Overview
The Compensation Review Tool is where Admins plan and manage salary, promotion, and equity decisions.
Kamsa provides tools to help you set eligibility, establish budgets and guidelines, assign reviewers, collect compensation decisions, and apply approved changes to Employee Data.
Budget Calculator: Build your Comp Review budget using the latest market salary budget benchmarks by country. You can also factor in eligibility requirements, Compa-Ratio, performance ratings, and more.
Comp Review Module: Assign and invite selected reviewers to enter salary increase and promotion decisions, using defined review and approval flows.
Kamsa Support: A compensation consultant will guide you through budgeting, project planning, and provide a one-hour manager training session (live and/or recorded) to ensure your cycle runs smoothly.
Create a Comp Review
The Comp Review Planning page is where Admins set up and manage compensation reviews in Kamsa.
Below are the steps to set up and run a smooth compensation review.
To create a new Comp Review:
Go to the Comp Review Planning page
Click Create New Plan
Enter info for the Comp Review, including:
Title for your compensation review (e.g., “Mid-Year Comp Review Cycle”)
Start Date and End Date
Review Start and End Dates
Kamsa doesn’t automatically start or end the review based on these dates — Admins control when the Comp Review is released and closed.
Start Date: The target date you expect reviewers to begin entering compensation decisions. This date is for reference only and does not automatically launch the review.
End Date: The suggested deadline shown in reviewer reminder emails. Reviewers can continue to access the review after this date unless an Admin closes the review or removes access.
4. Under the Planned Reviews section, toggle on the type of reviews you’d like to cover under this Comp Review plan - e.g., Salary Review and/or Equity Review
If Salary Review and Equity Review are included in the same Comp Review plan, you can set separate eligibility rules for each. However, the same Comp Reviewers will review both salary and equity decisions.
Create separate Comp Review plans if different reviewers should manage Salary Review and Equity Review.
You can have more than one Comp Review active at a time.
5. Select the performance rating scale used in your organization (if applicable).
You can customize the naming of each rating within the Company Profile page.
6. Click Create
Next, establish your budget, eligibility criteria, and increase guidelines.
Set Eligibility
Kamsa uses eligibility rules to determine which employees are included in the review, which directly impacts overall budget.
Changes to eligibility after launch, including adding or removing employees, will affect the Calculated Salary Budget.
If you're running salary and equity reviews at the same time, be sure to set eligibility rules for each.
In the Comp Review Settings page, go to Apply Eligibility.
How Eligibility Works
By default, all employees are considered eligible.
You can exclude employees by setting rules.
Employees excluded via eligibility rules will:
Be excluded from the budget
Be included as view only in the comp review
Be non-editable for proposed comp changes (unless made eligible)
Show a note explaining why they were ineligible
Eligibility filters work as exclusion rules. Employees who meet the criteria you select will be marked ineligible.
Criteria | Description |
Date of Hire | Exclude employees hired on/after a specific date
Example: If Date of Hire > Date is after > [Date] anyone hired the day after the selected date will be ineligible. |
Date of Last Increase | Exclude employees who had an increase on/after a certain date |
Employment Type | Exclude Contractors, Part-time, etc. |
Employment Status | Exclude employees on Leave of Absence |
Exemption Status | Exclude based on exempt/non-exempt classification |
Department / Country | Exclude specific departments or countries |
Job Family / Job Level | Exclude roles based on family or level |
Manager | Exclude specific managers and their reporting lines |
Market Data Cut | Exclude based on mapped market cut |
Compa-Ratio | Exclude those below/above a % threshold |
Target Commission Amount (Total Cash) | Include only employees with target amounts matching your input |
Total Cash Compa-Ratio (Total Cash) | Filter by compa-ratio threshold |
To Apply Eligibility
Select your filters and click Apply
Kamsa will display a list of ineligible employees
You can grant exceptions:
Click individual names to toggle them back to eligible (marked green)
Use the Still Eligible section to manually re-include employees
Notes & Special Cases
Promotions override ineligibility: If an ineligible employee is included in a Promotion upload, they will automatically be marked as eligible and added to the budget.
Promotions for ineligible employees (manual): Reviewers can still toggle “Promotion = Yes” for ineligible employees during the review, but no additional budget will be granted for these promotions.
If any changes are made to Employee Data, all eligibility requirements need to be re-applied if you want those changes to flow through to the current review.
Target Commission Eligibility
Kamsa’s Comp Review recommendations for Target Commission and Total Cash increases are for maintaining the market Pay Mix for eligible employees.
