Contents
- Focus Areas
- Creating Action Plans from Focus Areas
- Creating Standalone Action Plans
- Setting Progress for An Action Plan
- Linking Action Plans to OKRs
Focus Areas
With focus areas, people leaders and managers can:
- Analyze survey results
- Shortlist improvement areas
- Take action on improving 1-2 areas by creating action plans
This helps them plan their improvement areas better and increases adoption of action planning within their teams. Focus areas can be added from the dashboard, survey reports and/or poll reports by clicking on the wrench icon:
A pop-up modal will display the added focus areas (you can add multiple focus areas):
Creating Action Plans from Focus Areas (Recommended)
Action plans help managers and/or people leaders to take relevant actions based on survey and/or poll results to build engaged teams. With this capability, it will:
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Enable managers and/or people leaders to create transparency about the actions by sharing the actions with the teams
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Enable employees to check on and contribute to their manager’s and/or organization’s action plans
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Close the loop between People and Strategy by enabling managers to take the most effective action to build an engaged team; help managers move from listening to doing
To create an action plan from focus areas, simply go to the Action Center via the "Focus Areas Added" box (referenced above) or the left-side panel (reference below) and click "Define Action Plan" on the focus area that you'd like to take action on:
Note: You can add focus areas from different surveys and/or polls.
To view the action plans created for a particular focus area, simply click the "[#] Action Plan created" link or click on the "Action Plans" tab:
To delete focus areas, click the three horizontal dots to the right of "[#] Action Plan created" and select "Delete Focus Area" from the drop-down menu:
Creating Standalone Action Plans
Click "Create Action Plan" at the top-right corner of the Action Center:
Select whether to create the action plan from a template or create your own action plan from scratch:
Select a template
- All of the information will be pre-populated. We have approx. 150 action item templates. These templates are backed by leading industry and academic research (related research documentation are also available in the Resource URL section of the template for your reference); giving you scientific reasoning behind why the particular action plan is important and how that will help in improving your results:
Create your own action plan from scratch
- Name — Give your action plan a name
- Description — Provide necessary details with steps that needs to be taken
- Resource URL — You have any academic backing for why this action plan needs to be done, you can enter it in this section
- Assignee — Assign this action item to the applicable user
- Due date — Assign a due date
- By default, this is set to 30 days from the date of creation, but can be changed
- Send Reminders — If this is checked, a notification will be sent to the assignee a set # of days before the due date
- By default, this is set to 7 days, but can be changed
- Notify On Overdue — If this is checked, a notification will be sent to the assignee a set # of days after the due date
- By default, this is set to 3 days, but can be changed
To complete the process, click "Create the Action Plan":
Setting Progress for An Action Plan
After an action plan is created and assigned, the assignee will receive an automated email and will need to complete the action plan by the due date indicated:
While working on an action plan, there are three statuses the assignee can set for it:
- In Progress — Setting this status will show the administrative that work has begun on the action plan.
- Completed — When an action plan is complete, selecting this status will close it. A pop-up modal will display. On this screen, the assignee should provide any relevant comments on how the action plan was executed. The rating show allows the user to rate their efficacy on the action plan itself:
- Dismissed — if a plan is unable to be completed, the assignee will have to provide comments on why that is the case. The administrator will receive an automated email once the action plan is closed and can view the same in their Action Plan Center.
Linking Actions Plans to OKRs
Note: To use this feature, your organization will need subscriptions to both Engage and Betterworks Core (our OKR platform). For more information on how to update your subscription, please contact your CSM or support@betterworks.com.
Linking An Action Plan To An Objective
1. Click on wrench icon from any of the several locations that it appears in the Engage platform (i.e. under Survey → Reports → Opportunity Areas).
2. Select an action plan template or create one from scratch.
3. Select "Create a new objective".
4. Click "Create the action plan".
5. The action plan will be created in Engage and an objective will also be created in Betterworks Core.
6. Clicking "View Objective" will take you to the objective in Betterworks Core.
Note: If you're not logged into Betterworks Core, clicking "View Objective" will take you to the Betterworks login page, then redirect to the appropriate objective, post-login.
Deleting Action Plan Linked To Objective
You'll be able to delete the action plan from the Action Center. You'll also be able to delete the objective (created from the action plan) from the Objectives list page in Betterworks Core. However, deleting one will not automatically delete the other (i.e. deleting the action plan in Engage will not automatically delete the associated objective in Betterworks Core).
Link An Action Plan To A Key Result
Note: You can select any objective owned by you or any public objective within your organization. You can also search either by the objective name or the owner of the objective.
1. Click on wrench icon from any of the several locations that it appears in the Engage platform (i.e. under Survey → Reports → Opportunity Areas).
2. Select an action plan template or create one from scratch.
3. Select "Create a key result contributing to an existing objective”.
4. Select "Choose an Objective" to select the objective for which the action plan will be created as an associated key result.
5. Select the objective.
3. Click "Create Action Plan".
4. The Action plan will be created in Engage and a key result to the selected objective will also be created in Betterworks Core. Clicking "View Key Result" will take you to the objective under which the key result was created.
Note: If you're not logged into the Betterworks platform, clicking "View Key Result" will take you to the Betterworks login page, then redirect to the appropriate objective, post-login.
Deleting Action Plan Linked To Key Result
You'll be able to delete the action plan from the Action Center. You'll also be able to delete the key result (created from the action plan) from the Objectives list page in Betterworks Core. However, deleting one will not automatically delete the other (i.e. deleting the action plan in Engage will not automatically delete the associated key result in Betterworks Core).
FAQs
Will the action plan pre-populate any fields in the objective or key result?
Yes.
| Action plan field name | Objective/key result field name |
| Action plan name | Objective name |
| Description | Description |
| Assignee | Owner |
| Date action plan was created | Start date (not applicable to key results) |
| Due date | Due date |
Note: If you have categories enabled in Betterworks Core, you can add one named "Engage Action Plan". Doing this will automatically apply that category to every objective created form an Engage action plan going forward.
Who will be able to see my OKRs in Engage to select as part of their action plans?
Your Betterworks permissions will flow to the Engage platform. Only users that have view access in Betterworks are be able to see the objectives and key results as options to connect action plans to.