Leadership feedback surveys are an excellent methodology to assess the strengths and weaknesses of management.
Establishing a benchmark, like an employee net promoter score (eNPS), is a great way to identify what employees are most and least satisfied with. This type of insight is proven to increase employee retention and improve engagement.
Our employee survey company recently conducted a leadership effectiveness survey with a manufacturing company. This blog post will detail the objectives, process, and results of the market research.
If you are interested in partnering with a third party for a leadership feedback survey, contact Drive Research by emailing [email protected] or filling out a form on our website.
Choosing Your Survey Vendor
One of the most important aspects of employee surveys is making sure you choose the right third-party team to work with. We’ll give you a quick rundown of things to consider during your search.
Make sure you find a team that fulfills the following:
- They come up with solutions based on survey data
- They offer more than self-service options
- They send out the survey invites
- They offer easily customizable questions
When you receive your survey data, you’d like some insight as to what to do with it–right?
A solid third-party team will not only give you the leadership survey data, they’ll tell you how you can use it. Instead of just being handed a bunch of data and having no idea how to go forward, a reliable team like Drive Research will give you solutions to implement.
A good outside team won’t expect you to do the work all on your own.
Self-service can get tricky because exactly that, you’re working with the data by yourself. This can lead to confusion and potential misinterpretations of your survey data.
Third-party teams will do all that for you!
Another big thing: the invites. It’s normal for employees to feel uncomfortable answering leadership survey feedback questions if they realize the survey is coming from their own company. Staff may not be as open, which can lead to inaccurate data. Outside research teams eliminate this issue because they’re in no way connected to your company.
Another reason why working with third parties makes a difference is because you can tweak your questioning. In other words, you’re not just handed a set of generic employee survey questions. Instead, you can gear them towards the information you want to get out of the study.
If these things are not offered with the vendors you’re considering, keep looking–it’s worth it, we promise.
💡 The Key Takeaway: All of the above qualities we mention are key to choosing the ideal third-party survey company. Be wary of companies that don’t advertise these helpful services.
Objectives of the Leadership Feedback Survey
A manufacturing company hired our employee survey company to conduct a leadership effectiveness and culture survey with its staff. The market research involved reaching out to employees of the organization to request their feedback.
The goal of the leadership feedback survey was to:
- Measure leadership effectiveness
- Identify opportunity areas to improve
- Establish a benchmark
The third-party employee survey provided the leadership team of the manufacturing company with definitive, measurable, and actionable feedback to guide the next steps with upper management.
💡 The Key Takeaway: Feedback survey questions are created to obtain quality data from respondents. This data is then used in a variety of ways to further a company.
Approach to the Leadership Feedback Survey
To address the objectives of the manufacturing company, Drive Research recommended using an email survey to collect employee feedback. The reason our employee survey company often recommends an online approach is because of its many benefits.
Email surveys are commonly the most cost-effective market research methodology in comparison to other avenues such as by mail or phone.
Plus, online surveys are the quickest approach to collecting data. Lastly, you are not sacrificing the quality of data with online leadership effectiveness surveys. The insights collected are both high quality and measurable.
Process of Conducting a Leadership Feedback Survey
When working with a third-party employee survey company, like Drive Research, there is a streamlined process for measuring team feedback. This process includes:
- Signing a proposal
- Scheduling a project kickoff meeting
- Writing the leadership feedback survey
- Programming and testing the survey
- Launching the survey to employees
- Cleaning and analyzing the data
- Writing a market research report
- Scheduling a project debrief meeting
More Information on the Manufacturing Employee Survey
Fieldwork for the leadership feedback survey began on September 8 and lasted until October 9, 2020. The survey took an average of 12 minutes to complete and included 49 questions.
The survey received 230 responses from employees of the manufacturing company.
The response rate is 88%, which is excellent. According to Forbes, the average employee survey response rate ranges between 30% to 40%.
Additionally, the reliability of this data is exceedingly high. At the 95% confidence interval, the margin of error for these results is +/- 2.2%.
This means if the leadership effectiveness survey was conducted with another random 230 employees, results would yield within +2.2% or -2.2% of the totals 95 out of 100 times.
💡 The Key Takeaway: Email surveys are often the most efficient way to gather feedback. Combining this method with a quality third party research team makes the process simple and easy to understand.
Example Leadership Feedback Survey Questions
The custom-written employee survey included 49 questions. Examples of leadership effectiveness survey questions include:
- How important are each of the following when determining satisfaction with a job? (Compensation, relationship management, etc.)
- How likely are you to recommend [NAME OF ORGANIZATION] as a place to work? Please explain.
- How has your job satisfaction with [NAME OF ORGANIZATION] changed over the past 12 months?
- How does [NAME OF ORGANIZATION] compare to employment at other organizations?
- How much do you agree with the following statement? “Leadership holds me accountable at work.”
- How much do you agree with the following statement? “Leadership holds others accountable at work.”
- How much do you agree with the following statement? “My manager models the values of [NAME OF ORGANIZATION].
- What would you recommend your immediate supervisor keep doing? Enter your response below.”
- What would you recommend your immediate supervisor change? Enter your response below.
💡 The Key Takeaway: As you can see, effective survey questions need to be clearly written to have the desired result.
Results of the Leadership Feedback Survey
The results from the leadership effectiveness survey remain confidential with the manufacturing firm. The client received a comprehensive market research report.
This deliverable included:
- Background and methodology of the employee survey
- An infographic
- Results snapshot
- Key findings and expert recommendations
- Employee persona
- Full appendix
The appendix includes the question-by-question analysis of the survey and a copy of the survey documents.
💡 The Key Takeaway: While learning how to create a feedback survey, it’s important to understand the process doesn’t end when the survey does. Clients can use the provided data to implement changes in their workplace.
Contact Us to Conduct a Leadership Feedback Survey
Drive Research is an employee survey company located in Upstate New York. Our experts work with clients across the country in a variety of industries to build out custom market research and employee programs.
Interested in receiving a quote for a leadership effectiveness survey? Contact Drive Research below.
- Message us on our website
- Email us at [email protected]
- Call us at 888-725-DATA
- Text us at 315-303-2040
Emily Taylor
As a Senior Research Analyst, Emily is approaching a decade of experience in the market research industry and loves to challenge the status quo. She is a certified VoC professional with a passion for storytelling.
Learn more about Emily, here.
