Employees are the lifeblood of a company as they play a vital part in ensuring business growth. That is why 71% of leaders think employee engagement is relatively critical for a company’s success.
A high employee engagement rate enhances the company’s productivity by 22% and profits by 21%. That is why it is important for employees to be engaged and satisfied with the company.
To measure employee engagement, organizations conduct employee engagement surveys regularly. In this blog, we will discuss various aspects of an employee engagement survey, including the benefits, how to analyze the survey, a few tips, and more.
What is Employee Engagement and its Importance
Employee engagement simply means how happy and enthusiast the employees are feeling about the company and their work. This has become a crucial measurement factor for businesses to determine the level of commitment, satisfaction, and comfort of the employees.
Organizations want higher employee engagement as it boosts their growth. There are many benefits of highly engaged employees:
- They are more focused at work and complete tasks on time
- They make a positive and better work environment
- They are likely to stay at the company rather than shifting to another organization
- They increase the efficiency, profitability, and productivity of the company
Benefits of Employee Engagement Surveys
Businesses conduct employee engagement surveys so that they can obtain feedback, regardless of whether it is positive or negative feedback. Here are a few benefits of employee engagement survey:
Assess the employee engagement level
The primary advantage of these surveys is to measure the engagement level of the employees. Companies can know about how employees are feeling about their work, are they committed to their tasks, are they satisfied with the processes, what motivates them to work, and many more.
Highlight engagement drivers
After analyzing the survey results, organizations can easily pinpoint the best engagement drivers. Engagement drivers are certain aspects that motivate or drive employees to engage more. These factors can include work-life balance, company culture, colleagues, clear communication, better career growth, and many more.
Better employee retention and loyalty
When employees feel that the company is taking their opinions into consideration, they are likely to feel happy and satisfied. When employees are happy, they tend to stay at the same organization instead of quitting, which increases employee retention rate. When employees feel that the company is caring about them, it increases their loyalty towards the company.
Resolve common issues
Another benefit of these surveys is that companies can learn about the common issues or complaints that employees have. They can resolve these issues quickly and avoid the chance of escalating, which can increase dissatisfaction among employees.
Strengthen the company culture
Organizations can understand the opinions of employees towards the company culture. This helps them know what the employees like and dislike about the culture and adjust the policy to ensure better employee engagement.
Enhance employees’ performance
When businesses ask employees opinions and act accordingly, it is likely to make employees more productive at work. Their performance will increase, work will be done on time, and they are likely to be present at work activities better.
Analyzing Employee Engagement Surveys
Here is a step-by-step process you can follow for a proper employee engagement survey analysis:
Step 1: Categorize the feedback
The first step is to gather and categorize the survey feedback, which makes it easy to analyze the data. You can categorize the feedback on various basis, such as gender, team, department, employment duration, and many more. For example, if you have introduced a new dress code policy and want to know if employees are satisfied and following the policy, it is better to categorize the data on the basis of gender or generation.
Step 2: Identify weaknesses and strengths
After segmenting the feedback, it is time to list out strengths and weaknesses. This will help you find what employees like and dislike. However, the strengths and weaknesses can vary depending on the department or other parameters.
For instance, some teams might like remote work policy while certain teams where real-time and in-person collaboration is necessary may not be comfortable with remote working.
Step 3: Qualitative and quantitative data
Combine the qualitative and quantitative data to get much more in-depth feedback on various topics. For instance, on a scale of 1 to 5, if the employees responded with a 3, there is no way to know the reasons behind their response. However, if you add qualitative feedback, you can understand why employees chose 3, and their reasons can be used to implement better changes later on.
Step 4: Find patterns
Once you have categorized the feedback and have qualitative and quantitative data, you should identify certain trends and patterns. These patterns will help you determine if certain changes need to be executed as a priority. For instance, if 70-80% of employees are highly dissatisfied with a certain policy or rule, it is high time to alter it and ensure better employee satisfaction.
Step 5: Compare it with previous surveys
One of the best practices in employee engagement survey analysis is comparing the results with previous surveys. This will help you know if employee engagement levels have improved, if previous issues have been resolved, or if there are common trends.
Step 6: Take action and observe the progress
Once the feedback is categorized, strengths and weaknesses are figured, patterns and trends are listed out, you can discuss with the higher management and take necessary action. Develop an action plan, focus on areas of improvement, resolve common complaints, and observe the progress.
Tips for Conducting Employee Engagement Surveys
If you want more employees to participate in the employee engagement survey, here are a few tips to increase the response rate:
- Always keep the survey questions simple, short, and concise.
- Ask specific and on-point questions rather than beating around the bush.
- Include different types of questions, such as open-ended, likert scale, opinion-based, and more.
- Stick to neutral language and avoid biased writing style and tone.
- Make sure that the survey questionnaire is not too lengthy.
- Emphasize that the survey is anonymous.
- Send follow-up reminders so people who forgot can fill in the survey.
Getting Started with Employee Engagement Surveys
Employee engagement is highly vital for any company because if employees are dissatisfied, they are likely to quit, which may affect business processes. As a result, organizations are serious about taking employee engagement surveys regularly. Asking the proper, right questions will help companies gather quality feedback.
Get started with piHappiness to conduct employee engagement surveys. It is user-friendly software with free and customizable survey templates to make your work easier. Conduct the survey and get real-time feedback, analytics, and notifications.
