Evaluation Cycle

An evaluation cycle is one appraisal round. It names the population it covers, splits the year into the halves or quarters you appraise in, sets the dates every stage of each half runs between, and lists the people who score a sheet in order. Everything else in the module hangs off it.

Where

Performance Management › Evaluation Cycle

Who uses it

HR, once per appraisal round, with the consultant for the first one

When

Before the year or half it covers starts, not after

Needs first

Performance Target Entity, Evaluation Template

Produces

Employee Goal sheets

What it is for

The cycle is where an appraisal stops being a design and becomes dates. Every field on the period line is a date with a consequence: it decides when a man can type his targets, when his manager can score him, when the calibration meeting can move a number, and when the whole thing stops moving.

A cycle has one population, from Performance Target Entity, and one or more period lines. A period line is a half, a quarter or a full year: whatever stretch of time you appraise in one go. Each line carries its own dates, its own weight in the final figure, and its own evaluator chain.

A cycle freezes its chain and its window dates when it is activated. Activate takes a copy. From that moment the sheets generated for the round use the frozen copy, not whatever is on the screen. This is deliberate and it is useful: because the first half is frozen, you can change the evaluator chain for the second half without disturbing anything already scored. A client who reorganises in July can appraise the January to June half under the old reporting line and the July to December half under the new one, in the same cycle.

Stage dates are typed, not divided. The system does not take a window and split it by the number of steps in the chain. You type the window start and you type how many days each stage gets, and a stage deadline is the window start plus that number of days. The window start counts as day zero. So if the client says every evaluator gets seven days starting Monday, the window has to open on that Monday, and day seven lands on the following Monday.

Activating a cycle does not create a single appraisal sheet. Activate settles who is in the round. Generating sheets is a second, separate action, done one period line at a time, so a client appraising half-yearly issues the first half's sheets in January and the second half's in July.

Every field, in plain words

The round

Field	What it means	What to put in it	Notes
Evaluation Cycle	The short code for the round	CYC-FY26
Name	The round in words. Employees see this on their sheets	Appraisal Year 2026	Required
Cycle Status	Where the round has got to	Fills itself	DRF Draft, still being set up and invisible on the dashboard. STU Sent to Users, sheets are out with employees. ACT Activated, the population and the chain are frozen. CLD Closed, sheets stop moving and the scores and calibrations are kept
Activated	Whether Activate has been pressed	Fills itself
Performance Target Entity	The population this round covers	FACTORY	Required. Pick it from the list. Activate refuses without it, because a round with no population covers nobody
Evaluation Period	The year or period the round belongs to	Pick it from the list	Required
Evaluation Template	The fallback appraisal form	Management Appraisal 2026	Used only for somebody whose position names no template. The position wins
Evaluation Increment Matrix	The score bands this round pays on	ANNUAL-FY26	Pick it from the list. A period line can name a different one for one half

Periods

One line per stretch of time you appraise in one go. Every date on this line has a consequence, so they are set out in the order they happen.

Field	What it means	What to put in it	Notes
Line #	Line number	Fills itself
Half	Which half or quarter of the round this line is	1
Name	What the employee sees	January to June 2026	Required
Date From	The first day the performance being appraised counts from	01-Jan-2026	Required. Stamped onto every sheet generated for this line
Date To	The last day it counts to	30-Jun-2026	Required
Weightage	What this half is worth when the halves are combined into one figure for the year	50	Two halves at 50 each weight equally. 40 and 60 weights the second half more
Target Window From	The day employees may start typing their targets	01-Jan-2026	The target stage days on the chain are counted from here, with this day as day zero
Response Window From	The day scoring opens	01-Jul-2026	For a half where targets are set in January and the achievement is recorded in July, this is the July date
Response Window To	The day scoring closes	21-Jul-2026
Calibration Window From	The day the calibration meeting may start moving numbers	22-Jul-2026
Calibration Days	How many days calibration gets	14	Counted from the day that person's form is finished. Leave it blank and 14 days is used
Evaluation Increment Matrix	A different set of score bands for this half only	Leave blank to use the round's own
Status	Where this half has got to	Fills itself	A closed half takes no more sheets and no more changes

Evaluator Chain

One line per person who touches a sheet, in order. The chain is per half, so a second half can have a different one.

