How to Set Up Templates - Reviews & Check-ins

What this article covers 

Templates in Reviews & Check-ins give managers and employees a shared set of discussion points to reflect on and discuss together. Each person prepares their answers independently — in free text, with a quick rating, or both — and they compare responses once both have submitted. 

Good to know

Ratings are a quick way to give input without writing a lot of text. They help you follow an individual's trends over time and are not scores — they are not aggregated across teams or the company. 

The three template types 

As an administrator, you manage Simployer templates and Company templates. Personal templates are created by managers for their own use — they are private to the manager who created them and aren't visible to administrators or other managers. 

Simployer's template library 

Found under Templates → Simployer templates. As of now, the library includes: 

• 1:1 Check-in 
• Career development discussion 
• Exit Interview 
• Follow-up Meeting at the End of the Probationary Period 
• Growth & development planning 
• Impact-Based Conversation 
• Performance and Development Dialogue 
• Performance review 
• Self-awareness review 
• Start / Stop / Continue 
• What's cooking? 

Each Simployer template can be toggled Enabled or Disabled. Disabled templates are hidden from everyone who creates conversations — owners, admins, and managers alike — and can't be selected for new conversations or rounds, but this never affects conversations or rounds that already use it. You can also enable or disable individual discussion points within a Simployer template, useful when most of it fits your needs but a few points don't. 

Creating a company template 

Go to Templates → Company templates → Create a new template. A template has three sections: 

Note: To do any of the below you have to be in the application. You'll find it in the left side menu. Click on Performance and then select Reviews & Check-ins in the drop down menu under Performance.

Basic information 

1 Template name (required) 

Must be unique. E.g. “Growth & development planning.” 

2 Template description (required) 

Explains the template's purpose. Shown when browsing templates, not inside the conversation itself. E.g. “This template is used to define learning and development areas.” 

Conversation user guidelines (optional) 

3 Select “Write guideline” if needed 

Rich-text content — supports headings, bold, lists, and links. Shown to both participants inside the conversation via a “Show guidelines” button. Use it for instructions, mindset guidance, or procedures on how to use the template effectively. 

Discussion points 

4 Add each discussion point 

This is the actual prompt both participants will reflect on and answer independently, e.g. “What's going well,” “Blockers & friction,” “Support needed,” “Anything else.” Use Add discussion point to add more. 

5 Add instructions per point (optional) 

Short guidance shown below that specific discussion point inside the conversation, to clarify or steer the reflection. E.g. under “Blockers & friction”: “Describe any recent blockers or friction — anything that feels stuck, unclear, or frustrating since the last check-in.” 

6 Add a rating (optional) 

Turn on Include rating to let participants answer with a quick rating. Choose one of two types: 

• Smiley scale — five fixed options: Bad, Not great, Okay, Good, Great 
• Custom slider — a 0–10 scale. You can add labels for the low and high ends, e.g. “Not confident” and “Very confident”. If left empty, they show as Low and High. 

When a rating is added, it becomes the main answer for that discussion point, and the text field becomes an optional comment. Both are optional. 

7 Choose who responds 

Decide who answers the discussion point: Both (default), Employee, or Manager. Use Employee or Manager for points only one person should prepare, such as a self-assessment for the employee. Both participants still see every discussion point. Once both have submitted, the answer is visible to both, and the person who wasn't asked is shown as “Not asked”. 

You can combine this with a rating — a one-sided point can still have a rating. 

Good to know: Ratings and who responds are available in company and personal templates. Simployer templates use free-text answers from both participants. If all discussion points are assigned to one person, the other person has nothing to prepare and no submit step. 

8 Reorder or remove points as needed 

Use the up/down arrows to reorder, or the trash icon to delete a discussion point. 

9 Select Save 

The template is now available to everyone who creates conversations — owners, admins, and managers — under Company templates, if enabled. 

Tips for writing good discussion points 

Both the employee and the manager see the same discussion points, so phrase points answered by both neutrally — not directed at just one participant. Points assigned to only the employee or only the manager can be written directly to that person. 

Copying a template 

You can copy any template — Simployer or company — to use as a starting point for your own. Select Create copy next to the template. 

1 Where the copy is saved 

Where the copy ends up depends on your role. Administrators always create a new company template, available to everyone who creates conversations once enabled. Managers always create a new personal template, private to them. If you are both an administrator and a manager, a dialog asks you to choose between a company template and a personal template. 

2 Edit your copy 

The copy is pre-populated with all fields from the original, with “(Copy)” appended to the name. For Simployer templates, the copy uses whichever language was displayed at the time. The copy is fully independent — changes to either the copy or the original afterward won't affect the other. 

Good to know: You can only edit templates you own — your own company templates, personal templates, or copies you've made. The original Simployer templates themselves can never be edited directly, only copied and then edited. 

Editing and deleting templates 

You can edit or delete any company template (or your own copies) at any time from the Company templates tab. 

Important: Template changes only affect conversations created after the change. Conversations that already exist keep the exact template content they were created with — discussion points, guidelines, and instructions included. The same applies if you delete a template entirely: existing conversations built from it are not affected. This preserves the historical accuracy of past conversations — what participants actually saw and responded to stays intact. 

Assigning a template to a Conversation Round 

Templates are assigned when creating a Conversation Round, not managed separately. In Step 1 of the round-creation wizard (Name and template), you give the round a name and select which template all conversations in that round will use. See the Round-setup guide for the full wizard walkthrough. 

Video guide: Managing Reviews & Check-ins Templates
Managing Reviews & Check-ins Templates