Who can use this feature?
Performance administrators, Performance HR business partners (for assigned departments only)
Available on:
All Culture Amp subscriptions that include the New Performance Experience.
Calibration Views help ensure that performance ratings across your organization are consistent, accurate, and fair. By allowing you to view performance reviews, feedback, goals, and self-reflections together, Calibration Views support the alignment of ratings, reduce bias, and improve the quality of feedback.
Whether you’re working with a single performance cycle or multiple, this guide will show you how to create, share, and publish Calibration Views.
What is a Calibration View?
A Calibration View is a tool that allows HR and managers to see and adjust performance review data across a group of employees before finalizing ratings. It includes:
Performance Reviews
Self-Reflections
Goals
Peer and Upward Feedback
This process helps ensure that ratings are fair and consistent across teams and departments, mitigating bias and improving the quality of performance reviews.
How to Create a Calibration View
How to Create a Calibration View
Creating a Calibration View is straightforward. Here’s how to get started:
Navigate to the Calibration Tool
Click on the Performance drop-down and then under Admin, click on Calibrations.Create a New Calibration View
Click on the “Create calibration view” button and then Get started.Name Your Calibration View
Choose a name for your view (e.g., “Q3 2023 Calibration”).Select the Performance Cycle
Choose the performance cycle you want to calibrate. You can create the Calibration View even if the cycle is not complete.Multi-Cycle Calibration Views: If you want to compare ratings across multiple cycles, select more than one cycle. Note that multi-cycle views must have the same performance rating question and cannot be exported as a whole.
Filter and Add Employees
Use the Search Field to locate employees by name or click Add Filters to refine your search by demographics such as:
Business Unit
Country
Department
Division
Employment Type, Gender, Job Title, etc.
Note: HR Business Partners (HRBPs) can only select employees from departments they have access to. They will not see calibration views for departments outside their scope unless shared with them.Select Employees
Once you have applied your filters, check the boxes next to the employees you wish to include in your Calibration View or check the Employee option to select all.Click ‘Create’
Once you’ve set up your filters and selected employees, click Create.
The calibration dashboard will appear and displays the distribution of performance ratings for those included in the view.
Tip: We recommend that your cycles have the same performance rating question for consistency. This ensure that you can calibrate across multiple cycles
Note: When creating a calibration view, you can’t include your own review. The creator is automatically excluded from the results.
Editing a Calibration View
If you need to make adjustments to an existing Calibration View, you can easily do so:
Edit the Calibration Name
If you already have the Calibration View open, simply click Edit calibration name within the open view to change the name.
If you're not already in the view, navigate to Performance > Calibrations in your admin dashboard.
Click on the desired Calibration View to open it.
Click Edit calibration name to change the name of the Calibration View if needed.
Edit Performance Cycles or Employees
If you need to modify the performance cycles or the list of employees included in the view click Edit calibration and then select the Edit calibration view
Save Changes
After making the necessary changes, click Save to update.
Share a Calibration View
Once your Calibration View is ready, you can share it with relevant stakeholders:
Click on ‘Share Calibration View’
Navigate to the Calibration View and click on the Share calibration view button.
Enter Employee Names
Type the names or email addresses of the individuals you want to share the view with.
You can remove those with access at any time.
Click ‘Share’
Once you’ve added the employees, click ‘Share’ to send them an invite.
Export calibration view:
To export a copy of the view select Export CSV.
Tip: Shared users will have read-only access. They can view the Calibration View and use filters but cannot modify any data.
Running a Calibration Session
Now that you’ve set up your Calibration View and shared it, you can start the calibration session.
Review the Data:
Use the ‘Edit Columns’ option to add the manager review questions for each employee. This helps you calibrate ratings by giving more context.View Employee Profiles:
For additional context, click the ellipsis icon (three dots) next to an employee’s name to view their full profile. This will give you access to their manager reviews, feedback, and other performance data.Adjust Ratings:
If needed, update an employee's rating by selecting a new performance rating from the drop-down menu. The ratings will update automatically, but the original rating will remain visible for tracking purposes.Capture Notes
It’s important to capture any reasoning behind rating changes in Calibration Notes. This ensures accountability, especially if a direct manager is not present during the session.
After writing your notes, click Save to confirm the changes.
Publish Calibration Results
Once the calibration session is complete, publish the changes to finalize the ratings:
Click ‘Publish’
After reviewing and finalizing the ratings, click Publish to update the manager reviews with the final calibrated ratings.Confirmation Screen
A pop-up confirmation screen will appear. Check the box labeled “Notify managers of changes to performance ratings or notes” if you’d like managers to be notified of any updates.
Note: Indirect managers will not be notified, but they will still be able to view the calibration notes once the calibration has been published.
What Happens After Publishing:
The updated performance ratings will appear in the manager’s review.
Calibration notes will be shared with the respective managers.
Employees can no longer be added or removed from the Calibration View.
Filters and ratings will no longer be editable.
