Goal Types are exactly that….the types of Goals that you want to create for your Performance Review. They serve two purposes in your performance review: they Goal Types are groupings of multiple Goals. They are created to help organize your goals into different groups (i.e. Performance Factors and Developmental Goals) and they act as templates for the structure of goals.
The Goal Type can control what fields show up on a goal, what kinds of actions can be performed on the goal such as cascading or commenting, and more.
For every Performance Review, you will need to determine what Goal Types should on the performance review and/or what metrics will be evaluated. There is a lot of customization and flexibility that comes with setting up goal types, with opportunity to support users with attaining business competencies as well as personal development.
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Add a Goal Type
Setting up a Goal Type creates a place for similar goals, such as those for personal development, to appear together within the Performance Review. To create a new Goal Type, go to the Cognition HR menu tab and select Goal Types. Then click the green Add New button.
Next, fill out the settings you want to use.
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Tip: If you are making a new goal type based off of a previous one (for example, using Business Performance Goals 2020 2021 to create your Business Performance Goals 20212022), reference the old settings and use those as the basis for the new one. |
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There are several ways that you can set up your Goal Type, each way dictating how the Goals within that Goal Type appear. This ensures the Goals are all formatted consistently and have the same options. The various options provide copious amounts of flexibility – but you can make your Goal Type as simple or as complex as your needs!
Information
These fields will help you define the specific settings of your Goal Type.
Field Name | Description | |||||||||||
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Code | Internal code for organization; only seen by administrators. | |||||||||||
Name | The name that will show as the section title that is seen by end users. on the Performance Review. | |||||||||||
Goal Name Label | This label is shown to the associate when they are naming their goal. The default value is “Goal Name” but this can be customized to your language.  | |||||||||||
| This controls whether or not the measurement fields are shown and/or are required to be filled out by the associate. Measurement fields can be used to better define and measure whether or not a goal was met by allowing a place where metrics can be set. They can be set either by the associate when creating their own goal or by an administrator when creating a shared goal for the Goal Library. 
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Due Date | Allows a due date to be set for the goal and determines whether a goal is required to have a due date.  | |||||||||||
Actions | Enabling Actions allows users to create an action plan with smaller steps inside of the goal.   Examples of Actions in a Goal | |||||||||||
Comments | Enabling allows associate and their supervisor to leave comments on the goal. This might be used for check-ins or to record progress during the year before the evaluation.   Examples of Comments in a Goal
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Cascading | Enabling allows supervisors to cascade a goal down to anyone within their Supervision Pyramid. | Goals Added By | This field determines if an Associate or their Supervisor/HR can add goals on an Associate’s goals page for this Goal Type. This will disable adding goals to this goal type by anyone not included in the list you select. Options include: Associate, Supervisor/HR, Auto-Assign Supervisor/HR, Auto-Assign Associate, Auto-Assign to someone else in the organization. This can be set to either just individuals in the supervisor’s report pyramid or anyone within the organization regardless of pyramid hierarchy.  | |||||||||
Auto-Assign Cut-Off Date | You can auto-assign Goals in the Goal Library to positions of users. If you do that, Goals will be automatically added and removed as users fall in and out of the position. Once the Auto-Assign Cut-Off Date is reached, the Goals are no longer dynamically added/removed.  Ex: If you are doing a Performance Review ending in December, it may not be appropriate for a new hire who joined in November to be assigned a goal to reach by the end of the year. | |||||||||||
Evaluation Box Label | The label that appears on the goal’s evaluation box during a performance review. It will default to “Evaluation.”  
Example of Evaluation Box label inside of a goal | |||||||||||
Requires Approval
| If enabled, any goals that an associate adds to this Goal Type will require a supervisor’s approval. 
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Is Active | If checked, this Goal Type is active and can be used in a performance evaluationreviews. If unchecked, the Goal Type will not be able to be used and will be marked inactive.  |
Instructions
Use these fields to provide your associates with specific instructions at the various stages of the Performance Review process. The default instructions that you set here can be overridden at the Performance Review level to allow for customization per review/evaluation form.
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Field Name | Description | |||
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Goal Setting Instructions | The instructions for the associate and supervisor/HR that will show during goal setting. This text shows for the following statuses:
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Goals Approved Instructions |
These instructions for the associate and for the supervisor/HR will show after a goal has been approved. This text shows for the following statuses:
Info | | ||
Performance Review Instructions | These instructions show while the performance review is in progress before the Performance Meeting. They are broken out by each reviewer role and should instruct each person on what they need to do while evaluating this goal type. For example:
This text shows for the following statuses:
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Performance Meeting Instructions | These instructions show during the Performance Meeting. This text shows for the following statuses:
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PDF Download | This text shows on the PDF Download of an associate’s Performance Review, above the Goals for this Goal Type. |
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The final step is to tie your Goal Types to your Performance Review - this will populate the goals for each user in the HR Group assigned to that specific Performance Review.
Go to the Cognition menu tab and select Performance Reviews. You’ll see a list of all performance reviews. Click on Edit of the Performance Review you would like to add Goal Types to.
Click on the Goal Types.
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To add a Goal Type, search for it in the Selection Box and then click Add.
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There are some additional settings that control how each Goal Type is evaluated.
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Field Name
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Description
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Minimum/Maximum Goals
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If you are using Goals Workflow, this is where you can set the minimum and maximum number of goals that the associate is suggested to set for themselves. If you are not using the Goals Workflow or don’t want suggestions on how many goals should be set, skip this settings.
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Weight
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If your review will be auto calculating evaluation scores, use this to determine the different weights of each Goal Type. The weight must add up to 100.
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Auto-Weight Goals
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This applies to Goal Types which are weighted. When Auto-Weight Goals is checked, then the goals for a Goal Type have an equal weight. When Auto-Weight Goal is unchecked, then associates and managers will have to manually set their weight during Goal Setting and/or Performance Review.
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Evaluation
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Determine if the goal will be Evaluated during the review process and if Associate and/or Supervisor comments will be required. Check the corresponding boxes.
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Now that your goal type is created, learn how to build your goal library.