In this article you will find out…
- What to avoid when doing your employee survey
- Download additional tips
Quicksearch has been conducting relationship surveys for over 20 years and are experts in statistics, survey methodology and analysis.
Do you want to involve the employees in the company's improvement process? Do you want to know what they think and get a clear overview of the organization's strengths and areas for improvement?
At regular employee survey helps you see where you are today - which is an important question for you to be able to get where you want to go. On the way to your goals and visions, however, there are certain pitfalls to watch out for, as well as things you should keep in mind when doing your employee survey.
Below we list five mistakes to avoid when conducting your employee survey:
Feedback on the results of the employee survey is delayed
Employee survey feedback needs to happen as quickly as possible – while still remembering how you answered the employee survey. It is also important to continue to maintain the commitment that the employees have shown by participating in the survey.
Usually, an employee survey is open for about two weeks. Ensure that managers are prepared to act and that feedback on the overall result takes place the week after the employee survey is closed.
Let the management comment on the overall result and preferably already point out what needs to be done overall (such as direction without exact measures). After that, the entire business gets access to its results and can start its own feedback, development and actions.
If there is too much time between employee survey and feedback of results, you will lose attention and focus from both managers and employees. The HR teams get a tough job when they are expected to lead business development together with departments that already have their minds on some other important process or business need.
Employee surveys replace calls
Working with feedback does not mean that an employee survey is the solution to everything. It does not replace the conversation between manager and employee and colleagues. Giving and receiving feedback regularly is a prerequisite for both personal and organizational development and success.
Break out parts of employee survey and measure HR processes "when the feeling is fresh".
Examples of breaking out of your employee survey
- Follow up the completed development interview in connection with it being done instead of asking how it was perceived after six months.
- Ensure that recruitment and induction work in connection with their implementation. It gives a much greater opportunity to act immediately if something went wrong instead of understanding a year later why the newly hired shooting star chose to quit.
Spam mailboxes with information and reminders
It is, of course, important to inform that an employee survey is underway and to get employees to participate in the survey. But not everyone needs to participate in a survey in order to get representative data to work with. Reaching 80 % is a reasonable target for participation (70 % if the organization is distributed or more fragmented).
Don't send reminders to those who did what you asked in the first email. Make sure the system you use only reminds those who haven't started or haven't finished the employee survey. Make sure that all managers in the business can monitor their own response rate on an ongoing basis in order to get them to drive themselves and make sure to maintain a high response rate. Many organizations also display the response rate online on their intranet to create participation and engagement throughout the response period.
Employee survey without action
Your employee survey is not an action program or a change. An employee survey collects opinions, feelings and attitudes. How you use the feedback to create engagement is through action plans and actions. Don't mix them up.
Not taking expert help
- It is important that your employee survey and its implementation reflect your business and the needs that exist there.
- Make sure you have a supplier who understands your business, can tailor questions and feedback so that it does the most good in real life.
- Be sure to evaluate each time you complete an employee survey. What did we learn, what do we take with us for next time and what do we need to change - to be even better?
Summation
There are many opinions regarding the purpose and implementation of an employee survey. The survey must be seen as a regular and democratic process that benefits both employees and companies. Quicksearch recommends supplementing employee surveys with ongoing follow-up of the most important HR processes, e.g. recruitment, onboarding, employee interviews, daily engagement and employees who leave. Read more about how Quicksearch works with employee surveys that provide insight and drive engagement.
