside a cycle. It carries the review type, the period, the due date and the template.

A worked example:

2026 Annual Cycle (Jan 1 – Dec 31) › Q1 Quarterly element (Jan 1 – Mar 31) › one Quarterly review per employee

The same cycle can hold four quarterly elements and one annual element. An element’s timing is one of three choices:

Timing	What it means
Fixed window — same dates for everyone	Every employee is reviewed for the same period
Each employee’s hire anniversary	Each review falls on that person’s own anniversary
A set number of days after hire	Milestone reviews, 30, 60 and 90 days after hire by default

A cycle and each of its elements show Upcoming, In progress or Past, read from their dates — there is nothing to activate. A cycle can be edited until it is marked complete; an archived cycle is read-only.

The stages of a review — A review moves through five stages, and the label tells you who is holding it.

Not started › In progress › Pending Approval › Approved › Archived

• While a review is not started or in progress, the employee and the reviewer complete their parts. Its badge names who it is waiting on — for example Draft, Waiting on Employee, Waiting on Manager or Ready for Meeting.
• Pending Approval means the reviewer has submitted the final review and it is waiting for an approver.
• Approved locks the overall score. Approval also sends the completion email and, when Enable Automation is on, runs your outcome rules.

The person who submitted a review for approval cannot approve it themselves. On a review with a manager assessment that is the reviewer, so someone else must approve it. If you turn Require Manager Approval off, the reviewer’s final submission approves the review immediately.

Four kinds of feedback, often confused — They are separate records with separate rules.

What	Who writes it	Where it lives
Self-assessment	The employee, about themselves	Inside the review
Manager review	The assigned reviewer	Inside the review
360 feedback	Nominated colleagues, anonymous by default	Its own 360 feedback cycle
Continuous feedback	Any colleague, at any time	My Peer Feedback, outside any cycle

A template decides whether a review has a self-assessment, a manager review or both. 360 feedback is never collected by a template. It runs as its own cycle with a nomination phase and then a feedback phase; a template can only choose to show the employee’s 360 results as a card on the review. Continuous feedback is one of four types — Praise, Constructive, Goal Progress or General — and carries a visibility of Private, Manager, HR or Public.

Three different “cycles” — A performance cycle organizes reviews. A 360 feedback cycle collects nominated feedback. A merit matrix has its own planning cycle for pay. Creating one does not create the others.

Goals, and how they differ from OKR Hub — A goal here belongs to one employee, or to a department. It has a start date, a target date, a priority and a progress percentage. Optional Milestones set your own progress targets by date, for goals where most work happens late or in phases.

New goals follow the Approval Workflow Type you choose. Under the default, Two-Tier (Employee → Manager), the employee submits and the manager approves. Three-Tier adds a leadership approval. No Approval Required makes goals active at once.

OKR Hub is a separate app that owns company objectives and key results. When OKR Hub is enabled and its sync with Performance Management is on, a goal’s page shows a Linked Key Results card with Attach Key Result. The goal stays in Performance Management; the key result stays in OKR Hub.

Three switches that sound alike — Each controls something different, and none of them affects the others.

• Enable Automation controls automatic creation: reviews, 360 feedback cycles, and follow-up plans after a review is approved.
• Send performance review due & overdue reminders controls reminder emails for reviews that already exist.
• Autonomous AI Capabilities controls what the AI may do unprompted, such as launching review cycles or sending reminders.

Merit planning — A merit matrix calculates a recommended increase for each employee in scope. It moves through Draft, Calculating, Pending Approval, Approved and Finalized. It belongs to the Merit Matrix module, which depends on the Compensation Management app.

Mobile — On a phone, employees can complete a self-assessment, acknowledge a review, manage goals and give or request feedback. Managers can complete and approve reviews and approve goals. Setup, templates, cycles and merit planning are desktop-only.

4. Running it

Organize reviews into a performance cycle

1. Go to Analytics → Performance Cycles and choose Create Cycle. Managers reach the same page, read-only, from Team → Performance Cycles.
2. Open the cycle and use Add an element → Plan a new element. Pick the review type, timing, period, due date and template.
3. Each element shows where it is in time, read from its dates, and offers what fits:
   • Upcoming (its period hasn’t started): Create reviews, or Set up automation to make a rule that creates them on a schedule.
   • In progress (started, not yet past its due date): Create reviews, or Add existing reviews that were already sent.
   • Past (its due date has passed): Add past reviews that already happened.

The cycle itself shows Upcoming, In progress or Past the same way. Its ⋮ menu holds Mark Complete (it stops collecting new reviews) and, after that, Archive (it becomes read-only).

Create reviews for a group

1. Go to Team → Team Reviews and choose More actions → Bulk Assign.
2. Work through the three steps: Configure, Select Employees, Review & Confirm.

Bulk Assign is available to admins, HR admins and app admins.