You have the option of allowing Comp Reviewers to propose increases to selected employees’ Target Commission amounts during a Comp Review:
Within the Comp Review Settings page click Apply Eligibility (located on the left side of the page, under Salary Review)
Under the Target Commission Eligibility, click Apply
Select the Category you want to use to determine which employees are eligible for Target Commission increases.
The most common Category to use is Job Family:
Select Job Family from the Category drop-down
Select as many job families as you’d like (e.g., Account Executive, Inside Sales, Solutions Engineering, etc.)
Click Apply
Equity Review Eligibility
In the Comp Review Settings page, go to Apply Eligibility.
Under the Equity Review Eligibility section, click Apply
Select Date of Hire from the Category drop-down menu
Select the Date is after from the filter drop-down and enter a date (e.g., 01 Jan 2023) as the Value for employees who were hired after this date to be marked ineligible.
Click Apply.
You can then add another layer of rules using Additional Equity Review Eligibility.
Additional Equity Review Eligibility
The Additional Equity Review Eligibility section lets you include certain employees in the equity review without generating equity grant recommendations for them. Their equity fields will be editable, but no suggested grant amounts will appear.
This is helpful if you want to manually enter equity decisions for some employees, even if they don’t meet your standard eligibility criteria.
Under Additional Equity Review Eligibility, click Apply
Select the Category you want to use
Select the applicable Filter and Value
Click Apply
Review the list of ineligible employees
If needed, allow exceptions by selecting employees who should remain eligible
You can also use Make Eligible under the Still Eligible for Equity Review section to manually re-include employees.
Kamsa will calculate the Equity Review budget once employee grant data is uploaded within the Equity Review tab.
Performance Ratings & Promotions
Performance Ratings and Promotions are used to calculate compensation review recommendations and budgets. You can upload this information during planning or update it after launch.
Changes uploaded through Comp Review Planning update the Calculated Budget, even after launch. Changes made manually to an individual employee within the active Comp Review do not update the Calculated Budget.
Upload Type | Why It Matters |
Performance Ratings | Aligns merit increase guidelines by rating + compa-ratio. |
Promotions | Applies promotion increases and adjusts salary/equity budgets accordingly. |
Performance Ratings
Performance ratings, along with base salary compa-ratios, help Kamsa calculate recommended salary increase guidelines and the overall compensation review budget.
Customizing Performance Ratings
You were prompted to select a performance rating scale when you created your comp review. If you need to change the scale (3-point, 4-point or 5-point), you can update that in the Comp Review Settings page by selecting the pencil icon and then scrolling down to the bottom of the pop-up modal as shown below:
Kamsa uses a 3-, 4-, or 5-point rating scale. If you'd like support matching another rating scale, reach out to [email protected].
If you'd like to customize your performance rating labels:
Go to Company Profile
Click Edit Company Profile
Select Customize Naming
Enter your preferred naming convention
Click Save Changes
Upload Performance Ratings
In the Comp Review Settings page, click Upload Performance Ratings to download the template.
The template includes:Employee ID
Employee Name
Performance Rating
Rating Effective Date (when the manager gave the rating)
Complete the template and upload into the Upload Performance Ratings modal by clicking Upload File.
Once uploaded, the performance rating icon will be shaded green with a checkmark. Hover over the icon to see when the file was last updated.
You can base Merit Increase Guidelines on:
Compa-ratio only (used for employees with Unknown Rating)
Compa-ratio + Performance Rating (recommended for more precise budgets)
Employees without a rating will default to the Unknown Rating guideline.
How Performance Rating Changes Affect Budget
Uploaded Performance Ratings are factored into the budget for Salary and/or Equity Reviews.
If Performance Ratings are uploaded or re-uploaded from Comp Review Planning after launch, the Calculated Budget updates.
If an individual Performance Rating is changed within the active Comp Review, the Calculated Budget does not update.
For Salary Review Budgets, Kamsa uses:
Country
Base salary compa-ratio
Uploaded performance rating
Uploaded promotion
For Equity Review Budgets, Kamsa uses:
Job level
Job group (e.g., Technical or Non-Technical)
Uploaded performance rating
Uploaded promotion
Country
Changes made here after launch (like uploading or editing ratings) will impact the Calculated Salary Budget.
Promotions
Promotions can be entered manually in Kamsa by the Comp Reviewer.
If you've already collected promotion decisions, you can also upload a promotions file. Uploading a file allows Kamsa to apply your promotion increase guidelines, which helps generate a more accurate budget.
Go to the Comp Review Settings page.
Click Upload Promotions to download the template.
Add the Employee ID and Employee Name for employees you know will be promoted.
Upload the completed file into Kamsa.
The Promotions button will turn green once uploaded. Hover to see the upload date.
