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Cornerstone offers a "Piiq" into the future of performance reviews!
January 31, 2018

Cornerstone offers a "Piiq" into the future of performance reviews!

Gene Aldava, SPHR | TrustRadius Reviewer
Score 9 out of 10
Vetted Review
Verified User

Software Version

PiiQ

Modules Used

  • Performance

Overall Satisfaction with PiiQ by Cornerstone

The graphic user interface is much improved over the earlier CSOD. Employees and managers alike seem reasonably comfortable with the layout and logic of the program. Built-in user guide is well designed and easily accessible. However, initial setup of the competencies and rating definitions could be easier.
As stated earlier, the assigned customer service person has been very helpful. When she wasn't immediately available, someone else responded to my email. I recently inquired about their learning management system and was invited to visit their Santa Monica office. The information provided was very helpful. We are seriously considering how we might incorporate the learning materials as part of our employee development effort.
PiiQ by Cornerstone is the performance management system we use in our corporate office where our key business functions are domiciled. Those functions include finance, real estate development, property management, architecture, corporate communications/fund development, and human resources administration. We have deployed it as an interactive system for employee goal setting, periodic performance "check-in" meetings, and annual performance/merit review. It has been a key tool in moving from an annual, angst-ridden review experience toward a more useful dialog at different points during the year. The employees can draft their own goals and their self-assessment which helps build trust and engagement with their direct manager and the company as a whole. Also, the built-in 9-box analysis enables us to see team or department performance within a useful context for development and training.
  • Enables employees to draft work goals and collaborate with their supervisors on a final version - improves mutual understanding right up front.
  • Combines performance goal ratings with competency ratings and provides a blended score. Simplifies the goal weighting so you don't have to do any calculations.
  • 9-box matrix provides useful definitions and descriptions so managers can prepare development notes or plans for individual employees.
  • Need to include a signature line or checkbox where the employee can acknowledge receipt and review of the final document as submitted by the manager (and the date of same). This would be very helpful so there is no viable argument about the content of the document especially if an employee dispute and/or lawsuit regarding performance issues arises in the future.
  • A feature enabling employees to print out the final document. Right now, only the manager has a print command button on the screen. The employee can attempt this by using the browser’s menu option (i.e. mouse right click > print command) but the resulting hard copy is incomplete and poorly formatted. The word processor within Piiq has somewhat limited features compared to what is available in MS Word or even the more basic Windows Wordpad. But the interface is improved from the earlier version.
  • The final print out doesn’t match the screen output. Ratings that are displayed graphically on the screen are Instead displayed as text. The end result is wordy and, at best, awkward to read.
  • A 360-degree review that can be sent to parties outside the company would be helpful, especially for rating senior managers and executives who have extensive vendor or third-party relationships contributing to the overall performance rating.
  • Reviews are generally taking managers less time to prepare because the essential infrastructure is in place. Past reviews are easily retrievable for review if needed.
  • HR administration of the system takes less time than the previous version of Cornerstone (CSOD). HR is still responsible for training new users, but the built-in user guide is more thorough and easier to use.
  • We're starting to see - slowly but surely - more (and hopefully better) interaction between manager and employee.
We were already a customer of the original Cornerstone CSOD which was difficult to configure, so we used an external vendor for this purpose. With PiiQ, Cornerstone was able to transfer our data efficiently. It was easier to manage and update users and inactivate or delete employees no longer with us. The assistance provided by the helpdesk has been consistently reliable and timely in most instances.
PiiQ was well designed to help us address salaried staff retention and engagement. ADP's product wasn't as robust as we needed for our corporate staff. However, we decided to try out ADP for our nonexempt, hourly employee performance reviews. Whether we stay with ADP or roll the hourly staff into PiiQ will be decided in the future.
Piiq by Cornerstone is a tool (actually, a set of tools) well suited for salaried and professional employees (e.g. corporate headquarters). May be a bit too sophisticated for the performance management needs of hourly/production staff. We also faced some cost constraints and elected to use a simpler online performance management tool offered by our payroll vendor.