Performance Ratings+ automatically combines scores from self and manager reviews to generate numerical performance ratings for review cycle participants. Review Admins use it to measure performance consistently and connect ratings to compensation and talent decisions.
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Required access: Performance Reviews Personas: Review Admins Pricing: Perform and Total Platform packages
Feature Structure
Performance Ratings+ consists of four connected components:
- Question templates — define which competencies, values, and performance aspects are measured in a review cycle
- Formula — assigns weights to self and manager review questions, determining each section's impact on the final score
- Rubric — maps numeric score ranges to performance-level designations (e.g., Above Level, At Level, Below Level), so participants and managers understand what each rating means
- Reporting — surfaces results through Talent Matrix, Compare Groups, Performance Ratings, and Trends over Time views; also feeds the Performance metric on the HR Outcomes Dashboard
Default formula and rubric
All accounts include a pre-configured formula and rubric to reduce setup time:
- 15Five Recommended Performance Rubric — a 3-tier rating scale: Above Level (80–100), At Level (31–79), Below Level (0–30)
- 15Five Performance Framework — a ratings formula linked to the recommended Self & Manager Review template
These defaults can be used as-is or customized to fit your organization.
Performance Designation Mappings
Review Admins can map review answer choices and rubric levels to performance designations (e.g., Top, Middle, Bottom Performer) used in the HR Outcomes Dashboard. The mapping interface shows live participant counts as adjustments are made, so you can preview distribution before saving.
See Manage Performance Ratings+ settings for configuration steps.
How the formula calculates ratings
The formula follows a five-step pipeline to produce a single score per participant:
- Normalize each opinion scale answer to a common 0-100 scale.
- Average normalized scores within each section and review type.
- Combine review types by weight (for example, 60% manager and 40% self). Weights must sum to 100%.
- Combine sections by weight. Weights must sum to 100%.
- Map the final score to the rubric to produce a performance level.
Only opinion scale questions feed into the calculation. Text, Yes/No, and Multiple Choice questions are excluded. The formula is copied to the cycle at launch, so editing the formula template after launch does not change a running cycle's calculation. Both a formula and a rubric must be attached before a cycle can be approved.
Ratings are produced by this formula, not by 15Five AI. In a review cycle using AI-Assisted Reviews, 15Five AI assists open-text answers only. It does not select, suggest, or calculate a rating, and it does not generate an overall performance rating. Every opinion scale answer that feeds the calculation is selected by the review writer. See What does AI-Assisted Reviews do and not do?
Seven weightable sections are available: Growth & Development, Company Values, Competencies, Manager Effectiveness, Objectives, Custom Questions, and Private Manager Assessment, plus up to nine additional custom sections. See Create and manage a performance ratings formula for setup steps.
Single-question ratings
If the full formula approach is more complexity than your organization needs, 15Five offers a single-question alternative. Instead of averaging across sections and review types, one designated opinion scale question becomes the entire rating. This is typically the manager’s holistic assessment in the Private Manager Assessment section.
When enabled, 15Five auto-creates a three-level rubric (Below / Meets / Exceeds) and provides a default question: “Based on the expectations of [Name]’s role and level, what is your assessment of their performance?” The designated question must be an opinion scale type.
Single-question ratings are best for organizations that want a performance designation without configuring weights, included questions, or multi-section formulas.
Key Rules
- Performance ratings are calculated automatically from formula weights. They cannot be manually adjusted in Calibrations.
- A formula or rubric can be changed after a cycle launches, but only until the first review in the cycle is submitted.
- Reporting becomes available as soon as the first review is submitted. Scores recalculate when any review edits are made, including during locked calibration sessions.
- Performance ratings cannot be applied to historical cycles. Trends over Time data is only available from cycles configured with Performance Ratings+.
- Section-level weighting is designed to balance self and manager review input across the formula. It should not be used to weight individual competencies differently — competency scores flow automatically from the question template into the rating, and overriding them at the section level disrupts this flow and can produce unreliable results across future cycles.
- AI-Assisted Reviews does not generate ratings. 15Five AI assists open-text answers only and never selects or calculates a rating.
What You Can Do
Set Up
- Create and manage a performance ratings formula
- Create a performance ratings rubric
- Configure Performance Ratings+ for a review cycle
- Manage Performance Ratings+ settings
- Understand performance review question templates
Analyze