How can you keep your employee engagement surveys up to date?

In my experience, employee engagement is the foundation of any organisation and employees are your biggest assets. You have to be on top of your game and also not be in a mad rush - that company has done this engagement and so must I. No. Employee engagement is not a lift and shift model. You must ask and understand the needs of your employees, align it with the organisations purpose and make sure it’s a balance for both - employees and organisations. Do a base line survey and end line survey to understand the movement of the engagement needle and ensure that you have a two way channel to evaluate the outcomes based on engagement metrics defined.

Many companies have the habit of using the same survey questions to find the engagement and measure the trends. No doubt its good but there is no point asking somehting thats doing well for many years, you could check that in pulse surveys and move on identifying areas that are important for the organisation. Its good to modify questions every 3 years to stay on top of the world and keep them up to date.

Current HR analytics trends place much focus on quantitative data, trying to transform employee perceptions into ordinal data (such as a Likert scale to express the level of agreement with a statement - strongly agree, agree,...). Most tools actually allow HR to dig deep into correlations, data comparisons by clusters, KPIs, and drivers. Some even use AI to assess the sentiment of qualitative responses (open-ended questions). The ultimate problem with these tools is that while they provide an overview of topic sentiments, they are yet not viable for determining the reasons for such sentiment. Therefore, I always advocate that clients combine quantitative and qualitative approaches through interviews or focus groups.

What do you want to achieve? Why are you sending the survey out? Answer first, questions later! Your questions will remain relevant if you have clear objectives and you keep your communications around the 'why' (for employee and business) fresh!

Add some design thinking mindset to this. Be really clear on what the problem you are trying to solve is. If you can not answer that question then your questions won't make sense to people. Once you are clear on the problem you can tailor the questions accordingly

It's crucial that surveys resonate with what the organization and its employees are focusing on. Agility is also key. If significant changes occur within the company, the surveys should reflect those changes. This allows HR to gauge real-time reactions and assess the efficacy of change management strategies. Survey questions should be probing and insightful, asking if certain programs are effective, soliciting opinions on leadership engagement, and identifying areas of potential improvement. Transparent communication about how feedback led to tangible changes, not only reinforces the significance of these surveys, but also encourages employees to participate actively, confident that their voices make a difference.

The survey must reflect the organizations culture. For instance, if transparency is a core value, include questions about communication channels and transparency in decision-making processes. If innovation is emphasized, incorporate inquiries about opportunities for creativity and idea-sharing. Regularly review and update survey questions to reflect any shifts in organizational culture or values. Additionally, seek feedback from employees on survey content to ensure relevance and inclusivity. By aligning the survey with culture and values, organizations can capture meaningful insights that drive positive change and foster a more engaged workforce.

By designing your employee survey in close alignment with your business strategy, culture and values, you'll ensure much more relevant and actionable insights from the results. To achieve this kind of alignment, make sure you: > Involve senior leaders and other key stakeholders to gather context and feed this into the questionnaire design > Test the questionnaire with sample employee groups before wider rollout, to see how well it 'lands' > Review questions periodically (annually) to ensure continued relevance, and make refinements where needed

Aim for as close to real-time assessment as you can get. Once per year survey results can be interesting, but they're not useful. I recommend surveying a small percentage of the workforce every week. That way you can track rolling averages throughout the year. And you have greater chance if knowing whether interventions make a difference - at the point in time when you actually implement them.

Do they deliver on your objectives? Have that as your number one question when deciding if you need to update or address your engagement surveys. My other question to consider.. what do you do outside of the survey? A survey is an excellent way to assess engagement, but there are many other forums. Keep it fresh by taking additional opportunities.

I’ve found it helpful when there are efforts to bridge the gap between strict information gathering and proactively collecting ideas. It is imperative to understand the pulse of the population for a company to gain actionable insight and adjust its trajectory toward optimal change management. The engagement survey is usually well-structured. It targets areas of interest and pings the employee base to better understand cultural efficacy. Yet, at the end of the survey window, some participating teams feel their input will not be heard. A suggestion is to provide anonymous real-time access to Associate Resource Group moderators, allowing employees to submit inquiries or questions to assist them with making informed responses.

