What is calibration?
Calibration helps ensure performance ratings are fair and consistent across teams.
Instead of evaluating employees in isolation, managers review and compare ratings together to align on performance standards, reduce bias and make better talent decisions.
During calibration, you will:
Review your team's ratings
Compare them with other managers
Discuss and adjust where needed
Align on performance and potential
How to access calibration?
Once reviews are submitted, access calibration from the Calibration tab within a performance cycle.
Go to Performance
Open a review cycle
Go to the Calibration tab
In this tab, you can view the list of employees included in the cycle, their performance and potential ratings, and their positioning in the 9-box grid.
Prerequisites
Calibration is based on two questions configured during cycle setup by an HR Admin:
A performance question (used for performance rating)
A potential question (used for potential rating)
These two ratings determine each employee’s position in the 9-box grid. Only the manager’s rating is used for this positioning.
Important:
If these questions are not configured during setup, the 9-box and calibration data will not be available. Managers cannot modify this configuration.
Review and prepare
The Calibration tab offers two complementary views. Use them together to build a complete picture of your team before calibration discussions.
List view
The list view lets you review and compare employees individually. Selecting an employee opens an inspection panel with the following:
Score and averages
Shows the employee's performance and potential scores (e.g. 3/5) alongside department and role averages.
Note:
Averages are hidden when fewer than 4 people are included in the cycle, to protect individual ratings.
Compare to previous cycle
View how ratings have changed over time, one cycle at a time.
AI-assisted calibration brief
Generate a concise, evidence-based summary from the employee's performance data to help you prepare for calibration discussions.
To generate a brief:
1. Select an employee in the list view
2. Click Generate now
The AI provides a structured summary that includes:
Performance positioning
Key evidence
Context and comparisons (when available)
Areas that may be challenged during calibration
Calibration Notes
Add private notes for each employee to prepare your talking points. Notes are only visible to the author.
If a manager changes during the cycle, notes are automatically transferred to the new manager.
If a temporary manager is assigned, notes are shared; the last edit is saved and all changes are timestamped with the author's name.
Note:
Calibration notes are only available to managers who reviewed the employee.
View review
Opens the employee's full review. Ratings are not adjusted directly in the calibration view — to update a rating, open the review via View review.
9-box view
Switch to the 9-box view to visualize how your employees are distributed across performance and potential.
The grid is organized with Performance (Low / Med / High) on the X-axis and Potential (Low / Med / High) on the Y-axis. Each cell includes a label (e.g. Core Contributor, High Performer) to indicate talent positioning. Employees appear as avatars in their corresponding cell.
Interact with the 9-box:
Select a cell to focus on a specific talent group — the employee list updates to show only that group
Select an employee (from the grid or the list) to open their inspection panel