You Have your Employee Engagement Results. Now What?   

In an effort to build a better workplace, you spent countless hours putting together a survey that would best measure the temperature of your employees’ feelings about your organization. You have watched the surveys responses roll in. The survey has closed. You now have results!

Unfortunately for many companies, this is where the engagement survey story ends. The “employee engagement” box is checked. Another year of results are recorded in the book.

For companies that deal with a survey this way, this is a story of missed opportunities: a chance to spend time and money effectively, to engage employees by showing appreciation for their time and opinions, and to use incredibly valuable information to drive their business forward.

So, if you don’t want your organization’s engagement story to end too soon, how do you use your company’s survey to make a better workplace?

Figure Out Why you Are Doing the Survey
“Because it’s what companies do” is not a good enough reason to send an employee engagement survey. Surveys collect data from employees willing to share their thoughts and feelings — data that is key to increasing productivity for your organization. What was the point of going through the effort if you were not going to get any benefit in the end?  Not using this information is like cooking a roast, then throwing it in the trash can!

Decide, therefore, why you are sending this survey. Are you hoping to increase results from last year? Do you want to build a new recognition program from the information? Have you put new policies in effect that you hope are making a difference? Focus in on what you want to learn and cherish the other rich data your employees willingly shared with you.

Have a Plan for the Results
Before you send the annual employee engagement survey, you need to develop a strategy for how you will use your survey results. Consider the option that will best fit your culture and define what you want to achieve. This could include rolling out data and expectations through executives to managers to supervisors, or assembling a multi-level team to create an engagement strategy.

You need to be prepared for the outcome. What happens if the score you were focusing on goes up? What if it goes down? What if it stays the same? You must be prepared to do something with the results given to you by employees.

Cut the Survey Down to the Lowest Level Possible
Your organization needs to get results as close to the employees’ feelings as possible without “outing” any employee. So perhaps you cut your results down to teams that are no smaller than ten people. By creating team-specific results, managers can focus on strengths and opportunities that are meaningful to their particular teams.

Also, when you cut results down to this level, team members can be a part of the planning process to create a team engagement strategy.  In this way, engagement comes from where it is intended — from the ground, up.

Find the Problems
Cutting the survey down to the lowest level possible in your organization will reveal some issues in your organization. You will find managers who aren’t good at engaging employees. But that is okay. This shows areas where more training is needed for certain managers. It’s better these issues are discovered and handled, than left to cause issues into the future.

Link Scores to Performance Reviews
If something is important in your organization, it should be linked to performance and part of your professional success metrics and KPI’s. [A Key Performance Indicator (KPI) is a measurable value that demonstrates how effectively a company is achieving key business objectives.] Engagement scores, not just business metrics, should be part of your KPI’s for all levels of the organization. In this way, you are asking questions based directly on behaviors that should be exhibited every day. Employees will tell you whether it is happening, which gives you a chance to make adjustments.

We live in an era of data overload. We typically have so much data coming into our organizations that we do not know what to do with it. That does not have to be the case with your employee engagement survey. Being mindful about your annual employee survey can make a huge difference in the way your organization runs and produces.

Without employees, you would not have a business or customers. What they say is an important part of keeping both intact. Don’t just check the box. Use the gift of this data to make a difference.