Note:
Changes to the overall performance rating will only appear in the official manager review once the calibration is published.
The audit log records only the final change made to an individual question alongside the name of the user who publishes the calibration view.
Notifications and Manager Experience
When a calibration session is published and the option to notify managers is enabled, direct managers will receive notifications about any changes to their employees' performance reviews.
Notification Options
Managers will be notified about the following changes:
An employee’s performance rating has changed.
A note has been added during the calibration session.
Tip: If you're running multi-cycle sessions, consider withholding notifications to avoid premature performance conversations. Be sure to confirm with your People Team when performance discussions should officially begin.
Manager’s View
Managers can view both the original performance rating and the updated rating after calibration:
From the notification they receive.
By navigating to Performance > Reviews, selecting the cycle, and searching for the employee.
Once they’ve found the employee, they can scroll to the right, click the ellipsis icon (three dots) under "More Actions," and select Calibration Notes to view the updated notes.
Performance Review Activity Log
To view the performance review activity log as an admin, follow these steps:
Navigate to the Performance Tab
Go to the Performance tab in your admin dashboard.Select the Reviews Option
Under the Admin section, click on the Reviews option.Access the Performance Review Cycle
Click into the relevant Performance Review Cycle.Go to the Manager Review Section
Make sure to select the Manager Review section.Search or Filter for the Employee
Use the search bar or filters to locate the employee whose review activity you want to view.View the Activity Log
Once you’ve selected the employee, scroll to the bottom of their review page to find the Performance Review Activity Log.
Here, you’ll see a detailed record of all actions and updates related to the employee’s review.
Average of All Ratings
When creating a calibration view, you can choose to include a column showing the average of all ratings for each performance review. This helps give a clearer picture of overall performance across multiple rating questions.
How the Average Rating is Calculated
The average rating is based on all the responses from the rating questions in the performance cycle, excluding the overall performance rating. This is because the performance rating already serves as the final indicator of the employee's performance.
To make comparisons across different performance cycles easier, the calculation method has been standardized. Regardless of the rating scales used, the average rating is always capped at a maximum of 5. This ensures consistency even when cycles use different rating scales.
Since a performance cycle can include multiple rating scales, a simple average calculation wouldn’t be accurate. Instead, the system adjusts the rating scores to maintain consistency, scaling them all to a 5-point system.
Once you've summed the scores from all the rating questions, divide the total score by the number of rating questions in the cycle to calculate the average of all ratings.
Note: The overall performance rating is not included in the average rating calculation.
Performance Cycle with Same Number of Options for Each Rating Question
If all the rating questions in the cycle have the same number of options, each option will be weighted based on that number. For example:
If all questions have 4 options, the weights will range from 1 to 4.
If all questions have 3 options, the weights will range from 1 to 3.
Performance Cycle with Mixed Number of Options for Each Rating Question
If the cycle includes rating questions with different numbers of options, each option will be weighted according to the number of choices for that question. Here’s how it works:
A question with 5 options will be weighted 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5.
A question with 4 options will be weighted 1.25, 2.5, 3.75, or 5.
A question with 3 options will be weighted 1.67, 3.33, or 5.
A question with 2 options will be weighted 2.5 or 5.
⚛️ Formula for Mixed Rating Scales
Rating received × (5 ÷ # of points on rating scale)
For example:
1 on a 4-point scale: 1 × (5 ÷ 4) = 1.25
2 on a 4-point scale: 2 × (5 ÷ 4) = 2.5
3 on a 4-point scale: 3 × (5 ÷ 4) = 3.75
4 on a 4-point scale: 4 × (5 ÷ 4) = 5
FAQs
What if I made a mistake in a published Calibration View?
You cannot edit the Calibration View once it’s published. Instead, if the cycle is still live you can change the manager’s review directly within the cycle view from your Performance > Reviews tab (under Admin) or create a new Calibration View.
Can Perform HRBPs see calibrations created by others?
Yes, they can see both in-progress and published calibrations but only those related to departments they’re assigned to. They cannot view calibrations outside their scope unless shared with them.
What happens if an employee moves departments?
The Calibration View will not update automatically. If the view is still unpublished, you can edit the employee’s department manually. To do so, click into the calibration view and select Edit calibration view and then adjust the department.
Can I export a multi-cycle calibration view?
No, multi-cycle Calibration Views cannot be exported as a whole. However, you can export individual cycles within the view.
Why can't I add my questions as columns?
In a multi-cycle calibration view, questions can’t be added as columns.
Key Takeaways
Calibration Views help ensure fair and consistent performance ratings.
Create, share, and edit Calibration Views to calibrate employee ratings across multiple cycles and teams.
Publish your calibration results to finalize ratings and share feedback with managers.
Managers will receive notifications about rating changes and can view the final outcomes.
What's up next?
Check out our Performance Insights article to explore how to visualize your performance rating scale data.
For more details on managing a performance cycle, check out our Admin Guide to Tracking and Managing a Performance Review Cycle.
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