Describing the Line of Sight in Goal Management

Objective

After completing this lesson, you will be able to describe the roles involved in the goal management process and the relationship between permissions and goals.

Organization Terminology

Term	Definition
Organizational Chart	An organizational chart is a hierarchy of employees in the organization defined by manager assignments in the User Data File.
Line of Sight	Line of sight is the number of levels up or down the organizational hierarchy a user can view.

SAP SuccessFactors uses data from the User Data File (UDF) to determine the reporting relationships between employees. These reporting relationships are used to determine who can see whose goals in SAP SuccessFactors. These relationships are also used to permission goal plan actions such as adding, deleting, and cascading goals.

Line of Sight is defined as goal visibility up, down, and across the organization. Visibility is permissioned by role for each client’s goal plan based on the business needs and culture of the company. The concept of line of sight of goals throughout an organization is a key element and feature of the SAP SuccessFactors Goal Management module.

Different companies may have entirely different visibility permission models. Some may restrict the visibility of goals to only go down the management hierarchy, while others may be configured for full visibility up, down, and across all levels.

This image shows an example of an organizational chart line of sight.

Roles in Goal Management

Roles are established based on the relationship between the viewer of the goal plan and the subject of the goal plan, as determined by the employee data in the instance.

The permissions for actions and fields within the Goal Plan are defined in the XML template. Some of the typical configuration decisions taken at the time of implementing Goal Management are:

Who can create goals?
Who can delete goals?
Who can cascade goals?
Who can link/align goals?
Who can see private goals?
Who can change the visibility of a goal?
Who can view and edit the fields in the Goal Plan (name, status, % complete, comments)?

Based on the role of the end user accessing the goal plan, the permissions set in the back end will be in place. As an example, if a manager can delete a goal from a direct report goal plan but is not able to delete their own goals, the permissions set as employee (accessing their own goal) will not allow them to delete. Still, they can delete a goal when they navigate to the direct report’s goal plan (since their access to that goal plan will be as a manager, not as an employee (Self).

Organizational Hierarchy

Depending on the permissions configured for the plan and in Role-Based Permissions (RBP), users can look up and down the organizational hierarchy. This allows a manager to review the progress of direct reports’ goal setting or an employee to review a manager’s plan for inspiration in their goals.

Explore the Organizational Hierarchy

In Goal Management, the People Selector will display the organizational hierarchy, including Employee (Self), Manager, Matrix Manager, and Direct Reports, as long as those relationships are defined (from the User Data File).

In the example below, Marcus Hoff, one of the managers in the organization, is reviewing their goal plan. Therefore, the figure displays:

Marcus Hoff as self (the employee)
Carla Grant as Manager
Jonathan Lambert as Matrix Managers
Anita Burns and Gordon Silvers as Direct Reports

This screenshot shows an example of the People Selector from the Goals tab.

Depending on whose goal plan Marcus is looking at, the permissions and available actions might differ. If Marcus tries to navigate to Carla Grant (Manager) goal plan, there are some restrictions (no option to create or delete goals). The only options available are Cascade to Me, which means that Marcus could cascade one of Carla’s goals to his own goal plan as well as a Link with Mine action to align the goal to one of Marcus' goals.

This screenshot shows an example of an employee viewing their manager's goal plan and the options to Cascade to Me to copy the goal to their plan as well as a Link with Mine option.

However, when Marcus navigates to Anita Burns (Direct Report) goal plan, we can see additional actions. Marcus could create a goal in Anita’s goal plan and change one of their existing goals.

This screenshot shows an example of the available actions to the manager in their direct report's goal plan.

Finally, the People Selector will allow for a user search beyond your organizational hierarchy (dependable on the User Search permission in RBP). However, if no permissions to access the goal plan are granted for this user, the goal plan will not be visible to Marcus.

This screenshot shows an example of searching for a user outside of your hierarchy, with no goal plan visibility available.

Explore the Line of Sight

Business Example

In this exercise, you will explore the organizational chart and the how the Line of Sight impacts the actions available in the goal plan depending on the viewer.

ExerciseStart Exercise

Steps

Log into the instance and select Proxy Now, from the name menu.
Proxy as Marcia Barista (mbarista).
Select the Org Chart quick action in the Home Page.
Verify that Linda Lewis is one of your direct reports. If you select the 3/3 area in the direct reports card, you will be able to see Linda’s direct reports. Verify that one of the reports is Ian Iverson (2nd Level Report of Marcia).
Scroll up and select Up One Level. Verify that Marcia reports to Daniel Cortez.
Navigate to Home→Goals to access your goal plan.
Select Daniel Cortez and check the actions available to you as direct report.
Select Linda Lewis and check the actions available to you as manager.
In the People Selector search, type Ian Iverson. Select it and check the actions available to you as the 2nd level manager.

Summary

Line of Sight is defined as goal visibility up, down, and across the organization; the concept of line of sight of goals throughout an organization is a key element and feature of the SAP SuccessFactors Goal Management module.
Roles are established based on the relationship between the goal plan viewer and the goal plan subject, as determined by the employee data in the instance.
The permissions for actions and fields within the Goal Plan are defined in the XML template.
In Goal Management, the People Selector will display the organizational hierarchy, including Employee (Self), Manager, Matrix Manager, and Direct Reports, if those relationships are defined (from the User Data File).

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