The benefit of running an annual employee survey has for a long time been widely accepted but many organizations have been put off by the amount of effort that is required.
Many organizations who have conducted their own internal employee satisfaction surveys use word-processors to design and compile a survey, then go through the effort of printing and distributing the survey and invest time chasing and collecting the completed surveys and then more time transferring the survey response information into a meaningful management report.
Fortunately with the introduction of the Internet and hosted survey websites what was once a time consuming, resource hungry, long winded and cumbersome process is now slick, quick and easy.
This document provides a step by step guide to help implement a survey that will bring considerable benefits to any organization.
Step 1 – Identifying the Need
There are numerous reasons an organization might benefit from a survey. Listed below are a few of the common reason why organizations conduct employee satisfaction surveys.
Event Driven Drivers
If your organization is about to embark, or is going through, a process reengineering program a series of employee surveys can assist in managing the change program, measure the effectiveness of the change, help to deliver a ‘message’ and gather valuable feedback throughout the change cycle.
For organizations that are experiencing rapid growth employee surveys can monitor internal communications and management structures to ensure that employees are aware of their reporting and management responsibilities.
Where an organization is suffering from poor moral brought on by either internal or external influences an employee survey can be used to identify the specific concerns of employees so those concerns can be properly addressed.
Where there is an increase in turnover of staff employee surveys can help an organization identify the underlying cause of employee unrest and through their findings help find solutions.
Periodically
As part of a periodic assessment, surveys will assist an organization in regularly reviewing their employees and monitoring an individual’s job satisfaction, training and career development.
Employee surveys will allow the senior management team the opportunity to look at what makes their organisation tick and confirm, or not, that their ‘top down’ view matches the reality and ‘bottom up’ perspective of their employees.
With the help of employee surveys an organization can establish good employer/employee communication that will in turn bring both direct and indirect benefits.
Step 2 – Management Buy-In
Management buy-in is always desirable for any initiative and many will argue that it is essential to ensure a successful employee survey, however, in some instances the findings of an employee survey can lead to kick-starting a management that has grown complacent and detached from their employees.
Some senior management teams will recognize and drive the need for employee surveys, while other management teams may need to be convinced of the direct and indirect benefits an employee survey will bring.
The level of management commitment to an employee survey will have some bearing on the nature of the survey and to some extent will help determine what questions are to be asked and the manner they are asked.
A management that is supportive of the initiative may have specific areas of concern that they require feedback on or they may give the go ahead simply because they have no reason to think that the level of employee satisfaction throughout the organization is anything other than high.
Step 3 – Designing The Survey
Designing a good survey will take some time and effort but by following the basics of survey design and concentrating on the ‘need to know’ questions and removing the ‘nice to know’ a survey will rapidly take shape.
Deciding on what questions should be asked will be entirely dependent on the individual organization, its structure and the previously identified primary need and objectives of the employee survey.
At the same time as considering what questions to ask consider how the results are to be analyzed. For example there may be a desire to ask for individual comments but these types of answer formats can be very time consuming and cumbersome to analyze and should therefore be avoided or used sparingly.
Online surveys make it practical to conduct multiple smaller surveys than one very long survey and avoid the higher the drop out rate that are associate with longer surveys.
Step 4 – Checking And Testing
Grammar, Spelling And Clarity
Before the survey is published carefully check that there are no spelling and typing mistakes or incorrect grammar. It is recommended that you always have a colleague who has not been involved in the survey design to proof read the survey with clean eyes before the survey goes live, if no colleague is available try to take a break before checking through the survey again.
Say What You Mean And Mean What You Say
When checking the survey you should consider the survey from the viewpoint of the respondent, will the employee interpret the question the same way that you intended them to?
Allow The Employee To Answer Truthfully
For closed questions where the employee will be required to choose from a number of available responses have you allowed the employee to answer accurately? Make use of responses like ‘No Comment’, ‘Not Applicable’ or ‘Don’t know’ where you want to make the question mandatory but the employee may not be able to answer.
Give consideration to allowing the employee to include an ‘Other’ answer but be mindful that ‘Other’ answers add to the complexity when analyzing the survey results.
Don’t Insist on a Response to Questions that may not have one
Check that for questions that have been made mandatory that you definitely do require an answer, for example open questions that ask for additional comments should not be mandatory unless you really do require the respondent to write a comment.
Check You Will Be Able To Analyze The Data
Make another check of the survey but this time examine how the results of the survey will be analyzed. Consider how you are likely to want to analyze the survey data, have you asked the right questions to be able to perform detailed analysis? For example if you wanted to view the detailed response data from the perspective of the different genders, or maybe departments, check you have asked the employee to indicate their own gender and/or department.
Don’t Ask Anymore Questions Than You Need To
Consider all the questions in the survey and look for questions that are not ‘need to know’.
Test the Link and Try Completing the Survey
Publish the survey and then send the survey’s link to a number of people who will be willing to test the survey. By completing the survey yourself you will get a feel for how the respondent will view the survey. From your own and others feedback stop and make adjustments to the survey as required.
Repeat this process until you are happy with the survey.
Check The Data
Take the time to view the online results of the test data and ensure that the data is being collected and can be analyzed in a manner that will give meaningful results.
Step 5 – Deploying and Promoting the Survey
Where all or the majority of employees have access to the internet or company intranet deploying the online survey is as easy as ABC, either via email or by establishing a link to the survey from your own website or Intranet.
Where there are some or many employees that do not have direct access to the internet there are a number of alternatives that can be used from issuing the survey in printed form, providing a shared terminal or giving them an incentive to complete the survey at home.
Step 6 – Monitoring
While the survey is in progress you are able in to view the real-time results online and the number of surveys that have been both started and completed.
If after a few days the number of completed surveys falls short of the expected target it is advisable to send periodic reminders to employees asking them to complete the survey.
Step 7 – Analyzing the Results
When it comes to analyzing the results data there are no hard and fast rules. Much depends on the individual survey, the questions asked and the number of responses.
On the proviso that the right questions have been asked a number of ‘headline’ results will often stand out when the survey data is first analyzed that can provide you with an overview and an assessment of the general mood of the organization.
Where the results give areas of concern a more detailed analysis may be advisable. For example if employees were asked if they felt the organization provided equal opportunities to both genders it would be useful to have a gender split and if say 25% gave a negative response the ability to drill down further to see what the gender split was of the 25% that answered negatively. Was any negative view shared by employees of both genders, is it a view held throughout the organization, or is it one that is limited to a particular gender and/or a particular department?
Step 8 – Further Action
The most important step is more likely to be the last. An employee survey will either confirm that the perfect organization exists or it will highlight areas that are less than perfect by identifying individual and common concerns.
It may prove necessary to conduct further, more detailed surveys, to target specific areas. For example the survey may reveal that negative responses are received from employees working in a particular department but the reasons for their negativity may not be clear. A highly focused follow-up survey may help reveal the root causes.
When employee surveys are periodically run an organization that has taken steps to address issues will see their efforts reflected in subsequent survey responses. Almost all organizations have problems and it will help the moral of an organization to see that a channel is available that will highlight problems that can then be addressed and resolved.
Summary
These guidelines are intended to help an organization conduct successful employee satisfaction surveys, they are however, only a guide.
By utilizing existing technology and conducting surveys online you are now able to monitor the heart beat of an organization, quickly, easily and at minimal cost.