Approve what is waiting

Team → Manager Approvals gathers everything waiting on you in one place: performance reviews, development plans, 360 nominations, goals and competency assessments. Approving a review there has the same effect as approving it from the review page.

Run a 360 feedback cycle

1. Enable the 360-Degree Feedback module, then go to Team → 360 Feedback Management and create a cycle.
2. Choose Activate Cycle. Nominations open automatically if the start date has arrived; otherwise choose Start Nominations on or after that date.
3. Review nominations. When the cycle requires manager approval, pending nominations wait to be approved or declined.
4. Choose Start Feedback Phase, which appears once the nomination deadline has passed. Use Send Reminders for overdue participants, and finish with Complete Cycle.

Employees see their nominations and results under My Performance → My 360 Feedback.

Compare scores before finalizing

Analytics → Team Calibration lists each employee’s review status, overall score, goals, competencies and progress side by side, with a score distribution chart. Use it to align draft ratings before reviews are approved.

Plan merit increases

1. Go to Compensation → Merit Matrices and choose Create Merit Matrix.
2. Open the matrix and choose Start Calculations.
3. When it reaches Pending Approval, choose Approve, then Finalize. Finalizing cannot be undone.
4. Use the Reward Letters panel on the matrix to generate and send letters. Employees read theirs under My Rewards → My Reward Letters.

Automate review creation

1. Go to Settings → Review Management and choose Manage Rules.
2. Add a rule. A review rule fires on a cycle element, a hire anniversary, a tenure milestone, quarterly, twice a year or in a fixed month.
3. Turn Enable Automation on. Rules are checked once a day.

5. Settings

Settings are under the Settings tab. Module-level settings open from the Settings button on a module card in Module Configuration. Seven cards show one while the module is on: Performance Reviews, Goals Management, 360-Degree Feedback, Continuous Feedback, Merit Matrix, Development Plans and Competency Assessment.

Setting	Where	Default	What it changes
Module cards	Module Configuration	Performance Reviews always on, Goals Management on, all others off	Shows or hides each feature area across the app
Default Rating Scale	Performance Reviews settings	5-Point Scale (Standard)	The scale used by templates set to “Business Default”
Show Numeric Scores by Default	Performance Reviews settings	On	Shows the number beside the rating label, for example “5 - Outstanding”
Require Manager Approval	Performance Reviews settings	On	Submitted reviews wait in Pending Approval. When off, final submission approves the review
Allow Parallel Self-Assessment	Performance Reviews settings	Off	Lets the employee start their self-assessment while the manager is still preparing the review
Require Final Acknowledgement of Performance Review	Performance Reviews settings	Off	A two-sided review needs the employee’s acknowledgement before it can be approved
Approval Workflow Type	Goals Management settings	Two-Tier (Employee → Manager)	Who must approve a new goal before it becomes active
Minimum Goals Required	Goals Management settings	0 (no minimum)	A review cannot be submitted as complete until this many goals are linked to it. A template with its own goal-linking rule uses its own minimum
Enable Goal Weights	Goals Management settings	Off	Adds a weight percentage to each goal
Require 100% Weight Total	Goals Management settings	Off	Blocks review submission until goal weights total 100%
Anonymous Feedback	360-Degree Feedback settings	On	New 360 cycles hide who wrote each response
Require Manager Approval	360-Degree Feedback settings	On	New 360 cycles hold nominations for approval
Minimum / Maximum Peer Nominations	360-Degree Feedback settings	4 / 6	Apply to every 360 cycle. The feedback phase cannot start until each participant has the minimum, and nobody can receive more than the maximum
Allow managers to create 360° feedback cycles	360-Degree Feedback settings	Off	Lets managers, not only admins, create 360 cycles
Default Visibility Level	Continuous Feedback settings	Private	The visibility preselected on new feedback, and given to feedback sent without choosing one
Enable Automation	Review Management	Off	Lets automation rules create reviews, 360 cycles and follow-up plans
Autonomous AI Capabilities	Review Management	All four off	Allows the AI to launch review cycles, reassign stuck reviews, send reminders and compile feedback summaries
Send performance review due & overdue reminders	Notification Settings	Off unless set. Recently created organizations are set up with it On; older ones stay Off until an admin turns it on	Master switch for review reminder emails
First reminder / Overdue alerts	Notification Settings	7 days before due / 3 days past due	When the reminder emails go out
Performance Agent	Module Configuration → General Settings	On	Makes the Performance Agent available in Ask AI
Enable AI Powered Features	Module Configuration → General Settings	On for recently created organizations; older ones stay Off until an admin turns it on	Turns the in-app AI features on or off, including AI SMART goal analysis

6. More help

• Performance Management FAQ — specific setup questions, limits and troubleshooting.
• Ask AI — the assistant answers Performance Management questions from these articles.