HR can strategically schedule templated check-in conversations for the entire organization or targeted groups. Before initiating the process, it's essential to consider a few key elements to ensure success:

• Design a Structured Agenda: Define the topics to be covered during check-in conversations. Include elements like Team OKRs and Personal Goals to align discussions with measurable outcomes. A consistent agenda fosters uniformity in coaching conversations and ensures a comprehensive approach to employee development.

• Incorporate PACE Ratings: Decide whether to leverage PACE (Performance, Alignment, Competence, Engagement) ratings. This framework facilitates alignment between managers and employees, addressing performance perceptions and uncovering potential misalignments early, creating a space for open and honest dialogue.

• Establish a Clear Timeline: Set a timeline for when check-ins should be conducted and completed. A well-defined schedule ensures consistency across the organization and allows leaders to track progress effectively.

Steps to Create a Check-In Cycle

• Go to the Governance section from the 9-dot menu (for permissions, contact your CSM)
• Go to Check-in cycles and create a New Cycle

• You are now creating a draft cycle. Your selections and configurations are editable until you decide to click on the "Schedule Check-in" button
  • Name your cycle; this is the name that people in your organization will see for this Check-in (ex. Acme 1H Coaching conversations etc.)
  • Agenda template: Create a new agenda template or pick an existing one. More details outlined below
  • Timeline
    • Cycle start date: the cycle start date triggers the creation of the check-ins, and the appearance of email notifications and reminders from the system. You should pick your cycle start date to be official launch day of the check-in cycle. People will not see their check-ins requests before the cycle start date.
    • Cycle end date: This is the deadline you are giving everyone to complete the check-in conversations. The end date will not automatically close the check-in cycle (in case you need to extend it) but it serves as a reminder of the deadline you are driving to. If needed, the end date for a cycle can be extended while the cycle is still in progress.
    • Notify Participants: automatically send an email notification to everyone selected to participate in the check-in cycle on the cycle start date. More details are outlined below.

• Check-In Participants: HR can strategically schedule check-ins for the entire organization or targeted groups within the organization. More details on the selection options are outlined below. 
• Acknowledgment message: Check-in reviewer will need to "Mark a conversation complete" once the conversation has taken place. You can tune the acknowledgment message they will see.

Building the Check-In Agenda

As you build your check-in agenda, consider the purpose of the check-ins and the conversation you are trying to facilitate at scale:

• Including elements like Team OKRs and Personal Goals to align discussions with measurable outcomes. More details on the selection options are outlined below.

• PACE Ratings: Decide whether to leverage PACE (Performance, Alignment, Competence, Engagement) ratings. This framework facilitates alignment between managers and employees, addressing performance perceptions and uncovering potential misalignments early, creating a space for open and honest dialogue. You can learn more about PACE here, and keep in mind that PACE can be customized for your organization.

• Structured discussion topics: Define the topics to be covered during check-in conversations. These will be pre-populated on every check-in agenda. Here are a few suggestions that may be helpful:

  • Team Member:
    • What are you most proud of, or excited about?
    • What areas do you want to improve or grow?
    • Where do you need more support?
  • Team Member and Manager: Complete PACE and discuss gaps if any.

  • Manager:

    • Highlight areas of success.
    • Make suggestions for growth and identify areas that must improve.
    • Discuss opportunities to collaborate or coordinate better with others to achieve team/company outcomes.
    • Following meeting - Document areas of success, areas to improve, and areas of support

You can build the agenda template for these conversations by:

• Going to the Governance section from the 9-dot menu (for permissions, contact your CSM)
• Go to Agenda Templates and create a New Template
• Once you create an agenda template, it can be reused in future check-ins as well. 

• Team OKRs and Personal Goals: once you have selected your agenda template, and indicated that you would like to include OKRs in the conversation, you can decide if you want to bring OKRs from a specific time-period to help reflect on past contributions and performance (ex. OKRs from Q1 or 1H FY25 for a Performance Review), or bring in current OKRs to drive check-in conversations focused on staying aligned on current priorities.

Once these selections are made and check-ins are created, people will see check-ins where the selected elements are populated on the agenda where they can see their OKRs, Calibrate on PACE, and see the pre-populated discussion topics to facilitate the conversation.

