Workday Calibration Unlocked: Managing Changes with Confidence

Change is a constant in all organizations. Managing those changes when processes are in progress can be challenging, particularly when performance and talent processes are in progress for many weeks or months. While we strongly suggest organizations limit changes when performance review and talent assessment processes are in progress, we understand that some changes cannot wait until processes are closed. In the following post, we outline the most common changes we see organizations make during calibration processes and make suggestions for the best ways to manage them. 

Let’s begin by discussing how to handle a situation when an employee is either not initially included in a calibration launch and needs to be added or becomes eligible after the process launches.

Employees Who Become Newly Eligible for Calibration:

• An employee who’s supposed to be eligible for a performance review but wasn’t included as part of the review process at the launch date and has an eligibility effective date that’s before the review launch date will not show up automatically in calibration. The first step is to add the employee to calibration as part of the ad hoc process via the Manage Calibration task. Once this is done, the employee will be added to calibration in the applicable calibrator’s task and a performance review will launch automatically at the first step of the review process. It is important to not launch a performance review for them manually prior to adding them to the calibration process. This scenario is not affected by the initiation and completion date of the job change that made them eligible.
• An employee who becomes eligible after the performance review has already been launched will show under Add Workers to Calibration within the Manage Calibration task. The employee can be added to calibration, but a performance review will not launch automatically. A performance review can be launched manually for them, but it will not be linked to calibration. Therefore, this scenario should be avoided since we cannot add the employee to calibration after the review has already been launched.

An Employee is Terminated:

• An employee who is terminated after the performance review has already launched, regardless of when it was initiated and completed, the employee will still show on the calibration partner’s grid. They will need to be removed from calibration manually if it is decided they should not show any longer. Their performance review will need to be canceled or advanced to completion manually as well.
• It is not necessary to remove the terminated employee, however. The employee can remain as unplotted or if they were plotted before the termination process took place they can remain where they are and calibration can be closed. 

An Employee Changes Organization / Manager:

• An employee that moves to a different manager after the performance review process and calibration have already launched will show under Move Worker within the Manage Calibration task and be shown to be moved to the new manager or calibration partner’s grid/task if needed. They will continue to show on the previous calibration partner’s grid until they are moved by the Administrator to the new partner. Any movement made to the employee after performance reviews are already launched will not automatically update calibration, even if the effective date is backdated to before the performance review launch date. As expected, the performance review launch date is the key to determining where the employee should display within calibration.
• The subordinate organization of the manager who moved to a new organization is not impacted by the effective date. They will automatically move to the new calibration partner’s grid even if the employee didn’t. However, the subordinate org will need to be moved by the Administrator before they can be plotted by the new calibration partner.

NOTE: When an employee’s manager changes and they remain in the former manager’s or calibrator’s grid, we recommend not taking action and attempting to move them to the new manager. Most clients opt to have the new manager talk to the former manager to discuss where the employee should be placed in calibration.

Another scenario we see happen less often is when an employee assigned the HR Partner role, and is acting as a facilitator changes roles or an employee who is a Calibrator and currently has a grid (task) assigned to them changes roles when calibration is in progress.

• If the task is in the calibrator’s inbox and they attempt to click on it, but they are no longer the HR Partner for the organization associated with the task, they will receive an error message stating that the task is no longer available. This could mean their role has changed, or another employee sharing the same role for the same organization has already completed the task.

• If the calibrator’s role changes, the task can be reassigned via Manage Calibration under the Organization Role section. If another employee now has the role in that organization, the reassignment can be processed.

• If there is a Calibrator or Facilitator above the employee who should no longer have the task can use the Facilitate Calibration task to “complete on behalf of” and move the employees into their grid/task.

As we have seen, managing changes while a calibration process is in progress is possible. However, we strongly recommend limiting changes during this time. The best way to know how the calibration process will react to changes is to test each scenario you believe might occur before calibration is launched so you can anticipate what will happen during the process period. Once a change occurs, discuss it with the affected managers or calibrators to determine whether action is needed or if the employee can stay in their original calibration grid, with team discussions serving as a sufficient alternative. All in all, calibration in Workday can be a very effective tool to aid your organization in understanding and identifying talent.

Haven’t gotten enough of our calibration tips? Stay tuned for the 3rd installment of our 3-Part series on Workday Calibration – coming in March – in which we discuss the various business process configuration options when tying Calibration with Performance or Talent Reviews!