If the survey was well designed with statistically valid questions, I would avoid changing it too much so that you can track progress over time. Instead run bespoke pulse surveys between full ones, looking just at the areas that form your action plan from the previous survey.

Conduct pilot surveys with a small sample of employees to identify any ambiguities or areas for improvement. For instance, if a question about work-life balance receives varied responses, refine it to be more specific, like inquiring about remote work options. Gather feedback from participants to ensure clarity and relevance. Adjust survey questions based on trends or emerging issues in the organization to maintain their effectiveness. Regularly reviewing and updating surveys helps capture evolving employee sentiments accurately.

Get it right! Test your survey, find someone outside of HR/People teams to take it, make sure it reflects the instructions (i.e if you say it takes 5 mins it doesn't take 10!)

Communicating results is key. If you promoted participation in it and asked for employees to take time to share thoughtful and constructive feedback, there's an expectation to be transparent and share results so everyone has awareness of what's working and what can be improved, and so that leaders and managers can implement and track against action plans.

I repeatedly work with leaders who jump straight to the "red areas" when they first see the dashboard of their employee engagement survey. Next, they dive into correlations to determine reasons. "Engagement going south? Let's see what's pulling that. Oh la la, it must be development. Red as well." No. I actually don't show correlations. It's so hard for our brains to differentiate correlation from causality. The reddest areas, such as rewards, don’t necessarily have to be ground zero for your action plan. Time and again, it's something much more subtle going on that projects into these survey areas. The most negative issues are not strictly those that are the most important to change. They're merely most noticeable.

One thing I have found helpful is post-survey gatherings within a peer group to discuss the feelings of the survey and share feedback on what was great and not so great. This is an excellent opportunity to assign a moderator who can take the lead as a voice for the collective group to share the team's feelings and thoughts. This will allow leadership to take prompt action on any items of immediate concern. This goes a long way with teams as they see their efforts producing results.

I strongly feel no survey is effective unless it can be acted upon or captures impactful insights. Listening to employees is central to building an employee engagement plan. Actions based on employee feedback are the best resources to enhance employee experience by identifying engagement initiatives that employees truly desire. This also ensures a direct buy-in from employees and builds strong credibility before a plan is implemented. Apart from how employees have rated different experience drivers (such as recognition, learning, career growth, etc.), it is critical to include at least one open-ended question in your surveys to understand employee needs more deeply.

In the current context many organizations are deploying analytics solutions to predict retention, correlating factors such as compensation, travel schedule, manager, and demographics to comprehend why certain employees e are less engaged than others. But the answers are hard to find. I think it is important to focus on establishing a flexible, humane, inclusive workplace. It can establish trust, mutual respect, empathy and align with the organizations vision/mission/values.

Regular updates. Align with goals. Short, focused questions. Anonymous & confidential. Regular pulse surveys. Actionable insights. Manager involvement. Benchmarking. Diverse feedback channels. Evolve with needs. Inclusivity. Long-term perspective.

- Ask for feedback about the survey (what is their understanding of the questions and is it capturing the information you want to capture?) - Be transparent about the purpose of the survey, its results and the actions you’re taking to address some of the concerns that arise through it. Employee surveys shouldn’t just be a tick box exercise. It should be a tool used to actively improve your culture, employee experience and other aspects of the business. Not acknowledging and acting on its results make it pointless and a waste of time.

Ensuring the relevance of employee engagement surveys requires a consistent effort to review and revise survey questions, integrate feedback, keep abreast of industry trends, utilise diverse survey techniques, establish ongoing feedback channels, routinely analyse data, and share survey findings with employees. By adhering to these guidelines, companies can effectively collect valuable insights, pinpoint opportunities for enhancement, and sustain a culture of strong employee engagement. 🫡✨

A couple of points to consider. 1. As the workplaces embrace multiple generations working alongside, it needs to cater to how each generation approaches responding to surveys. Some prefer shorter and more specific questions and ways to respond while other generations are comfortable with long form responses. 2. The world is moving to ongoing and periodic pulse checks on experiences rather than an annual engagement survey because things change so rapidly at the workplace that any initiative can get redundant quite soon.

Transparency Swift action Pivot to the demands of the business Listen Respond with purpose and intention Earn trust Be involved Celebrate the smallest of wins