An Accountable Approach to Engagement Surveys
Employee engagement surveys have become an almost-expected procedure to collect employee feedback and evaluate organizational performance. From the traditional annual survey to the newer trend of periodic, shorter pulse surveys, organizations collect loads of data from their employees. For some, it may be time to reevaluate whether the resources going into survey administration are well-spent. If you have been looking for an excuse to reconsider your organization’s approach to engagement surveys, then this article is for you!
The most important phase of survey administration happens after reports are finalized. Employees want to know – what are you going to do about it?
In this post, you will find advice on two decision points for surveys that are backed by best practices and C1C’s experience in employee surveys. First, I will cover what kinds of information to collect on surveys to allow you to respond to results with little delay. Second, I will highlight the importance of taking action on the survey results, including detailed action planning.
Does your survey include questions that lead to actionable results? Survey administrators should feel confident that they are collecting information that will drive employee engagement and illuminate solutions to problems. The first step in identifying what to ask on your survey is defining what you want to measure. We encourage leaders to spend the extra effort up-front to ensure you will receive the answers you need to follow-through on results.
For example, if you notice that overall employee engagement levels are low for one particular department, you will likely identify a need to dig further into the “why” behind the results. This might include exploring whether the issue stems from employee/manager conflict, a lack of opportunities for promotion, or misalignment on future strategy. In that case, if your engagement survey is proactively measuring all these aspects, then no further investigation is needed because your results can tell you which areas of employee experience to leverage or improve. You can move immediately into identifying viable strategies and solutions for addressing low engagement.
An accountable approach includes collecting a complete picture of engagement and its drivers so that you’re ready to take action on results. We at C1C have a model of engagement that includes five factors including people’s level of energy for their work, their intent to stay, pride in the organization, likelihood of recommending the organization, and overall level of satisfaction. In addition to engagement, we also recommend capturing critical aspects of employee work experiences that are known to drive engagement. Some aspects we measure include:
Job Fit, Role Clarity, and Balance
Advancement, Development, and Stability
Compensation and Benefits
Tools, Training, and Work Conditions
Manager Relationship and Teamwork
Communication and Inclusion
Including such engagement-adjacent drivers on your survey will set you up for making timely and informed decisions that will ultimately boost the commitment of your employees. If your organization is not focused on gathering a well-rounded picture of your employees’ work experience as well as their engagement, you risk paying for survey results that only necessitate further investigation to come up with solutions, which creates an unnecessary step in between data collection and follow-up.
Do you have a plan for how you will take action on the survey results? The most important phase of survey administration happens after reports are finalized. Employees want to know – what are you going to do about it? Taking action and communicating after-the-fact assures employees that their opinions, expertise, and work matter. In fact, smart leaders realize that frontline workers most often have the best ideas for improving daily operations. Not allowing surveys to impact organizational processes and decisions is simply a missed opportunity to maximize engagement and build trust amongst leaders and staff.
If it is important for employees to continue to honestly express their concerns and ideas in future surveys, then it is important to clearly demonstrate that the results will be used to make change. An action-oriented decision-making process is key for boosting response rates as well as the quality of responses you receive.
An accountable approach includes having a plan for taking action and communicating that plan to employees. Before beginning a survey cycle, it is critical to develop a plan for taking action on the results. Developing a plan of action takes time and effort. Before the survey is administered, start to plan how and when you will bring key decision makers together to review, interpret, and be responsible for acting on the results. C1C’s process for detailed action planning provides some guidance for this planning phase and includes 5 stages:
Share. Discuss your survey results with key players who will lead the action planning process.
Prioritize. Pick up a few areas that you would like to leverage or improve based on the results.
Plan. Select a couple of strategies for each of the employee experience areas you picked.
Implement. Set a deadline and identify a responsible party to guide plan implementation.
Monitor. Track progress and assess your impact with informal check-ins and/or more surveys.
Prioritizing improvement areas means identifying the most viable, cost-effective, and impactful areas for leveraging engagement and improving employee experiences. Parties designated to carry-out the action items should be organized and committed to fully realizing the strategies that have been identified. Once the changes are implemented, share outcomes and lessons learned with employees. Following through on each of these stages and keeping employees in the loop throughout will encourage both respondents and key stakeholders to take ownership of the results and be more engaged in the process!
I hope this post gives organizations and their leaders permission to think creatively about how to measure and boost engagement while providing avenues for employee voice, ideas, and feedback. From our perspective, an accountable approach to surveys is essential for achieving positive outcomes and avoiding negative outcomes. It is better not to survey rather than to survey without taking action. If you would like more individualized guidance on how your organization can adjust your engagement survey practices, feel free to reach out!