The Conversation Guide bridges the written review and the live performance conversation. It takes everything from the review — the manager's review, the employee's self-assessment, peer feedback, and context layer data — and turns it into a structured prep workspace so managers walk in prepared and employees walk out clear.
This article applies to organizations enrolled in the AI Assisted Reviews beta. The Conversation Guide is available for manager reviews only, at the Medium or Full support level.
Before you begin
- All reviews for the participant must be submitted (your manager review, the employee's self review, and any peer reviews included in the cycle).
- AI Assisted Reviews must be enabled for this cycle at the Medium or Full support level.
- "Manager coaching for review conversations" must be enabled at the cycle level. See Configure AI features for a review cycle (Admin) (Beta).
Access the Conversation Guide
- Select Reviews in the left navigation.
- Open the active review cycle.
- Navigate to the completed review for your direct report.
- Open the Conversation Guide.
What to focus on
The guide opens with a summary that orients you before going into the agenda:
- Last cycle rating and trajectory — where this person was rated previously and the direction of change.
- Tenure context — how long this person has been in the role.
- Ranked priorities — the most important things to land in the conversation, pulled from gaps and patterns in the review. Each priority links back to the sources that surfaced it.
This is coaching specific to this review, this employee, and what the data shows — not generic conversation advice.
Suggested agenda
Below the summary, a conversation flow is organized in five stages:
1. Opening
Set the tone by inviting the employee's perspective first. Suggested talking points are provided as prompts, not scripts — use what fits, skip what does not. You can add your own talking points.
2. Recognize
Surface the wins that are worth naming out loud, grounded in specific Moments from the review period. Recognition lands better when it is specific and the employee can see you noticed the details.
3. Growth
Address development areas with enough specificity that the employee knows what to do differently. Vague growth feedback ("be more proactive") is less useful than targeted feedback linked to real situations from the review.
4. Impact
Connect the employee's work to what it meant for the team and the organization. This stage is about helping the employee see the bigger picture of their contribution.
5. Closing
Land concrete next steps and commitments so the conversation ends with direction, not reflection. What happens after the meeting should be clear to both sides.
Each stage is linked to the sources from the review that inform it, so you can see exactly what the talking points are grounded in.
Create an Individual Development Plan (IDP)
At the close of the agenda, the guide surfaces an option to draft an IDP directly from the review:
- Click the option to create an IDP.
- The guide drafts a development plan from the review's growth areas, next steps, and commitments from the conversation.
- Edit the plan before sharing — it is generated from the review content but should be finalized in your own words.
- Share the IDP with the employee.
The IDP turns what was discussed in the meeting into a structured plan so it does not stay in the meeting room.
Note: Auto-generated IDPs are disabled if "Manager coaching for review conversations" is disabled at the cycle level.
Review summary
The guide also generates a Review Summary — an AI-drafted overview of the review and next steps, written for the employee to read alongside the conversation.
- Review the generated summary.
- Edit it in your own voice.
- Share it with the employee.
The summary gives the employee something concrete to take away and ensures both sides are working from the same picture.
Chat assistant in the Conversation Guide
The Chat assistant is available throughout the Conversation Guide. Use it to:
- Ask how to open the conversation in a way that fits this employee's style
- Ask what to avoid saying
- Ask what questions the employee is likely to raise
- Ask how to handle Moments where you and the employee might disagree
All responses are grounded in this specific review and employee context — not generic manager coaching.