Uploaded promotions trigger:
Automatic Promotion = Yes toggle in the review
Auto-filled New Kamsa Job Match (next level up in the same job family)
Updated Market Base Salary based on the new job level
Admins and reviewers should always double-check the job match, especially for moves to manager roles or different job families.
If you don’t have the list of promotions:
You can enter a Promotion Budget (% of Payroll) by country.
Kamsa will distribute this budget across all Comp Reviewers.
Whenever possible, upload known promotions so they're included in the Calculated Budget.
How Promotion Changes Affect the Budget
Promotions uploaded from Comp Review Planning before or after launch update the Calculated Budget.
If a reviewer manually marks an employee as a promotion within the active Comp Review, the Calculated Budget does not update.
Set Your Budget
If your company has a target budget, enter it in the Actual Budget field.
Kamsa will calculate the Salary Budget based on your merit, promotion, and market adjustment guidelines, along with the eligibility rules you've already set.
The Calculated Budget can continue to update after launch when changes are made through Comp Review Planning.
For example, uploaded Performance Ratings and Promotions will update the Calculated Budget after launch. Manual changes made within the active Comp Review will not.
If the calculated budget is higher than your actual budget, you can adjust any of the guidelines. Kamsa updates the budget automatically as you make changes.
Salary Increase Guidelines
Guidelines in Kamsa help shape your compensation review by setting the standard increases for salary and equity decisions. They define how much to budget for merit increases, promotions, market adjustments, and equity grants — all based on factors like performance ratings, compa-ratios, and location.
By setting these guidelines, you give comp reviewers a consistent starting point and ensure your overall budget aligns with your compensation strategy. You can customize each guideline to fit your goals, and Kamsa will use them to generate recommended increases and calculate your salary and equity budgets in real time.
Salary Guidelines
For the salary budget calculations and recommendations shown to comp reviewers during the comp review, you’ll need to confirm the percentage increase guidelines you'd like to apply based on performance ratings and promotions.
To edit the defaults go to Edit.
Merit Increase Guidelines
Kamsa uses Merit Increase Guidelines to calculate both individual salary increase recommendations and the total salary increase budget based on real-time market benchmarks — by role and level, across job families and locations.
These guidelines are based on each employee’s country, compa-ratio, and, if provided are tailored to your performance rating scale and budget (see example below). This gives managers a consistent starting point, reducing decision fatigue and supporting fair, equitable pay decisions.
By default, Kamsa provides recommended salary increase guidelines by country.
You can adjust these guidelines as needed to align with your budget.
How Merit Increase Guidelines Work
1. Compa-Ratio
Compa-ratio compares an employee’s current salary to the market rate for their job.
A compa-ratio of 100% means their pay is right at market.
The typical competitive range is 85%–115%.
Below 85% = below market; above 115% = above market.
2. Performance Rating (Optional)
If you choose to use performance ratings and would like them factored into your budget, upload them using the Performance Ratings template.
Kamsa will then apply salary increase guidelines that consider both the employee’s performance rating and compa-ratio.
This allows for a more tailored and accurate budget calculation.
If a performance rating isn’t uploaded for an eligible employee (or if no ratings are uploaded at all), Kamsa applies the Unknown Rating guideline for that employee.
Market Adjustment: Bringing Employees Up to Market
The Market Adjustment feature lets you add budget specifically to raise employees with a base salary compa-ratio below 85% up to at least 85%.
How to Use Market Adjustment
Go to Comp Review Settings page.
Toggle Market Adjustment switch to ON.
Enter a Max Market Increase % for each country.
This sets a cap on how much an employee’s salary can increase to reach 85%.
Example: Entering 10% means Kamsa won’t recommend more than a 10% raise, even if the employee is far below market.
If you want to raise employees to 85% regardless of cost, enter a high cap (e.g., 100%).
How It Impacts the Budget
Once a Max Market Increase is entered, Kamsa includes the cost to bring below-market employees up to 85% in the Calculated Salary Budget.
For employees below 85%, Kamsa compares:
The Merit Increase
The Market Adjustment
The larger of the two is applied as the recommended increase.
Important: For Market Adjustments to be included in the budget, the Merit Increase guideline for that employee’s category must be greater than 0% (e.g., at least 0.01%).
If the Merit guideline is 0%, no Market Adjustment will be calculated — even if the employee is below 85%.
If the guideline is 0.01% or higher, Market Adjustments (up to the cap you set) will be applied.
Promotion Grant Guidelines
Promotion Budget (% of Payroll):
The total amount set aside for promotions, as a percentage of your company’s eligible employee payroll.
