Create and launch a manual review cycle

Ben Pemstein Ben Pemstein
· Updated

Review Admins use this article to create and launch a manual Best-Self Review® cycle. When complete, the cycle appears in Upcoming Cycles on the Reviews dashboard and goes live automatically on the start date you selected.

Note: Your organization may have renamed this feature. If you don't see "Best-Self Review®" in your navigation, check with your admin for the name used in your account.

Before You Begin

  • You must have Review Admin access with Best-Self Review® and feature settings enabled. Contact your Account Admin if you do not have this access.
  • Review types and question templates must be decided before setup. See Understand performance review question templates and Review types in a performance review cycle.
  • To reuse settings from an existing cycle instead of building from scratch, see Clone a review cycle.
  • To use AI-Assisted Reviews in this cycle, it must be enabled for your company first: the AI-Assisted Reviews toggle on Features > 15Five AI and the AI-Assisted Reviews page in Agents Hub. It is available on the Total Platform and Perform & Goals plans. See Set up AI-Assisted Reviews.

Phase 1: Name the cycle

  1. Go to Reviews in the left-hand navigation.
  2. Click Add review cycle.
  3. Select Send Manually in the cycle type dialog.
  4. Click Next: Customize.
  5. Enter a cycle name, and select a Cycle start date and Cycle end date. You can change them later on the Timeline step.
  6. Click Continue.

Phase 2: Select review types and 15Five AI

  1. Select one or more review types to include:
    • Self — participants assess their own performance
    • Manager — managers assess their direct reports
    • Peer — peers assess their colleagues
    • Upward — direct reports assess their managers
  2. If you selected Peer, choose how to conduct the peer review, on the same step:
    • Participant initiated — participants nominate their own peers
    • Peer initiated: peers select which participants they will review. There is no nomination or approval step. To control who reviews whom, choose Participant initiated and manage peer nominations
  3. Click Continue.
  1. On the 15Five AI step, under Choose how reviewers write, select With 15Five AI, Without 15Five AI, or Use the Legacy Experience.
  2. Click Continue.

Note: Enabling AI-Assisted Reviews for your company does not decide what an individual cycle does. With 15Five AI is selected by default for new cycles created on or after September 17. Without 15Five AI keeps the cycle on the new review experience without AI-Assisted Reviews functionality; it is not the legacy experience. See Configure the review experience for a cycle (Admin) for each setting in full.

Note: If this cycle uses AI-Assisted Reviews, AI drafting applies to self, manager, and additional-manager reviews. Peer and upward reviews can be included in the same cycle, but those writers get the new review experience without AI drafting, Moments, or the review assistant.

Phase 3: Add cycle collaborators

  1. Search for and select individuals to co-administer this cycle.

Note: Cycle collaborators have the same permissions as Review Admins, scoped to this cycle only. See Add or remove cycle collaborators.

  1. Click Continue.

Phase 4: Set the review timeline

  1. Click the Start date field and select a date from the calendar.
  2. Click the End date field and select a date from the calendar.
  3. If your cycle includes manager reviews and you want calibrations, toggle Include calibration sessions in this review cycle on. The calibrations due date must fall between the manager reviews due date and the date sharing starts.
  4. Set individual due dates for each timeline action using the calendar view or list view:
    • Drag an action bar on the timeline to update its date, or click the pencil icon to edit the date manually.
    • Due date fields shown depend on your selected review types (Self, Peer, Upward, Manager, Calibrations, Share & Finalize).
  5. Select a repeat cadence at the bottom of the timeline section:
    • Repeat monthly, Repeat quarterly, Repeat bi-annually, Repeat annually, or No, this is a one-time review
  6. Click Continue.

Note: These dates are when the cycle opens and closes. They are separate from the performance period, which is the period of work an AI-assisted review evaluates and is set in the cycle's 15Five AI settings. If you set a repeat cadence, recheck the AI settings on each new cycle rather than assuming they carried over.

Phase 5: Choose review participants

  1. Select a participant scope:
    • All active, invited, and created users
    • All active users
    • Everyone (all active, invited, and created users), except some people or groups
    • Only specific people or groups

To filter by hire date, tick Filter participants by hire date range under Filter by hire date.

  1. Add or remove specific individuals or groups as needed.
  2. Click Continue.

Note: Users not selected as participants will not have reviews written about them but may still be asked to write manager, upward, or peer reviews for participants who are included.

Phase 6: Configure Objectives (optional)

  1. Toggle Include Objectives on or off.
  2. If enabled, select which Objective types to include.
  3. Click Continue.

Note: You will choose the Objective timeframe in Phase 7 when you select a question template.