Field	What it means	What to put in it	Notes
Line #	Line number	Fills itself
Half	Which half this chain line belongs to	1	Leave the first half's chain and copy it to the second with the Copy Evaluator Chain action
Sequence	The order this evaluator acts in	1	Required. The sheet starts at sequence 1 and passes on from there
Evaluator Type	Who this seat is	Manager	Required. See the list below
Reporting Level	How far up the reporting line to go for a Manager seat	1 for his own manager, 2 for the manager above
Employee, Name	The specific person, for a Nominated Employee seat	10427, Ahsan Raza	Only for the Nominated Employee type
Form Type	What this evaluator fills	Scoring	RVW Review, he reads and comments. SCR Scoring, he gives marks
Weightage	This evaluator's share of the settled score	Self 10, Manager 70, HOD 20	The shares of the scoring seats are meant to total 100
Allow Scoring	Whether this seat may enter marks at all	Tick for the manager
Comment Only	The seat may write but not score	Tick for a peer you want heard but not counted
Send Back Allowed	The seat may push the sheet back a step	Tick for the manager	Without it a mistake has to be fixed by HR
Target Days	How many days this seat gets in the target stage	7	Counted from Target Window From, which is day zero
Review Days	How many days it gets in the scoring stage	7	Counted from Response Window From, which is day zero
Overlap With Previous	The seat starts when the previous one starts rather than when it finishes	Tick to let a peer score at the same time as the manager
Target Date From, Target Date To	The dates this seat's target stage actually runs between	Fill themselves from the window and the days
Review Date From, Review Date To	The dates its scoring stage runs between	Fill themselves

The evaluator types:

• SLF Self. The employee himself. Almost every client has this as sequence 1.
• MGR Manager. The person the employee reports to, taken from his Organization Assignment, going up as many levels as Reporting Level says.
• SUB Subordinate. The people who report to him, for upward feedback.
• PER Peer. People at his own level.
• HOD HOD. The head of his department.
• HRM HR Manager. This type resolves to nobody in this product. There is no HR manager recorded anywhere in the organisation data to resolve it from, so rather than guess at somebody it deliberately finds no one. If HR must sit in the chain, use Nominated Employee and name the person.
• EMP Nominated Employee. One named person, for every sheet in the round. Use it for a quality head or an HR head who signs off everybody.

What the buttons do

• Activate Cycle settles the population and freezes the chain and the window dates. It creates no sheets. It refuses on a closed round, refuses with no target entity, refuses with no period line, and before it finishes it names everybody held back and everybody whose position resolves to no form.
• Generate Sheets issues the goal sheets for one period line. The line's own dates and the frozen windows are stamped onto each sheet, and the sheet starts at the first seat in the chain. Anybody skipped is named, with the reason.
• Apply Dates pushes revised windows and chain dates onto sheets that are already out. Sheets whose dates were changed by hand are listed first so you can decide about them.
• Copy Evaluator Chain copies one half's chain onto another half, replacing what is there.
• Close Period closes one half. Its sheets stop moving. Scores and calibrations are kept.
• Deactivate pulls the round back to being set up again. It refuses the moment any sheet has been submitted or approved, which is the point: you cannot quietly withdraw a form a man has already filled.

