Dictate in any app · HR

Voice typing in Workday

Performance reviews are the most-dreaded writing in corporate life, and Workday is where they happen. With Typally you hold a hotkey, speak, and the text lands in Workday exactly where your cursor was.

This is a vendor guide from the makers of Typally. Anything we say about Workday is worth verifying — third-party features change without notice.
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In short

  • Workday's own dictation: None. Review text, goals and feedback boxes are typed.
  • What Typally does instead: puts text wherever the cursor is, in Workday or in anything else you have open.
  • Best used for: performance review narratives

Does Workday have built-in dictation?

None. Review text, goals and feedback boxes are typed.

Why dictate in Workday at all?

Review season means every manager writing paragraphs about every report, all in the same fortnight, on top of their actual job. The result is vague, hedged text that helps nobody and takes hours to produce.

In practice people use it for: Performance review narratives, goal descriptions, feedback for colleagues, and justification text on requisitions.

How to dictate in Workday

There is no Workday extension or add-in involved — Typally behaves like a very fast keyboard:

1

Start with the install

Windows or macOS build, signed in once.

2

In Workday, click the field before you speak

Make sure Workday has the cursor in the intended field; that is the only thing that decides where words appear.

3

Hold, say it, release

Nothing truncates part-way through.

4

Read it before you move on

Workday sessions time out and long forms can lose unsaved text. Save frequently when working through a long dictated review.

What Typally adds in Workday

Typally types into review narratives, goal descriptions and feedback boxes, so a manager with nine reports can speak each review as if the person were sitting opposite. That framing keeps reviews concrete where typed ones drift into corporate abstraction. Employee data is confidential — check your HR and IT policy first.

What this looks like in practice

A manager with nine direct reports blocks two hours in review season and talks through each one as if they were sitting opposite. The reviews are longer, more specific, and done in one sitting rather than four evenings.

One habit that makes it work better

Say what you would tell the person in a one-to-one, then edit for the record. Written-first reviews drift into corporate abstraction; spoken-first ones stay concrete.

What to watch out for in Workday

Workday sessions time out and long forms can lose unsaved text. Save frequently when working through a long dictated review.

Frequently asked questions

Does Workday have dictation?

No. Every text field is typed.

How do I write better performance reviews faster?

Speak them as if talking to the person, then edit. The specificity that makes a review useful is what typing tends to remove.

Is it safe to dictate personnel information?

Employee data is confidential and often subject to data protection law. Audio goes to a third-party service, so check your HR and IT policy first.

Try it in Workday

Free plan: 100 minutes of dictation a month, no card. Pro is $7.99/month if you want more.

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