Selection of Check-In Participants

HR can strategically schedule check-ins for the entire organization or targeted groups within the organization. The choices available are:

• • Entire organization: Everyone in the organization will get a scheduled check-in with their people manager
  • Selected leader’s sub-organization tree: Anyone below the selected leader in the reporting tree will be chosen to participate in a scheduled check-in. One or more leader sub-organizations can be selected within the same check-in.
    • Example:
      • If John is selected, then John’s direct reports will have a check-in with him, their direct reports will have check-ins with them, and so on, all the way down the reporting tree for that leader.
      • John himself won’t need to participate in a check-in with John’s people manager when this selection is made.
  • Selected leader’s direct reports: Everyone who reports directly to the selected leader will need to have a check-in with that leader. One or more leaders can be selected within the same check-in. 

    • Example:

      • If John is selected, everyone who reports to John’s directly to John will have a check-in with John.

      • John himself won’t need to participate in a check-in with John’s people manager when this selection is made.

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Additional Segmentation Controls: If participation is defined by selecting one or more organizations under specific leaders, HR teams can also select how many layers deep within that specific part of the organization should participate in check-in conversations:

• All (default): Includes everyone in the reporting chain under the leader.
• 1 Layer: Direct reports to the leader will have a check-in with the selected individual
• 2 Layers: Direct reports to the leader + their direct reports with their respective managers.
• 3+ Layers: Expands further down the chain, including each layer with their respective managers.
• So on and so forth

Check-In Kick Off Email Notifications

If you choose to notify participants, WorkBoard will automatically send a default notification to everyone selected for the check-in.

You can customize this notification separately for managers and individual contributors, ensuring each group receives relevant instructions, guidance, and resources. Each person will receive only one notification, and managers will only receive the manager version.

Alternatively, you can skip WorkBoard’s automatic notification and send your own communications outside the system.

Modifying Check-In Cycle & Agenda:

There are a number of important considerations around modifying the Check-in cycle and the agenda:

• You can modify the check-in cycle details (targeted group, cycle start and end date, agenda topics etc.) while the set-up is still in draft mode, and all the way up to the start of the start of the cycle.
• Once the cycle start date comes around, the check-ins are created for the targeted group of participants and the topics are pre-populated on the agenda for all. You will not be able to change these topics for the check-in meetings that have been created after the cycle start date.
• The end date of a Cycle can be extended by an HR admin as long as the check-in is still in progress. The updated due date will automatically reflect in in-app reminders.

Monitoring & Tracking a Check-In Cycle

HR teams can monitor the progress of a check-in cycle:

Tools to Manage the Check-in Cycle at Large:

• Progress bar shows number of conversations completed out of the total number of conversations that are required.
• Mark as Complete allows HR to close out a check-in cycle. Closing out a check-in cycle requires a manual step of HR closing out the cycle of marking a Cycle as "Complete"; the manual set is designed to accommodate extensions to deadlines, ensuring everything is in order before locking the record of the conversations in a cycle.
• Exporting Data: HR team can export the check-in progress to CSV where they can see which conversations have been completed and when.
• Sync & Add Check-Ins allows your to check for new employees that may fall under the targeted groups, and create check-ins for them
• Extending a Cycle: The end date of a Cycle can be extended by an HR admin from the kebob icon of a check-in cycle as long as the check-in is still in progress. The updated due date will automatically reflect in in-app reminders.
• Option to Cancel a Cycle to disband a cycle mid-cycle. Should be used if none of the check-ins that have taken place are relevant and you want to simply delete all the data from them. If you simply one to close out a cycle - choose "Mark as Complete"
• Edit takes your to the check-in cycle's configuration and set up page where you can see presets and set up

Tools to Manage a Specific Check-in Conversation within a Cycle

• Marking a single conversation as complete: occasionally a check-in conversation has taken place, but the parties to the conversation need assistance from HR to mark the conversation as complete. HR team can mark a conversation complete from the specific cycle by going to the check-ins tab, and clicking on the kebob icon.
• Reopening a specific Check-In Conversations: HR teams can reopen mistakenly closed  check-ins that may have been closed prematurely or have been flagged for requiring a correction.
• Accessing a Summary of a Check-In: Given the sensitive nature of check-in data, access to the content of specific check-ins requires additional elevated permissions (HR super access role). A user with this access level, will be able to go to the check-ins tab of a specific check-in cycle, click on a kebob of a conversation, and then get a published summary of the conversation.
• Syncing to Workday: More info here: How to Sync WorkBoard Check-Ins to Workday

Considerations for Before, During & After Check-Ins:

As you think about setting up check-ins for your organizations, it helps to think about roles and responsibilities of each group of people in the organization when it comes to check-ins.