ThreadWare User Guide

Performance Management

Performance reviews: agreeing what you will be measured on, commenting as the year goes, rating yourself at the end, and getting a final score. This guide explains the stages so you know whose turn it is.

You only see what you have been given access to

ThreadWare is built from modules - Sales, Production, Quality and so on. An administrator gives you a role in each module, for each company you work in. The menu is built from those roles. So if something in this guide is not in your menu, it has not been given to you yet. Ask your administrator, or log a support ticket. To see what you currently hold, click your initials in the top right and choose My Access & Roles.

Can I use it?

RoleWhat you can do
My Performance Reviews Your own reviews, and the reviews of people who report to you.
Performance Master Data Editor Reference data, review periods and templates. Nothing else.
HR Executive All performance reviews, and status overrides.
HR Admin Employees and HR administration.
If you manage somebody, you can see their review already

You do not need a special role to see the reviews of people who report to you. ThreadWare works it out from the Direct Manager field on each person's record, and it follows the chain - so you also see the people who report to them. Those reviews are read-only unless it is your turn in the workflow.

If a manager cannot see their team, the Direct Manager field is usually the reason. An administrator sets it under Administration ▸ Users & Organisation ▸ User Admin.

Where to find it

Menu ▸ Performance Management ▸ Performance Reviews

PageWhat it isNeeds
Performance ReviewsYours and your team's. Everyone in the module
All Performance ReviewsEvery review in the company. HR Executive or HR Admin
Review Status Override Force a review to a different stage when it is stuck. HR Executive or HR Admin
Employees Everyone on the uploaded employee spreadsheet, with their job title and grades, and the payroll list beside it. See The employee list. HR Executive or HR Admin
Headcount ReportStaff numbers for a company. HR Executive or HR Admin
Performance Reference Data The strategic priorities, KPI categories, KPI measures, ratings and behaviours reviews are built from. See KPI categories and measures. Master Data Editor and up
Review PeriodsWhich periods reviews run for. Master Data Editor and up
Performance Review Templates The forms themselves, and which roles they apply to. Master Data Editor and up

The stages a review goes through

A review moves through a fixed set of stages. At every point it is waiting for either you or your manager, and the status tells you which.

StageWhat happensWhose turn
DraftThe manager is building the review.Manager
KPIs Proposed The manager has proposed what you will be measured on and sent it to you. Employee
KPIs Queried You disagreed with something and sent it back. It goes round again until you agree. Manager
KPIs Accepted You accepted what you will be measured on. You only comment at this point - you do not rate yourself yet.-
ReadyThe cycle is running.-
Employee Comments Saved Your comments through the period are recorded.Manager
Employee Self-Rating Now you rate yourself, once, on every KPI and behaviour. Employee
In Review The manager rates you and writes their comments.Manager
FinalisedDone. The final score is set and the PDF can be exported.-
You rate yourself once, at the end - not at the start

This trips people up. When you accept your KPIs early in the cycle, you are only agreeing what will be measured and adding comments. The self-rating comes much later, at the Employee Self-Rating stage.

Ratings and the final score

Both you and your manager pick from the same rating list. Each rating carries a percentage:

RatingCounts as
Below0%
Meets50%
Exceeds100%

Your company can change this list, so check what yours actually says.

Your self-rating does not affect your score

Self-ratings are recorded for reference and for the conversation. The final weighted score is calculated from the manager's ratings only, blending the KPI part and the behaviour part according to the weightings your company has set.

That is not a reason to skip it. Where your self-rating and your manager's differ is exactly what the review conversation should be about.

Everyday jobs

Accept or query your proposed KPIs

  1. Open Performance Reviews and click your review.
  2. Read each proposed KPI and its weighting.
  3. Add your comments.
  4. Click Accept, or Query if something is wrong or unachievable - say why in the comment.

Do your self-rating

When the review reaches Employee Self-Rating, open it, pick a rating for every KPI and every expected behaviour, and submit. It then goes to your manager.

Add a KPI to a review (managers)

A KPI is chosen in three steps, and then you write what this person must achieve.

  1. Open the review while it is still a draft.
  2. Under Key Performance Area, pick a KPI Category - a heading such as "Quality and delivery".
  3. Pick a KPI Measure from that category - for example "Right first time".
  4. Pick the Strategic Priority this KPI serves. Only the priorities that the category supports are listed. If the category supports just one, it is filled in for you.
  5. Click Add to Review.
  6. In the new row, type the SMART KPI: exactly what this person must achieve, by when. Set the due date and the weight.

One KPI, one strategic priority. A category can support several priorities, but each KPI on a review serves exactly one, and it is shown under the measure on the KPI's row. While the KPIs can still be edited you can change it there. A row that says "Choose a strategic priority" or "No strategic priority chosen" has none yet - pick one. The review can still be sent in the meantime; nothing is blocked.

