The benefits of conducting an annual employee survey is widely accepted but many organizations have been put off by the amount of effort those annual surveys take to deploy.
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.
Document here is a step by step guide to help implement a survey that will bring considerable benefits to any organization.
Step 1 – Identifying the Need
The reasons an organization might need a survey are numerous. The following 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 change management program employee surveys can assist in managing the change, measuring 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 offer the senior management the opportunity to look at the soft underbelly of their organization and will help them confirm, or otherwise, that their ‘top down’ view of the organization matches the reality and the ‘bottom up’ perspective.
Employee surveys will help an organization establish good employee/employer communication that will in turn bring direct and indirect benefits.
Step 2 – Management Support
Although having management buy-in to a survey is always desirable and in some cases may be essential to ensure it is a success, in some instances the results of a survey that may be all that is required to kick-start 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.
While considering what questions to ask give consideration to 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 – Proof Reading And Testing
Grammar, Spelling And Clarity
Before the survey is published carefully check that there are no spelling and typing mistakes or incorrect grammar. If available it is always recommended that you have a colleague who has not been involved in the survey design to proof read the survey with clean eyes, 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 need to consider the survey from the viewpoint of the respondent, you may know what you mean by each question but will the questions be clear to the employee?
Allow The Employee To Answer Truthfully
Check that for closed questions where the employee will be required to choose from a number of available responses; have allowed the employee to answer accurately? Make good use of answer response options like ‘No Comment’, ‘Not Applicable’ or ‘Don’t know’ where you have made the question mandatory but the employee may not be able or wish 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 Require 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 be made optional unless you really do require the respondent to write a comment.
Check that the Data can be Analyzed
Make another check of the survey but this time examine how the results of the survey will be analyzed. Give consideration as to how you will want to analyze the survey data, have you asked the right questions to be able to perform the detailed analysis that you desire? For example if you want to be able to view the detailed response data from the perspective of the different departments, or maybe length of service, check you have asked the employee to indicate their own department and/or length of service.
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 colleagues who will be able to help you 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 time to view the online summary results of the test data and confirm that the data is being collected in a manner that can be properly analyzed and 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 easy, either via email and/or by establishing a link to the survey from your own website or the Intranet.
If there are employees that do not have direct access to the Internet there may be a number of alternatives that can be used such as issuing the survey in printed form, providing access through 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 any set target it is advisable to send employees one or more reminders to ask them to complete the survey.
Step 7 – Analyzing the Results
There are no hard and fast rules for analyzing the data. Much will depend on the specific survey, the questions that are asked and the number of responses that are received.
Providing the right questions have been asked when the survey data is first analyzed often a number of ‘headline’ results will immediately stand out that will provide you with an overview and an instant 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 and 25% gave a negative response it would be useful to know the gender split of the organization and also to look at what the gender split was of the 25% that answered negatively. Was any negative view shared by employees of both genders, consistent throughout the organization, or was it restricted to a particular gender and/or a particular department?
Step 8 – Further Action
Probably the most important step is the last. The results of an employee survey will either confirm that the perfect organization really does exist or, and more likely, it will by the individual and common concerns that are raised identify the areas that are less than perfect.
It may be that further more detailed surveys are required that 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 smaller, specifically targeted 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 some problems and it helps an organization’s moral to see that a channel is available that will allow problems to be highlighted, 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.