To improve employee wellbeing, you really have to know what makes staff tick–both in positive and negative ways.
Staff burnout and lack of engagement are (unfortunately) commonplace now more than ever.
For instance, recent research shows that 75% of employees have dealt with burnout at some point – with 40% of them stating it’s gotten worse since COVID-19.
It takes dedicated employers to reverse these issues. The good news? It’s totally possible.
To improve employee health and wellbeing, you need to listen to their concerns. However, this may not be as simple as you’d think. Burned-out staff are often not willing to share their concerns with employers for fear of penalization.
Enter employee surveys.
Sorry, but we’re leaving you with a cliffhanger here. Keep reading to learn more.
Get In Survey Mode
We’ll just say it like it is: the best way to improve employee wellbeing is by running surveys.
We’re not trying to make you paranoid, but say there are certain factors about your company that staff don't like but won’t speak out about for a variety of reasons.
Whether it be a turn-key employee survey solution or a custom employee engagement survey project, using a third party for employee surveys is crucial.
That's because, when working with a third-party company like Drive Research, employee surveys can be done online, and anonymously sent to your staff via email.
This is to ensure employees will feel open to expressing their true feelings without fear of backlash from the company. Leadership will not know who said what, which makes things more comfortable for both parties.
While there are many benefits of employee surveys, we’ll cover a few right now.
They’re great for staff discussions
Staff surveys will undoubtedly reveal the not-so-great areas of your company, and that’s okay. These make for helpful discussion topics and talking points during employee meetings and other similar functions.
In fact, we actually recommended that follow-up meetings are put in place to discuss key survey findings.
This allows staff to be kept in the loop, and it also allows employers to have productive conversations with staff in a controlled environment.
Clear improvement opportunities
As we stated in the previous bullet, a survey lets employers know what areas need work in their company.
Did you get poor responses about culture, pay, or benefits? Whatever needs to be addressed at your company, you’ll find out through a well-crafted survey.
These factors can then be assessed and improved upon by leadership to help lessen employee burnout. This means fewer employees looking for a new job.
Overall satisfaction drivers
So, we covered how not every response to your employee survey is going to be amazing.
A handy little tool known as regression analysis can actually help track negative responses, giving employers unique insights into satisfaction rates.
Put simply, this means that employers will be able to understand what elements to improve to boost important company factors like loyalty, and so on.
Read more about regression analysis in our post: What Is Regression Analysis in Market Research?
And yes, there’s more where that came from. Watch our video on additional employee survey benefits:
💡 The Key Takeaway: To improve employee health and wellbeing, staff surveys are the step that needs to be taken. Through them, leadership will be able to pinpoint key areas of improvement. Once identified, steps can be taken to implement new systems that can promote employee wellness.
Recommended Reading: Using a Third-Party for Employee Surveys [Costs, Process, Benefits]
Peace Out
Additional employee wellbeing initiatives focusing on health are also appreciated by employees.
Recently, a study found that 9 in 10 businesses provide at least one form of wellness outreach for staff. Again, there are many ways to go about doing this.
Consider implementing these mindful strategies:
- Meditation sessions
- Group sharing activities
- Advice/talks from local wellness professionals
If this is a little uncomfortable for you, that’s normal. However, implementing these strategies to improve job satisfaction even per quarter could have a positive impact on employee wellbeing.
What’s more, employees will begin to recognize work as a safe space where they are open to leadership.
💡 The Key Takeaway: Ways to improve employee wellbeing can be found in mindfulness initiatives–this can be anything from brief meditation practices to guest speakers.
Get Chatty
Onto our next step to improve employee health and wellbeing – talking!
In all honesty, there’s not much more to this step.
What we mean by talking: opening the lines of communication between you and your staff.
Again, surveying employees are a fantastic way to do this. As we mentioned a few sections ago, they give you the chance to have an honest dialogue with employees about the pros and cons of working for your business.
The more employees feel like they can be open about their experience working at your company, the less burnout they will feel.
💡 The Key Takeaway: Wondering how to improve employee wellbeing? Open up! When staff feels comfortable sharing thoughts and concerns about work, they’ll be happier in general.
Make It Fun
Lastly, another way employers can help improve employee wellbeing is to incorporate some fun into the office – whether that’s remote or virtual.
In fact, our workplace wellness survey found that a good work culture outweighs having a bad manager for 53% of the U.S. workforce.
You’re in luck because you can take this pretty much anywhere you want to go–get creative with it.
Carve out some time each week, or bi-monthly, to host happy hours at the office (or on Zoom), where employees can step away from work duties for a bit and unwind.
Playing a few games or simply chatting with one another are good ways to relieve stress and go back to work projects feeling a little refreshed.
Going in line with this, think of some fun holiday party ideas. We’re not saying you have to throw expensive, off-the-wall parties. Even throwing smaller-scale gatherings to get together and celebrate will have a good effect on morale.
Just try not to channel Michael Scott in this venture, please.
💡 The Key Takeaway: A great way to improve employee wellbeing just having fun. Incorporating office parties and semi-regular gaming or happy hours take the stress out of work and allow for a nice break.
Contact Our Employee Survey Company
Did we convince you that in order to have a great company, you need to improve employee wellbeing? We hope so. Any company can benefit from the strategies we’ve mentioned in this post.
Drive Research is a market research company based in New York. Our team has years of experience in employee surveys and can craft one according to your specific business needs.
Want to know more about our market research services? We want you to! Talk to us through any of the ways below.
- Message us on our website
- Email us at [email protected]
- Call us at 888-725-DATA
- Text us at 315-303-2040
Lark Allen
As a Content Marketing Specialist, Lark has a strong background and passion for creative, professional, and journalistic writing. She is also a self-proclaimed music freak and 90s enthusiast.
Learn more about Lark, here.