How to configure it

1. Have the Performance Target Entity ready, and the target entity set on the Organization Assignment of everybody the round covers.
2. Open the screen, give the round a code and a name. CYC-FY26, Appraisal Year 2026.
3. Name the target entity, the period, and the Evaluation Increment Matrix the round pays on.
4. Add a period line per half. January to June 2026 from 01-Jan to 30-Jun, weight 50. July to December 2026 from 01-Jul to 31-Dec, weight 50.
5. On each line, type the target window start, the scoring window start and end, and the calibration window start. Work backwards from the day the client wants the increment letters out.
6. Check the day arithmetic. A stage gets its window start plus its days, and the start day is day zero, so a seven day stage opening on Monday the 1st ends on Monday the 8th.
7. Build the chain for the first half. Self at sequence 1, Manager at 2, HOD at 3. Set each one's Form Type, weightage and days.
8. Use Copy Evaluator Chain to put the same chain on the second half, then change it there if the reporting lines have moved.
9. Save, then press Activate Cycle. Read what it tells you about people held back or with no form, fix those, and activate again.
10. Press Generate Sheets for the first period line only. Check two or three sheets, then tell the employees.
11. In July, come back and press Generate Sheets for the second line.

Scenarios

"We set targets in January and record the achievement in July"

One period line, from January to June. Target Window From is in January, Response Window From is in July. The employees open their sheets in January and type targets, the sheet sits until July, and scoring opens then. The two windows on one line are exactly this case, which is why they are separate fields.

"We reorganised in July and half the managers changed"

Appraise it as two halves on one cycle. The first half was frozen when the round was activated, so its sheets keep the old chain and the old dates whatever you do afterwards. Build the second half's chain against the new reporting lines. Nothing already scored moves.

"A man joined in September"

He is in the population from the moment his Organization Assignment names the target entity. The January to June half has already ended, so no sheet is due for it, and he is not counted as overdue for it. He gets the July to December sheet like everybody else. Check it on the Run Coverage tab of Performance Target Entity.

"Everybody gets seven days and the cycle opens on a Monday"

Set Target Days to 7 on each seat and open the target window on that Monday. The window start is day zero, so sequence 1 runs Monday to the following Monday. Open the window on the Sunday instead and every deadline lands a day early, which is the mistake clients make.

"HR has to approve every appraisal"

Do not use the HR Manager evaluator type, it resolves to nobody. Add a Nominated Employee seat at the end of the chain and name the HR head.

"We want to change the dates after the sheets are out"

Change the period line, then use Apply Dates. Sheets whose dates somebody already changed by hand are listed separately so you can decide whether to overwrite them. HR can also extend one person's own sheet, but only outwards, never inwards.

What it is connected to

• Performance Target Entity supplies the population, and the member list is frozen onto the cycle at activation.
• Evaluation Template supplies the form, from the position, with the cycle's own template as the fallback.
• Employee Goal sheets are generated from here and carry the line's dates and the frozen windows.
• Calibration opens inside the calibration window, half by half or over the whole round.
• Evaluation Increment Matrix turns a settled score into a band, for the round or for one half.
• Performance Payout and Salary Revision are both raised against a cycle and a period.
• Dashboard reads the round. A round still in Draft is not offered in its cycle list.

If something looks wrong

• "Activate says to set a performance target entity first" - the round names no population. That is who it covers, so nothing can happen without it.
• "Activate says to add a period line" - a round with no halves has no dates, and a sheet cannot be dated.
• "Generate Sheets says the cycle is not active yet" - press Activate first. Activate settles the members, generating issues the forms.
• "Generate Sheets says a half has no dates" - Date From or Date To is blank on that period line.
• "Somebody was skipped when sheets were generated" - the action names everybody it skipped and why. The usual causes are no form from the position, held back on the population, or not an active member because the round was not activated again after he was added.
• "Deactivate refuses" - a sheet has already been submitted or approved. A filled form is not withdrawn quietly. Close the period instead.
• "Every deadline is a day out" - the window start counts as day zero. Move the window start, not the days.
• "The round does not appear on the dashboard" - it is still in Draft. A draft round is deliberately left out.