The center dial on your water softer should be at the “IN SERV.” position when in normal operation.
Your water softer will work fine with the preloaded settings, it’s designed to plug and play.

Regeneration is the cleaning cycle your softener goes through.
The regeneration cycle on your water softener is automatic.
If you need to start a regeneration cycle manually, turn the center dial to the “Regen.” position, the cycle will complete and the softener will return to it’s normal operating mode at the “IN SERV.” position.