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Most companies use appraisals or performance reviews to assess their employees’ contribution towards the organisation’s objectives. They are often held on an annual basis and are a cornerstone in the decision making process around promotions, salary adjustments, and career development opportunities.

At RORA, we promise to offer you variety, impact and progression that you would not be able to find in a similar role.

The appraisal cycle plays an important part in allowing you to keep track if we are delivering on this promise.

It also allows us to keep track if you are delivering against your

responsibilities⁠

and how you are progressing along your

Skills Ladder⁠

Appraisals at RORA

At RORA, we hold feedback cycles every quarter. Every second feedback cycle is also an appraisal that allows you to progress up your Skills Ladder.

We believe feedback is the most powerful tool to help you grow. It gives you the opportunity to always iterate on your own behaviours and gives you the skills you need to fix your own bike.

That’s why you will receive feedback from your peers every three months (if not more often).

Every six months, we will also assess your performance more formally during this feedback cycle, and determine if you are ready to move up your Skills Ladder. If you’ve reached the end of your Skills Ladder, this is also when we assess your readiness for a promotion.

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We know this is an exciting page and that many of you are keen to dive into the content below to find out how appraisals work at RORA and how you can get promoted.

What you will see is that all assessment processes are underpinned by feedback - so before you dive in, we ask that you take a moment to familiarise yourself with the
principles of feedback at RORA⁠
and make sure you know what good feedback looks like.

Feedback cycles: how it works

At the beginning of every quarter (that’s January, April, July, and October) you will receive an invitation from our performance management tool,

Leapsome⁠

, to nominate your peers for a quarterly review.

👉 Select your peers to give you feedback (either do this in the “Home” tab or within the “Reviews” tab)

We recommend selecting up to 5 peers across all levels (Lead, Manager, and Associate), but no less than 3. You can nominate people you work with for partners, but also in squads.

Your peers will then be asked to asess you against your

Skills Ladder⁠

and give you a score from 1 to 5, with 1 being the lowest and 5 the highest.

🤲 Remember to also fill in the feedback others have requested from you!

What do the scores mean?

When considering which scores to give your teammates, use the skills ladder for their level to make an assessment.

1 - This person is not meeting any of the expectations at their current skills ladder level.

2 - This person is meeting some but not all of the expectations at their current level on the skills ladder.

3 - This person is meeting all of the expectations of their current level on the skills ladder - no more.

4 - This person is meeting all of the expectations of their current level on the skills ladder. Looking at the skills ladder above, they're meeting some of these expectations.

5 - This person is meeting all of the expectation of their current level and the level above.

To help you decide on the right rating, use the flowchart below:

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At the end of each feedback cycle, you will receive the feedback your peers have shared with you and an aggregate score from the ratings you have received. You will not see who has given you what score, only a moderated average.

For example, if you have received a 5, a 4, and three 3s, your score would be 3.6. You will only see the 3.6.

Did you know? You can add Leapsome to your Slack, to have all your feedback reminders in one place.

Appraisals: how it works

Every second quarter (January and July, respectively) the feedback your peers will be asked to share with you will look more in-depth.

They will still be asked to assess you against the technical and behavioural criteria of your current skills ladder, but they will also be asked to share the following feedback.

Describe something this person does really well, using examples from your collaboration

Describe an area of improvement for this person, using examples from your collaboration

They will also be asked to give you a score from 1 to 5, following the same principles as above.

During an appraisal cycle, you will also be asked to write a self-assessment of your work and skills. This won’t be shared with anyone, but is an important moment of self-reflection for you.

Before an appraisal cycle, we will do a forecasting exercise to determine if we have any Lead or Manager positions coming up in the upcoming semester.

We will communicate the number and types of roles available before launching the appraisal cycle.

If you are at the end of your Skills Ladder and interested in taking the step up to the next one, please contact the People team and inform them that you’d like to be considered for a promotion.

At the end of an appraisal cycle you will again receive the feedback your peers have shared with you, as well as the aggregate score based on your ratings.

Appraisal cycle (archive)

Why we introduced quarterly cycles ❔

More regular - we want to build a culture of rapid progression at RORA. A appraisal once a year simply isn’t frequent enough

More transparent - you get feedback directly from your peers

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Overview of the process 📲

Every quarter,

Leapsome⁠

will invite you to complete a quarterly review. It will ask you to:

Select your peers from whom to get feedback (either do this in the “Home” tab or within the “Reviews” tab)

We recommend selecting 5 peers across all levels (and squads if you work in one). It's not an issue if you have fewer than 5 peers, but if you find that you have fewer than 3 peers - then please reach out to PeopleOps so we can collect additional feedback from your partner(s) if required

Your peers will be asked to input a comment and rate you on the technical and behavioural criteria that are relevant to where are are currently on your Skills Ladder

Remember to follow up with your peers to ensure they’ve added your feedback before the deadline

Write your self-assessment

It is not visible to anyone on the portal (including the moderation team). This is designed as a moment of reflection for yourself.

Provide feedback to your peers

Make sure your feedback is constructive, complete and consistent!

NB: The feedback you get will be from your peers and your self-assessment is based on where you currently are on the skills ladder.

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Progression 🔝

Moving from one band to another

If your average score post moderation is equal to / higher than the benchmark score set that quarter, you move up a band

Moving from one Skills Ladder to another

FinOps Associate → FinOps International Manager (new): if you’re a FinOps Associate (above level 2), and are interested in the FinOps International Manager role, please reach out to the PeopleOps squad

FinOps Manager → FinOps Lead: all FinOps Managers at Level 2.5 are eligible to be promoted to FinOps Lead Level 1

Scope for promotions is determined based on availability data and business resourcing needs

The moderation team meets to discuss feedback about team members whose score is higher than the set benchmark to decide which of them can move up; this is based on who has demonstrated FinOps Lead role model behaviour

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More info can be found in the Progression section here⁠

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NB: For updates re scope of promotions each quarter, refer to that feedback cycle’s Notice Board. The scope is decided based on guidance from the Ops, Scheduling and Sales squads

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Why quality of feedback is important 📮

The moderation team also moderates for the quality of feedback you have provided to your peers. If your feedback is constructive, complete and consistent, you have 0.1 added to your final adjusted score. On the other hand, if your feedback is inconsistent, unhelpful or incomplete, you lose 0.1

This is to make sure everybody invests time and effort into feedback they give so it can be useful for the team

We recommend taking a look at the

feedback cheatsheet in the Team Handbook⁠

to make sure your feedback has all the elements of good feedback that we are looking for (and get that extra +0.1!)

Pro-tip - here's what differentiates good feedback from really good feedback - actionable suggestions! So, make sure you not only share feedback about current performance, but also include suggestions for your colleague to work on in the coming quarter!

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And what happens after? ⏩

Results are shared through an email/Slack update - post which you can find the results on Leapsome

For special cases, the moderation team directly gets in touch with team members to communicate the results

Office hours are scheduled between Antigone and Anuli to clarify doubts, seek clarification, discuss next steps, etc.

Calls are also scheduled with your Quantico Touchpoints to interpret your feedback and set you up for success for the next quarter

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The various ways to reach PeopleOps 📬

#peopleops-questions Slack channel

PeopleOps helpline (on the above channel) to reach out privately

Office hours scheduled before and after moderation - calendar invites have now been sent!

Quantico Touchpoints - you can always reach out to them for support, or to channel your questions through them to PeopleOps anonymously