Promotion Increase (% of Salary):
The default salary increase recommendation applied to each promoted employee. This % will be used to calculate their new base salary.
Adjusting salary increase guidelines after launch (e.g. budget %, min/max %) will impact the Calculated Salary Budget.
Equity Guidelines
For the equity calculations and recommendations shown to comp reviewers during the comp review, you’ll need to confirm the percentage of equity grant guidelines you'd like to apply for promotions, equity refreshes, and new hire grants.
Promotion Equity Grant Guidelines
Kamsa offers two ways to calculate promotion equity grants during an Equity Review:
Option 1: New Hire Grant Guideline for New Role MINUS Unvested Shares (Default & Most Common)
This method calculates the promotion grant by subtracting an employee’s unvested shares from the new hire grant guideline for their new role.
How to apply this approach:
Go to the Promotion Grant Guidelines section.
Click Edit.
Select "New Hire Grant Guideline for New Role MINUS Unvested Shares".
Click Save Changes.
Kamsa will calculate the recommended equity grant based on:
The employee’s new role (Job Group and Job Level)
Minus their unvested shares
Note: If this calculation results in an amount lower than 25% of the new hire grant guideline for their current role (if they are eligible for a refresh grant), Kamsa will default to the higher value between the two.
Option 2: Set a % of the New Hire Grant Guideline for New Role
This method lets you apply a fixed percentage of the new hire grant guideline for the new role, regardless of unvested shares.
How to apply this approach:
In the Promotion Grant Guidelines section, click Edit.
Select "Certain % of the New Hire Grant Guideline for New Role".
Enter your desired percentage.
Click Save Changes.
Kamsa will then calculate the promotion grant based on:
The new hire grant guideline for the employee’s new role
Multiplied by the percentage you entered
Uploading Equity Grant Data
Before promotion grants can be calculated, you must upload current equity data:
In the Comp Review Settings page, click Upload Equity Data.
Download the template and fill in:
Employee ID
Options Grant Amount
Grant Date
Unvested Shares
Upload the completed file to Kamsa.
Once uploaded, and once your promotion grant guidelines are selected, Kamsa will generate Recommended Options Grants for promoted employees.
Setting Equity Grant Guidelines by Performance Rating
To set equity grant guidelines based on performance ratings, go to the Equity Review section of the Comp Review Settings page and click Edit.
Enter the % of the new hire grant guideline you want to apply for each performance rating. Kamsa will use these percentages to calculate the Recommended Options Grant for each eligible employee.
For example, based on the table shown:
Employees rated 2, 3, or 4 will receive 25% of the new hire grant guideline.
Employees with a rating of 1 will receive 0%.
Employees without a rating will receive 20% (using the “Unknown” category).
Kamsa calculates the recommended grant using:
The % entered for the employee’s rating
The Equity Grant Guidelines for their Job Group, Job Level, and Country
Note: The performance rating scale in this table comes from your Company Profile settings.
To use ratings in your Comp Review, upload a Performance Ratings file via the Comp Review Settings page.
New Hire Equity Grants
Kamsa uses market benchmarks and your estimated per share value to calculate New Hire Grant Guidelines for each job group, level, and country. These guidelines power the recommendations shown throughout the equity review — including for promotions, refreshes, and performance-based grants.
To set your New Hire Grant Guidelines:
Go to Equity Guidelines in the Comp Review setup.
Enter grant values by Job Group, Level, and Country (including any country-level discounts).
These values will auto-fill into the equity recommendation logic used during the Comp Review.
Most clients use the midpoint of Kamsa’s suggested range for offers and internal grants. You can work with Kamsa’s team to update or validate these guidelines based on your equity strategy and hiring plans.
Changes to Additional Equity Review Eligibility (bottom section) do affect the Calculated Salary Budget.
Changes to the Equity Review Eligibility date (top section) do not.
Set the Comp Review Flow
Before launching your comp review, make sure your Comp Review Flow is set up correctly. This determines who will be responsible for entering pay decisions in Kamsa.
Set up the reviewer structure before launch whenever possible. Changes after the review starts can affect reviewer access and data entry.
By default, Kamsa assigns each manager as the reviewer for their direct reports.
You can update this to:
Limit reviewers to certain levels (e.g., only VPs and above)
Assign someone else, such as an Admin, HRBP, or exec, instead of the direct manager
Assign all employees to a single reviewer if desired
To update the flow:
Go to the Comp Review Settings page
Click the Comp Review Flow tab
Click Edit
Then either:
Use Assign All next to a leader to reassign an entire team
Click on a name in the Comp Reviewer column to update individual reviewers
⚠️ Note:
The CEO can’t have a Comp Reviewer.
