Every cycle carries a budget and a set of guidelines. The budget is what you're willing to spend; the guidelines are how you want the money decided. Together they're what One uses to suggest increases, and what managers and approvers see as they work.
Both of them advise. Neither of them blocks.
This article explains what each one does, how to set them, and how to change them once a cycle is running.
What the budget does — and what it doesn't
The budget is a reference figure. One suggests increases that fit inside it, and running totals show how the cycle is tracking against it as proposals come in.
The budget doesn't cap anything. A manager can propose an increase that takes the cycle over, an approver can approve it, and an Owner can lock the cycle with the total above the limit. Nothing is prevented at any stage.
That's a deliberate choice — some decisions need the exception — but it means going over budget is a judgement call, not something the system will catch for you. If staying inside the number matters, someone has to watch it.
Setting a budget
Set the budget when you create the cycle, by telling One the total you're willing to spend. You can change it later: open the cycle and adjust it, at any point before the cycle is locked.
The budget is a gross salary figure. It covers the increase to salaries themselves, not the employer costs that follow from it — so the true cost of a cycle to the business is higher than the number you set.
Splitting the budget
You can ask One to split the budget rather than hold it as one pot — by team or department, so each part of the organisation has its own amount to work within.
If you split it, each person sees the portion that belongs to their own scope. A manager sees their team's share, not the company total.
Reading the figures
Three numbers describe the state of a cycle:
- Budget — the limit you set.
- Preview increase — what the proposals currently add up to.
- Remaining — what's left between the two.
A negative Remaining means the cycle is over budget. Nothing changes when that happens except the number — no warning stops the work.
Everyone sees these figures for their own scope, not the whole cycle. A manager sees what their team's proposals add up to; an Owner sees the company picture. Nobody learns anything about pay outside the part of the organisation they can already see.
This means a manager can't tell how the cycle is tracking overall. If you need them to pace against a shared pot, split the budget so each team has its own figure to work within — otherwise they're proposing in isolation.
What guidelines are
Guidelines are the rules you want increases decided by — a merit range such as 3–15%, who qualifies for a promotion, how an equity gap should be treated, what performance results are needed to earn a rise.
You write them when you set up the cycle, in your own words. They do three jobs:
- They steer One's suggestions. Suggested increases are built to sit inside your rules.
- They decide each person's verdict — whether someone shows as Eligible, Not eligible, or Not judged.
- They tell your managers what you expect, which is the part that saves the most time later.
How guidelines produce a verdict
Everyone in the cycle carries one of three verdicts:
- Eligible — they meet the guidelines.
- Not eligible — they don't, with the reason shown alongside.
- Not judged — the rules couldn't be applied because information is missing. If your guidelines look at someone's last three performance reviews and they only have two, there's nothing to judge them against.
Verdicts flag, they don't block. A manager can propose for someone marked Not eligible or Not judged, and an approver can approve it. The verdict's job is to make sure the exception is a decision rather than an oversight.
Not judged isn't a no. It usually means missing data, not an undeserving person. Treat a cycle with many Not judged verdicts as a sign your guidelines are asking for information you don't hold, rather than as a list of people to skip.
Changing them mid-cycle
Both the budget and the guidelines stay editable while a cycle is live — in Draft, Scheduled, Open requests and Under review. Once the cycle is locked, neither can change.
After you change either one, ask One for fresh suggestions. The existing suggestions were built against the old numbers and won't update on their own.
If you change the budget or the guidelines after proposing has started, tell the people in the cycle. Their totals will move, verdicts may change, and nothing notifies them.
Best practices
- Set the guidelines before you set the budget. The rules tell you what the cycle should cost. Working the other way round makes the budget an arbitrary number that the rules then have to fit.
- Write guidelines you can act on. "Reward strong performers" gives One nothing to work with and gives managers nothing to follow. A range, a qualifying condition and a performance threshold do.
- Check what your rules need before the cycle opens. Guidelines that depend on three performance reviews will return Not judged for everyone who doesn't have three. Run the eligibility preview first and look at the split.
- Decide in advance who watches the budget. Nothing enforces it, and only an Owner sees the whole picture, so name the person whose job it is to notice.
- Split the budget if you want managers to self-regulate. Without a split they can't see the company total, so they have no way of knowing whether they're taking more than their share.
- Remember the number is gross salary. Employer costs sit on top, so a cycle that lands on budget still costs the business more than the budget says.
- Leave room for exceptions. A budget spent exactly to the limit on the expected cases has nothing left for the counter-offer that arrives mid-cycle.