Employee check-in software helps people prepare updates, discuss support needs and follow through on agreed actions. Choose it around the workflow you need: an asynchronous update, a shared meeting agenda or a guided conversation. Test employee access, who reviews each response and what happens next before paying for additional features. A stored answer is not the same as a resolved problem.
Start with the task, then shortlist tools
Write down what currently fails. Is the employee unable to raise a topic before the meeting? Does the manager miss a request for help? Do commitments disappear when a meeting is rescheduled? These problems call for different capabilities.
| Your immediate task | A starting option | What to demonstrate |
|---|---|---|
| Prepare a small team's meetings | Existing shared agenda and action list | Both participants can add topics and revisit unresolved actions |
| Collect short updates before a meeting | Asynchronous check-in workflow | Responses reach a named reviewer without duplicating a project status report |
| Manage recurring one-to-ones | Shared agenda with action ownership | An unfinished topic and its context carry into the next meeting |
| Explore a defined work question | Focused conversation campaign | Relevant follow-up, a usable brief and appropriate access for each role |
| Run broad engagement measurement | Survey and analysis workflow | Suitable questions, population coverage and aggregate interpretation |
These options can coexist. A team may use an HR platform for formal reviews, an agenda for one-to-ones and a focused campaign for onboarding difficulties. CIPD's performance review guidance places structured reviews within a broader performance-management process; regular conversations do not automatically make formal reviews unnecessary.
Two named options worth examining for different workflows
This is a starting shortlist, not a ranking or a claim that these are the only suitable products. Confirm the current package, permissions and integration scope in a demonstration.
15Five Check-ins is worth examining for structured asynchronous updates. Its product page describes weekly or one-time questions, goal progress and connections to one-to-ones and feedback. Ask how to target the relevant group, handle a skipped response and make a request reach a reviewer. Do not assume its advertised completion times will match your employees' work or access conditions.
Lattice 1:1s is worth examining when the central task is a shared meeting agenda. Its employee help documentation describes participant talking points, past agendas, shared and private notes, and action assignment. Test what happens when an item remains open or a reporting relationship changes. A label such as “private” needs to be understood through the product's actual access rules and your configuration.
Your existing tool is a third candidate. Include it in the pilot comparison: avoiding another login or duplicate record may matter more than a new summarization feature.
Use this demonstration script
Bring fictional records rather than real employee information. Ask the vendor to perform the workflow, not simply show a slide listing features.
- Create an employee and a manager with different access rights. Show what each can read, edit and export.
- Let the employee add a topic about a blocked task. Distinguish a request for support from the manager's interpretation of performance.
- Have the manager ask a clarifying question and agree a specific action. Assign an owner and a review date.
- Reschedule the next meeting. Show whether the open action, its context and any disagreement remain visible to the appropriate people.
- Change the manager. Demonstrate which records transfer, which remain restricted and what requires an explicit decision.
- Correct an inaccurate summary. Check whether the correction reaches the view a reviewer will actually use.
- Export or remove the fictional record according to the agreed process. Ask what happens in connected systems and backups; do not assume a screen disappearing proves deletion everywhere.
For each requirement, record demonstrated, needs configuration, separate module or not available. Avoid a single average score that lets attractive features hide a failed essential requirement.
Design a check-in people can answer
The following is a proposed agenda, not a universal questionnaire:
- What changed in the work since our last discussion?
- Which task needs clarification, time or help?
- What is one example that would help us understand the difficulty?
- Which previous commitment should we revisit?
- What would you like to add to our next conversation?
Keep a routine project update in its existing system when copying it would add no value. Leave room for the employee to disagree with a summary or prefer a human conversation. Provide another appropriate contact when the concern involves the manager.
Choose a cadence you can support. A new starter learning a changing role may benefit from a different schedule than an experienced employee discussing development. For shift teams, include access to a suitable device, a realistic time window and language needs. An unread weekly form is not improved by making it daily.
Pilot the whole path from response to action
Fictional example: a service team already has a shared agenda, but handover requests remain unanswered when the manager is covering another site. Buying richer questions will not fix missing ownership. The pilot first names a backup reviewer, then tests whether the existing agenda can route an open request to that person. Dedicated software is justified only if it closes a demonstrated workflow gap at an acceptable cost.
Use this worksheet before the first invitation:
| Decision | Write down before testing | Review afterward |
|---|---|---|
| Scope | Team, work question and eligible participants | Who participated, who could not and why |
| Access | Device, language and available time | Where people needed help to complete the journey |
| Review | Named reviewer and expected response window | Responses acknowledged and requests still waiting |
| Follow-up | Owner, proposed action and review date | Actions discussed, attempted, completed or declined |
| Cost | Subscription, setup, training and review time | Actual effort, duplicate entry and support burden |
| Continuation | Conditions to keep, change or stop the process | What evidence supports the next decision |
Keep the denominator visible: responding employees, invited employees and eligible employees answer different questions. Participation can reveal an access problem, but it does not establish employee trust or prove improved performance. Likewise, “reviewed” should not be reported as “resolved.”
Where Lontra may fit
Lontra is worth exploring when you need a focused employee conversation to prepare a manager discussion or examine a team work question. Managers receive a brief rather than raw conversations; HR uses aggregates with a minimum of five respondents. That minimum alone does not guarantee anonymity.
Start with the fictional manager brief example, then compare its usefulness with the agenda you already have. The free trial covers one campaign, up to 30 invitations over 60 days, without a credit card. Do not assume this replaces a complete meeting, performance-review or engagement platform.
For the conversation itself, use the performance conversation guide. For listening methods beyond check-ins, compare pulse surveys and other listening options.