As the workforce undulates in the digital limbo of agility, endurance is more important than ever. Endurance shows up in the workplace as the ability to continually respond to and transform issues into solutions. In order to build endurance, employers must deeply understand, communicate with, and recognize employees as an individual. As part of an agile, responsive approach to retaining and attracting talent, employers have adopted a sort of ‘getting-to-know-you phase’ of people management.
Many organizations first turn to employee surveys to create a roadmap for building improvements. While employee surveys are a common place to start, improvement is only as effective as the action taken with the collected responses that truly drive change.
A well-designed survey is tailored to the organization's brand. Values, mission, and culture are all reflected in each query. Respondents (your employees) are confident that the valuable information they are providing will be carefully considered. They are comfortable answering questions that were clearly crafted by their employer.
The framework for a positive workplace culture is a bonus product of a well-designed survey system. Properly sifted answers to properly crafted questions can transform a company at little (and sometimes zero) cost to employers.
Important Considerations for Choosing Employee Survey Tools
1. Delivery
Does the survey tool integrate with the company communication system? Surveys that go uncollected, or even incomplete due to lack of communication or access difficulties are useless to driving change. Ensure the tool is easy to access, clearly communicated, and easy to moderate, manage, and interpret results.
2. Incentive
Companies usually conduct surveys with intentions to benefit the organization as a whole in addition to individual employees. Unfortunately, successful surveys require more than good intentions. If you want employees to provide meaningful feedback that has real potential to drive real change, offer a participation incentive. Effective incentives can involve a great deal of coordination and responsibility and ultimately hours. Choose a tool that automates incentives as part of the survey to cut out unwanted spend.
3. Analysis
Again, a survey is only as effective as the analysis and action following its deployment. Employees expect to see some form of change after participating in a survey. Be sure to properly
When paired with employee recognition, the end product of properly sifted and winnowed employee opinions can build the foundation for a leading workplace culture.
