Upward reviews are reviews written about a manager by their direct report(s). If you are a manager yourself, and your direct report(s) are also managers, this article applies to you. Keep reading for a walk through of next steps after an upward review has been submitted for one of your direct reports.
Upward review process overview
- You will only be responsible for reviewing submitted upward reviews of your direct report if your direct report is a manager.
- Upward reviews are optional for review cycles and may or may not be included for the cycle at hand.
- Upward reviews will only be completed about your direct reports if they are also participants in the cycle.
- If you are the manager of someone who is also a manager, you will receive the upward reviews that your direct report's direct reports have submitted. Once an upward review has been submitted, you will receive a notification. These are upward reviews that have been written for your direct report(s).
- After submission/notification, you can open the upward review. As a manager, you do have the ability to remove feedback that is not constructive on these upward reviews (if the setting is enabled for the review cycle).
- There is also a setting that review admins can enable which hides all upward feedback from being shared verbatim with the participant. If this setting is enabled for the cycle, you will see a note at the top of the upward reviews letting you know that the participant (the manager) will not see the upward answers verbatim and you should include the upward feedback in your summary.
- If you are an additional manager for a participant, you will also be able to view upward reviews upon submission. Anyone that you are an additional manager for will appear under the 'My team' filter on the cycle overview page. Use the same steps as below to view submitted upward reviews.
- Depending on the review settings, the identity of the upward review author may be hidden from you.
- Upward reviews will be shared with the participant when you 'Share results'. This usually is the very last step in the review cycle. If upward reviews are hidden from the participant, they will never see the upward answers verbatim, even after you have shared the results.
- You will not be able to edit/remove feedback from the upward review once results have been shared.
View upward reviews for your team
1. Click on Best-Self Review® from the left navigation.
2. Click on the name of the cycle you need to work on. It will be under the 'Active review cycles' section.
3. From the 'Overview' tab, you will see a drop-down menu with options Me, My team, My hierarchy, and Everyone. Depending on your role and the visibility settings for the cycle, you may not see My hierarchy and Everyone.
Note
If you have a large number of direct reports participating, you can also search for a specific person in the search field and then complete steps 5-6.
4. Click the My team option.
5. Scroll down to 'Review progress' for your team, click the ... next to the participant whose upward reviews you want to view, and then click View.
6. You'll land on a reviews page for that person and there will be a 'Upward' tab after the 'Manager' tab. This 'Upward' tab houses all upward reviews that have been submitted for your direct report.
7. If upward reviews are hidden from the participant, your direct report, you will see the yellow message shown below.
The upward reviews are only hidden from the participant, and not from review administrators, the hierarchy, or an additional manager if applicable. It is a reminder of the visibility settings and also a reminder to include the upward feedback in your summary of answers. It is important that the upward review results be conveyed to the participant in order to maintain a fair and objective review.
8. Use the information from the upward reviews to help you complete your Summary and to help guide the final meeting with your direct report. This is especially important if upward reviews are not being shared verbatim with the participant.