Employee Engagement Surveys - Why Stop There?
Within the last couple of years Employment Satisfaction Surveys have been re-branded and are now called Employee Engagement Surveys. Typically conducted once a year, these surveys are targeted at gauging employee’s attitude, motivation and commitment to the organization. From the employee perspective these Engagement Surveys provide an opportunity to be heard and their opinions expressed. Once the Employee Engagement Survey process is complete and the results are compiled and analyzed, “Best Practices” would dictate within a few months time; results of the study are shared across the organization, positive or above average results are celebrated, and the areas of improvement are identified as actionable items as good faith attempts at making overall improvements to the organization. Long-term progress and results of those efforts should then be frequently communicated back to the employees. However, why stop there? Why not be proactive? Instead of always fixing what is perceived as already broken or not living up to employee’s satisfaction, why not embrace a continuous process improvement mentality where areas of concern can be fixed before the negative impact has gone too far and could potentially impact retention?
* L& n7 n, t( I" x4 B( }) L5 x. oWithin the last several months, the QTrac team has seen a trend where our client’s recruiting process effectiveness, brand awareness and retention efforts are satisfactorily meeting the needs of the employee within their first 30 days of employment. However, between the 30 day and 90 day surveys a decline begins to be apparent. This decline presents a dynamic change in the employee’s thought process and experience. Upon surveying an employee, at the completion of the first 30 days of employment, an organization is really acquiring their external perspective. How the candidate perceived and rated their experience coming from outside of the company. It is not until around the 90 day of employment where the new employee can now evaluate the information provided, presented, and sold during the recruiting process to be true and accurate. Now their perspective is turning inward. The candidate at this point has an opportunity to experience the culture of the company, complete the on-boarding process, interact with their peers and managers, perhaps have minimal experience with the benefits offered and determine if their expectation of job role and responsibilities presented is what they are really experiencing. Is there a job fit and do they see themselves building a career within this organization. From my experience both professionally and personally the first 90 days of employment is the most critical. So at this point, the candidate is either deciding they will stay with the company for up to 1 year and continue to look for something better or they are looking going to build a career within the company.
, B5 \( c5 r. u2 c6 BThe disconnect with Engagement Surveys is the one point in time perspective it provides. A company may either conduct the Engagement Survey either too early to capture the change in the employee’s perspective or too late to impact their potential retention. Plus, although companies may utilize “Best Practices” they still don’t capture in real time the impact of any changes they do make. By the time organizational changes are implemented those dissatisfied employees could be walking out the door. QTrac can overcome this short-coming because it is designed as a 12 month project cycle engaging the employee’s perspective 4 times within a one year period. Although, QTrac might capture similar information regarding the employee’s dissatisfaction, it has the additional capability to provide real time data identifying the impact of real time changes on the employee’s overall satisfaction and perception. With the information QTrac provides clients have had the opportunity to be proactive in their retention efforts.
/ S: m7 D4 l; S) B1 S* k2 xOverall, I am not anti Engagement Surveys. They do have their time, place and opportunity to provide information to HR departments. Just be aware there are better options like QTrac offering more robust and comprehensive information for the same amount of time and money investment in the market place.
