GoalSpan Review

GoalSpan
Product:
Vendor:
Founded:
Headquarters:
GoalSpan
GoalSpan
2008
San Francisco, CA
Ownership:
Customers:
Deployment Model:
Free Trial:
Private
Unknown
Cloud
Yes
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GoalSpan At A Glance

Good: Employees set concrete and measurable goals and milestones with managers' feedback, easy-to-use interface with minimal training needed, employees share ideas and achievements with others.
Bad: Recruiting and learning management features are not offered.
Bottom Line: Intuitive and customizable solution that helps companies improve their performance and employee engagement, and ultimately achieve their missions.

Product Overview

GoalSpan is a performance management solution that supplements the yearly performance appraisal with continuous check-ins between the manager and the employee. The employee sets performance goals that are manageable by milestones and tracks the goals’ progress within the software. The manager can provide comments and approve the employee’s goals, which can be used in the annual review.

GoalSpan has a simple and intuitive user interface that requires minimal training. It works as a collaboration tool for employees/managers to share ideas, achievements or other updates with their team. The user tags specific employees and those employees get instant notification, so they can provide comments or feedback in real time.

Several benefits of GoalSpan include:

  • Improved employee job satisfaction as they have ownership in their career success using measurable goals
  • Platform and workflows that are tailored to client’s brand
  • Flexible performance management features, such as peer feedback and anonymous feedback
  • Scalable to fit client’s growing needs (e.g., additional employees)
  • Clients have access to a customer service rep by phone or email rather than a chat-bot

Features

Clients set their own goal types and attributes that best fit their organizational structure, visions or objectives. The employees set their own goals that align with their job roles and the company’s objectives. They can add measurable milestones to achieve in order to reach their goals. GoalSpan’s SMART Coach feature provides tips that guide the employees on specific goals and milestones they can add.

The goal plan is sent to the manager for feedback and approval. Once it’s approved, the manager and employee each sign off on the goal, which then can be exported, printed or saved in the library (a section within GoalSpan that houses reviews and other documentation).

GoalSpan offers a goal history tracking feature that lets users track any changes made to the goal over its lifespan.

Within GoalSpan, employees complete a self-assessment review where they rate their performance on specific metrics and add in their accomplishments and goals met. The self-assessment is then sent to their manager for feedback and approval. Within the software, the manager can request changes to the self-assessment from the employee. Once the assessment is completed and approved, both the manager and employee can sign off on it electronically. The assessment is saved within the software and can also be printed.

Managers can customize goal attributes and performance reviews, such as by adding rating scales or question/answer formats to the review. They can also collect performance feedback from the employee’s peers or other managers. GoalSpan even has the capacity for users to submit feedback anonymously.

Finally, GoalSpan’s additional features include employee engagement surveys, document management, custom training videos, activity logs, notifications (both email and within the platform) and task overview.

Target Market

GoalSpan serves small to medium size companies in over 40 industries representing eight countries. Below is a partial list of industries it serves:

  • Aerospace
  • Beverage
  • Biotech
  • Construction
  • Food Manufacturing
  • Nonprofit
  • Software
  • Television
  • Tourism
  • Venture/Private Equity

Implementation/Integration

GoalSpan does the heavy lifting so the client doesn’t have to. Implementation timing is driven by the client, not GoalSpan. The vendor can implement as quickly or as slowly as the client needs. Implementation steps include:

1.) Develop implementation timeline with client
2.) Set up templates, content, processes and workflows
3.) Turn on applicable integrations
4.) Conduct administrator and user training workshops
5.) Go live

GoalSpan provides interactive online training workshops that are specific to the client’s content, processes and workflows.

GoalSpan integrates with SAP, Slack, BambooHR, ADP and other third-party software solutions. Users can also post feedback and share files directly from their email program.

Customer Service & Support

GoalSpan prides itself on providing exceptional customer service. It doesn’t believe in self-service chat-bots, and customers are assigned a client service representative they can email or call. GoalSpan provides online support for all users from the support screen of its application. It also provides short videos and digital content which answer most of the common questions.

Pricing

GoalSpan is very competitively priced with a tiered structure based on the number of users the client has. There are three tiers:

For up to 25 employees at $9 user, per month ($8 per user, per month with annual billing) with a minimum spend of $234 per month or $2,400 per year

For 26 to 50 employees at $7 per user, per month ($6 per user, per month with annual billing) – note that minimum pricing applies to this tier, too

For 51 to 250 employees at $5 per user, per month ($4 per user, per month with annual billing) – note that minimum pricing applies here, too; also this tier covers premium support, additional onboarding, a performance training workshop and dedicated account management.

Companies with over 250 employees can contact GoalSpan for a custom quote.

Shortcomings

Recruiting and learning management features are not offered.

Screenshots

GoalSpan Screenshot 1
GoalSpan Screenshot 2
GoalSpan Screenshot 3

About

GoalSpan is creating the future for employee feedback and performance. It was founded in 2008 with the mission of providing the best solutions to the most common performance management problems in the most simplistic and elegant way. It was also founded with the vision of helping organizations improve their performance, workforce alignment and productivity, and ultimately achieve their vision and mission.

Its founders have run public and private companies, and are performance management experts. GoalSpan freely offers consultative value with every implementation. It serves customers in the U.S., as well as nine other countries.

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Send feedback or corrections to feedback@betterbuys.com.

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Pros: User friendly, logical system, the updates are acted upon customer feedback
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Cons: Changes / upgrades need to “promoted” before the change happens so users know.



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GoalSpan is easy to use!

on 2019-08-02 18:17:45

Pros: GoalSpan is easy to use. Cons: If I need to update employee’s information I need to start over from directory- search the employee-updated and again start from directory too many steps.



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User Friendly! Excellent Customer Service!

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Pros: The ease of administration and accessibility to customer support.
Cons: More example templates would be good.



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A super user-friendly platform

on 2019-08-02 17:49:25

This is a super user-friendly platform that increases the efficiency and quality of all our Reviews.
Pros: User-friendly; easy to follow and navigate!
Cons: The transfer of knowledge in settings.



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Great user-friendly product backed up by excellent Customer Service

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Pros: Ease of use, integration with BambooHR and great customer service.



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GoalSpan team is always responsive and helpful!

on 2019-08-01 19:03:07

We are in the UK - the GoalSpan team is always responsive and helpful despite the time difference.
Pros: It drives good behaviour and provides a consistent approach to managing company and individual performance.

Cons: We have had to fiddle the system a few times as it is a little rigid in its approach but the GoalSpan team have been very accommodating and we have usually found workarounds to fit our process!