The line above the two lists tells you whose job the lists were built for, for example "Showing KPI categories for Production Supervisor (job function: Production Supervision)". You are only offered the categories and measures that suit that kind of job.

Cannot find the measure you want? Switch on Show all categories. Everything is then listed. Use it for the odd case; if you need it often, ask whoever keeps the reference data to offer that category to the job function.

If you see "No job title is set for this employee, so all KPI categories are shown", nothing is wrong and nothing is blocked - the person simply has no job title, or their job title has no confirmed job function yet. An administrator sets that under Administration ▸ Job Titles.

Why is the KPI Category list empty or very short?

Export a review as a PDF

Open a finalised review and use the PDF export. The document is laid out with the review first and the full history of who changed what, and when, in its own section at the end - so you can print just the first part if the history is not needed.

KPI categories and measures

Menu ▸ Administration ▸ Performance Reference Data

Every KPI on a review hangs off a short chain:

Strategic Priority → KPI Category → KPI Measure → the SMART KPI

Link in the chainWhat it isWho sets it
Strategic PriorityOne of the company's big goals. Reference data
KPI Category A heading that groups measures, such as "Quality and delivery". It can support several strategic priorities. Reference data
KPI Measure The thing being measured, such as "Right first time". It has no strategic priority of its own. Reference data
SMART KPI What one person must achieve, in the manager's own words. It serves exactly one of its category's strategic priorities. The manager, on the review

Set up a KPI category

  1. Open the KPI Categories tab.
  2. Type the category's name and, in plain language, what it is for.
  3. Tick the Strategic Priorities it supports. A category can support several.
  4. Tick the Job Functions it is offered to. Leave this empty to offer it to everyone.
  5. Click Add.

File a measure under a category

The KPI Measures tab has a form at the top and, below it, the measures listed under their category. Each category's heading shows the strategic priorities it supports - a measure does not have one of its own; the manager picks one of the category's priorities when adding the measure to a review.

  1. To add a measure, type its name in the form, choose its KPI Category, describe its purpose in plain language and click Add.
  2. To change one, click the pencil on its row. It is loaded into the form; change it and click Save changes, or Cancel to leave it as it was.

Only for is optional. Use it for a specialist or executive measure: tick the job functions that should see it. Left empty, everyone who is offered the category sees the measure.

A measure with no category is not lost. Managers still see it, under Uncategorised, until it has been filed. Click a category's heading to fold its measures away.

A category's strategic priorities can be ticked and unticked at any time. A KPI already on a review keeps the priority it was given.

Retire, do not delete. A measure that a review or a template already uses cannot be deleted, neither can a category that has measures, and neither can a strategic priority that a category, a measure or a review uses. Untick Active instead. It is no longer offered, and reviews that already use it keep their wording.

Why a manager sees only some categories

The lists a manager picks from follow the employee's job function, which comes from their job title.

The same link can be seen, and ticked, from the other side: Administration ▸ Job Functions shows which categories are limited to each job function, and the Edit window of a job function has a tick box per category. Two changes can only be made on the KPI Categories tab, because they change who else sees the category: limiting a category that is open to everyone, and removing the only job function from a category.

The employee list

Menu ▸ Administration ▸ Employees

The page has two lists.

A person with no ThreadWare login can be listed here, but a performance review can only be created for somebody who has a login.

Employment-equity details

Gender, race, socio-economic status and the identity number are kept in a separate, locked panel.

Comments are kept, including edits

ThreadWare records the history of comment changes as well as status changes. If a comment is edited, the earlier version is still on record. Write comments as though they will be read later, because they will be.

When something looks wrong

What you seeWhat it means
A manager cannot see their team's reviews The Direct Manager field is not set on those people. It is set in User Admin, or by the employee upload from the manager named in HR's file.
A review still belongs to a manager who has left When HR accepts a change of direct manager in the employee upload, the person's unfinished reviews move to the new manager. Finalised reviews stay as they were.
A KPI row says "No strategic priority chosen" That KPI has no strategic priority yet. While the KPIs can be edited, pick one on the row.
You cannot edit anything on your review It is not your turn. Check the status against the stages table above.
The self-rating boxes are not there The review has not reached the Employee Self-Rating stage yet.
The template you expected is not on the list Templates can be limited to certain roles. Ask HR.
A review is stuck at a stage HR can move it with Review Status Override.
You can edit reference data but not employees Correct - Master Data Editor opens only reference data, review periods and templates.

Asking the assistant

Performance review questions are treated more carefully than anything else. You need the HR Executive or Administrator role, and you must actually use the words "performance review" in your question. That is deliberate - it stops HR data turning up in an answer to a question that was about something else.