An Admin must enter their pay decisions directly.
A red question mark icon flags issues that need to be fixed
Run a Comp Review Without Manager Participation
If you want to run a compensation review without notifying or involving any managers as reviewers:
Go to the Compensation Review Flow
Assign employees to yourself using Assign All for each applicable leader
If desired, leave the executive chain intact while reassigning the remaining employees to yourself
Manually update any remaining reviewer assignments as needed.
Kamsa will automatically block circular reviewer relationships.
Review Budget Status
Once you’ve set your eligibility rules, increase guidelines, and reviewer assignments, check your budget before starting the Compensation Review.
The Budget Status page gives you a full view of the compensation review budget, including both salary and equity.
You'll see:
A list of all Comp Reviewers and their assigned budgets
Budget calculations based on:
Merit increase guidelines
Promotion increases
Market adjustments (if enabled)
Eligibility rules
Overall Salary Budget
You can also:
View Flow: Open a visual diagram of the Comp Review Flow to confirm reviewer assignments and approval setup
Preview Reviewer Details: Click a reviewer’s name to see their specific budget and review data
Export Budget Data: Download the summary for internal review or recordkeeping
After confirming your budget and reviewer assignments, you can move on to reviewer access and launch.
Give Comp Reviewers Access
If your review includes Comp Reviewers entering pay decisions, you’ll need to give them access to Kamsa before they can begin their review.
If you’re managing all decisions yourself or with a small team, you can skip this step.
Go to Budget Status
Select Start Comp Review
Add the email addresses of the Comp Reviewers
Click Give Access next to each reviewer or Give Access to All
At this stage, reviewers are being given access to Kamsa. This does not yet give them access to enter decisions in their assigned Compensation Review.
Reviewers who do not already have access to Kamsa will receive an email to set up their login. The invitation expires in 48 hours. If it expires, they can use Forgot password? on the login screen.
Before launch, reviewers can access:
Career Paths & Levels
Comp Review Waiting Room
They cannot access their assigned Compensation Review until it is launched.
👉 If helpful, you can also share this short resource with your team who will be performing the Comp Review.
📺 Overview of Compensation Review in Kamsa
Launch the Comp Review
When you’re ready for Comp Reviewers to begin entering compensation decisions:
Click Send Invite next to an individual reviewer, or
Click Launch to Comp Reviewers to launch all reviewers at once.
This gives reviewers access to their assigned reviews and allows them to start entering compensation recommendations.
Comp Reviewers receive an email notification when their Compensation Review is available.
If you need to update a user's role, you can do that in the User Management page.
💬 What Email Notifications do Reviewers Get?
When the Admin clicks Start Comp Review from the Budget Status page, only Comp Reviewers who do not already have Kamsa access receive an email to set up their login.
When the Admin clicks Send Invite, Comp Reviewers receive an email letting them know the Comp Review is available and they can begin entering pay decisions.
Manage the Comp Review
Once the review is active, Admins can:
Track which reviewers are over or under budget
Monitor progress and see who hasn’t started or submitted
Open the Comp Review from Comp Review Settings to review each reviewer’s status and decisions
Admins and Owners can also enter compensation decisions directly in the active Comp Review.
Open the Comp Review from the Comp Review Settings page.
Click Edit.
Enter salary adjustments, promotions, performance ratings, and notes as needed.
Remember: manual changes to performance ratings or promotions made within the active Comp Review do not update the Calculated Budget. To update the budget for these items, make the change through Comp Review Planning.
Approve and Complete the Comp Review
Once all leaders have entered their salary decisions, it’s time to review and close out the Comp Review.
Admins can complete the review even if some reviewers haven’t submitted.
Enter the CEO’s Proposed New Base Salary
Go to the CEO's row and enter a value — even if it's their current salary (this field can't be left blank).
Click Approve Reviews
This opens the Comp Review page, where you’ll see budget usage by reviewer.
Check for Missing Salaries
If any reviewer skipped a Proposed New Base Salary for an employee, Kamsa will flag those employees.
Even if no raise is being given, a value must be entered to confirm the decision was reviewed.
Approve Review
When ready, click Approve Review.
Comp Reviewers will now see all final, approved salaries, promotions, and updated titles in their review view.
Apply Changes to Employee Data
Click Apply Changes, choose the effective date for increases, and save.
This logs the changes in both the Employee Data and Employee Profile pages.
Once the Comp Review is completed, Comp Reviewers can log in to view the final approved results.
Off-Cycle Promotions and Transfers
To run an off-cycle Promotion or Transfer, use the Cultivate Your People Tool.