Employee engagement is an important aspect of running a successful business. Engaged employees based on research, are more productive, more satisfied, and less likely to leave their jobs.
To measure employee engagement, many companies use employee engagement surveys which measure how employees feel about their work, their colleagues, and their organization.
While a survey might not be the most complete way of seeing how your employees feel - they are a fantastic way to get feedback from them as long as you’re doing them the right way.
What is an Employee Engagement Survey?
Employee engagement surveys collect feedback on how much staff members feel connected to their work, their colleagues, and the organization as a whole.
An employee engagement survey is a tool used by organizations to measure the level of engagement and satisfaction among their employees. It can be administered through online platforms, email, or paper-based forms.
The survey typically involves a series of questions that are designed to assess various aspects of an employee's experience within the organization, including their level of motivation, commitment, job satisfaction, and overall sense of well-being.
The survey is usually conducted anonymously with an employee survey company to encourage team members to provide honest feedback.
The Benefits of Employee Engagement Surveys
It’s easy to underestimate what a survey can tell you from your employees.
Sometimes employees may not feel like they’re able to provide feedback until the opportunity of a survey.
Some of the benefits of employee engagement surveys are:
- Giving employees a voice: Employees can share their thoughts and feelings about their work and the company openly and officially.
- Identifying areas of opportunity: Engagement surveys can find areas in the business that employees feel need to be improved or expanded upon.
- Driving meaningful change: Engagement surveys provide unique and valuable data that can be used to make informed decisions – that can’t be found anywhere else!
For more benefits of employee engagement surveys, watch our 60-second video below.
Why You Should Care About Employee Engagement
Employee engagement can affect employee morale or at least be related to it.
Based on a recent write up by Projections, when employee morale is low, employees are more likely to be less productive.
Feeling disengaged from their company might also have a similar effect on employees where they might even care less about their goals at the company. They might also be more likely to leave the company and search for other opportunities.
Poor employee engagement might also lead to a toxic or negative work environment including being more critical of coworkers, the company itself, or having negative opinions about goals in the workplace.
Overall, employee engagement is not something to ignore and if properly taken care of - can lead to a wholesome work environment with employees having a positive work experience.
How to Conduct Effective Employee Engagement Surveys
Employee engagement surveys are an essential tool for managers to understand the strengths and weaknesses of their employee relations.
By identifying drivers and barriers to engagement, HR and leadership teams can take action to improve satisfaction and reduce employee attrition.
Here are some steps to conduct effective employee engagement surveys.
1. Define Your Objectives
Before conducting an employee engagement survey, it is important to define your objectives.
- What do you want to achieve with the survey?
- Do you want to improve areas of the company?
- Do you want to track progress on a change that’s happening? Or measure a company initiative?
Defining your objectives first will be important for developing and being successful in your survey project.
2. Running Your Survey
There are different ways to run employee engagement surveys, such as online, paper, phone, or face-to-face. You might also use an online survey tool to run surveys within the company.
However, we recommend using a third party for employee surveys to achieve the best results possible. In fact, a survey that isn’t done properly or created with objectives in mind will have a similar outcome and impact to no survey at all.
That’s why at Drive Research we’re committed to running and implementing the best employee engagement surveys.
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3. Create Effective Survey Questions
Creating effective survey questions is one of the most important steps to running an employee survey and sometimes it's better to spend the most time just developing your survey.
Here are some tips for creating effective survey questions:
- Use clear and concise language that is easy to understand
- Avoid leading questions or biased language that influences answers
- Include both closed-ended and open-ended questions
- Cover a range of topics, such as job satisfaction, communication, recognition, and career development
- Use a rating scale to measure employee engagement, such as a Likert scale or an employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS)
4. Analyze and Act on Results
Analyzing your results is the most important part of collecting feedback and developing an action plan.
Here are some steps that our market research team does (and you should too) to analyze and act on the results of employee surveys:
- Use data visualization tools, such as charts or graphs, to identify trends and patterns
- Compare results across different teams, departments, or locations to identify areas of improvement
- Prioritize action items based on their impact and feasibility
- Communicate survey results and action plans to employees to build trust and accountability
Best Practices for Employee Engagement Surveys
Common market research best practices ensure that employee engagement surveys are designed in a way that accurately measures the level of engagement within an organization.
Here are a few best practices for employe engagement surveys our team recommends:
1. Ensure Confidentiality
One of the most important aspects of conducting employee engagement surveys with a third party is that it ensures confidentiality.
It helps employees feel like they can be truly honest with their employer and coworkers if they know that they can give their honest opinion.
Having employees feel comfortable about sharing their most honest feedback is crucial to getting valuable information that might otherwise be lost if surveys aren’t anonymous.
2. Communicate Clearly and Transparently
Clear and transparent communication is essential for the success of employee engagement surveys. We’ve found it’s best when employers are open about the goals and objectives of employee surveys to get the desired outcome.
If you’re open and honest with employees about a survey - you’re more likely to get the feedback and information you’re looking for. It may also help to share the results with your employees.
3. Encourage Participation
Encouraging participation is critical to ensure that the survey results are representative of the entire organization.
Along with being open about the survey’s goals, you’ll want to show employees that you take their opinions seriously in order to get their feedback on important matters.
As experts in market research, we understand how important it is to improve employee survey response rates.
That’s why extra things like providing incentives, such as gift cards or extra time off, can help increase participation.
Frequently Asked Questions About Employee Engagement Surveys
Are employee engagement surveys effective?
Effects of a properly run engagement survey can affect the performance and productivity of a company.
If your employees are the engine that runs your company, understanding their morale, feedback, and professional opinions can help the company run more efficiently and productively.
Remember to invest in the employee experience, and build a strong workplace culture.
What are the strongest indicators of employee engagement?
- Employee net promoter scores
- Company turnover rate
- Successful hires
- Internal promotions
- Employee satisfaction feedback
- Online company ratings
- Active employee social ambassadors or social media users
How can we benchmark our survey results against industry standards?
When working with employee survey companies like Drive Research, you'll have access to industry benchmarking data to compare your organization's engagement levels with similar companies or industry norms.
This provides context and helps identify areas where your organization can improve.
How can we maintain anonymity in the survey while ensuring data integrity?
The best way to show employees their results are 100% confidential is to use anonymous survey platforms or third-party employee survey companies.
Doing so ensures that survey data is aggregated and reported in a way that individual responses cannot be identified. All of which helps to protect employee confidentiality and encourages honest and unbiased feedback.
Survey your employees with the help of a third party for honest, actionable feedback
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