Phase 7: Select question templates

  1. Select a question template for each active review type.
    • Click View next to a template to preview its questions before selecting.
  2. If prompted, select an Objective timeframe.
    • Objectives with start and end dates within this range will be included. Only participants who own at least one objective or key result in this timeframe will see Objective-related questions.
  3. Click Continue.

See 15Five default question templates or Create a custom question template for a performance review cycle.

Note: Your template choice affects AI-Assisted Reviews. A self or manager template needs at least one open-text question to use With 15Five AI. If the template you select contains only ratings or metric questions, an error appears and you will need to add an open-text question to the template, select a template that has one, or change the review experience. AI drafting never answers rating-scale questions, so every rating stays the writer's own selection.

Phase 8: Add a performance ratings formula (optional)

  1. Turn on Include performance ratings in this review, then select a formula from the Ratings formula dropdown.
    • Click View next to the formula to see its name, description, section weights, and included questions.
  2. Select a rubric from the Rubric dropdown.
    • Click View next to the rubric to see all rating levels, score ranges, and descriptions.
  3. Select a Rating visibility setting.
  4. Choose whether to include additional manager reviews in the ratings calculation.
  5. Click Continue.

See Create and manage a performance ratings formula and Create a performance ratings rubric.

Phase 9: Review settings

  1. On the Review cycle settings step, review each section: Visibility settings, Peer review settings, Direct report transparency for upward reviews, and Release peer and upward feedback.
  2. Click Edit on any section to modify it.
  3. Click Continue.

Phase 10: Configure the kickoff email

  1. Review the pre-populated kickoff email in the Kickoff Email step.
  2. Edit the subject line or body text as needed.
  3. Toggle the kickoff email on or off.
  4. Click Continue.

Phase 11: Confirm and launch

  1. Review the setup summary. Confirm cycle name, review types, participants, timeline dates, and kickoff email status.
  2. Click View Participants to verify the full participant list.
  3. Click Edit next to any setting to make changes before saving.
  4. Click Save changes. To finish later, click Save draft & exit instead.
  5. If the start date is today, This cycle will start right away opens. Click Yes, start now. Participants are added, email notifications are sent, and the cycle becomes active.

What You Should See When Complete

The new cycle appears under Upcoming review cycles on the Reviews dashboard until its start date. On the start date, it moves to Active review cycles and kickoff emails are sent (if enabled). A cycle that starts today goes straight to Active review cycles.

Once a cycle is saved and shows as upcoming, it can't go back to Draft. You can still delete it. See Delete a performance review cycle.

If Something Goes Wrong

Issue Check Fix
No participants appear after applying filters Participant scope may exclude all users matching the criteria Change the scope to All active users and re-apply group or hire date filters
A required question template section is missing for a selected review type The template may not include questions for that review type Open the template in Admin > Performance > Templates, verify sections, and re-select it in Phase 7
Calibration due date field does not appear Calibrations require at least one manager review type to be selected Return to Phase 2 and confirm Manager is selected, then re-enable calibrations in Phase 4
Cycle does not appear in Upcoming Cycles after saving Save was not completed or a required field was left blank Return to setup, confirm all phases show a checkmark, and click Save on the summary screen
Performance rating formula dropdown is empty No formulas have been created in this account See Create and manage a performance ratings formula to build one before continuing
With 15Five AI cannot be selected, or an error appears after selecting it The selected self or manager template may contain only ratings or metric questions. AI drafting needs at least one open-text question. Add an open-text question to the template, select a template that has at least one, or change the review experience to Without 15Five AI or Use the Legacy Experience. See Configure the review experience for a cycle (Admin)
On the question template step, you see The selected template doesn't work with your current configuration. Select Show more to see what the template is missing. With calibrations, the manager review needs a question that can be calibrated: Opinion scale, Yes / No, or Multiple choice without Allow multiple answers, that isn't conditional and isn't asked once per objective. If the cycle assesses objectives, the template needs a question in its Objectives section. With 15Five AI, the template needs at least one open-text question. Select a template listed under Show more, add the missing question to your template, or turn off that setting for this cycle.
The cycle launched on the legacy review experience unexpectedly Check the cycle's own setting on the 15Five AI step, under Choose how reviewers write. For an active cycle, select Edit review cycle from the cycle's settings gear, then look under 15Five AI for this cycle. Cycles that were already draft, upcoming, or active before September 17 stay on the legacy experience by default. Set the experience you want and save. See Troubleshoot: A review cycle is using the legacy review experience

Not Covered Here

This article does not cover automatic (lifecycle) review cycles, calibration session configuration, cloning an existing cycle, or the full detail of each AI-Assisted Reviews cycle setting. See Create an Automatic Review Cycle (Lifecycle Reviews), Configure a review cycle to include calibrations, Clone a review cycle, and Configure the review experience for a cycle (Admin).

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