An employee engagement survey can, if designed and rolled-out correctly, be invaluable feedback to any company.
It is an effective method to measure workplace engagement levels, identify challenges and opportunities within the company.
It can also be useful for measuring management performance, create HR strategies to improve employee retention, increase employee productivity and to benchmark other organisational efficiencies.
So why are companies struggling to garner this pertinent data when using employee engagement surveys?
Because they are not always asking the right questions.
Not any old question will do.
If you want to get the most out of your employee engagement survey, you need to ask the right questions, at the right time and frequency. This will help you to build a continuous feedback loop from which you can make organisational deductions. It will also help you to understand how your employees are feeling at any time.
Pulse or heartbeat surveys are a great way to ‘check-in’ with your employees on a weekly or bi-weekly basis.
But…
It cannot be overstated that anonymity is key! This will need to be communicated to them, right up front.
For employees, this is an important factor as it helps them feel comfortable to give their opinion without being isolated.
For employers, it provides a great opportunity to receive honest, constructive feedback that can move the company forward.
Together with a robust employee engagement strategy, surveys are one of the easiest ways to increase engagement.
So what have we done to help you?
We’ve put together a list of 13 best employee engagement survey questions for you to use right now:
13 Employee engagement survey questions;
1. How happy are you at work? Rate your happiness on a scale of 1 to 10.
This question will help you gain immediate insight into employee morale and workplace satisfaction.
2. Do you understand your career path at the company?
According to Gallup, employees who get the opportunity to continually develop are twice as likely to say they’ll spend their career with that company compared to those who don’t.
This is a great way to identify career development opportunities and create succession plans for the company.
3. How would you rate your work-life balance? Rate it on a scale of 1 to 10.
Work-life balance is an important factor for employees to be attentive and engaged. You can prevent employee burnout and manage absenteeism by asking this question.
4. How likely is it that you will refer a friend, or family member to work here?
Highly engaged employees are more likely to refer someone to work at their current company.
This speaks to their levels of workplace satisfaction.
5. Do you think you can you reach your full career potential here?
Employees want career acceleration. Companies who can nurture their need for growth and development could see longer employee tenure.
6. Do you know our company values?
Employees who don’t know their company values is an indication that they are performing tasks without understanding their contribution to the company value.
Get everybody connected and on the same page by educating them on the values, vision and mission.
7. Describe our company culture in four words.
This is a great way to find out what your employees think about the company culture.
This provides you with the necessary data to implement culture-building campaigns across the company or even to specific business units.
8. Are you comfortable giving feedback to your manager? Rate it on a scale of 1 to 10.
Direct managers can have a big impact on employee engagement in companies.
If employees don’t feel comfortable to give feedback to their direct manager, it could be an indication that the environment is suppressive and not conducive to suggestions to improve the immediate work environment.
9. Do you feel that your colleagues respect each other?
Respect is an important aspect especially if you want to build a positive workplace culture. Peel back the layers and gauge how employees feel about their peers. It may just be time to ramp up the team-building activities within the company.
10. Do you feel your colleagues truly live our company values?
If your employees don’t resonate with the company values then unfortunately to them, it is just words.
Understanding how they feel about the company values is necessary. It informs your next steps to educating them about citizen-like behaviours that the company supports and believes in.
11. How often do you have fun at work?
Positive work cultures are those where employees blur the lines between work and play. Is your company worth the effort for employees to come to every day?
12. Do you feel valued at work?
Use this question to see if your employees feel valued.
13. How often are you recognised by your manager for doing a good job?
Only 1 in every 3 employees strongly agree that they have been recognised within the last 7 days (Gallup)
Not only does it send employee morale rapidly downhill, according to Gallup it is also responsible for an estimated 10% to 20% difference in revenue and productivity.
An employee engagement survey is an important tool for companies to combat disengagement and manage attrition.
But surveys aren’t simply asking the right questions, it’s about measuring and identifying challenges and opportunities for improvement to foster a positive workplace culture and to create an engaging environment.
There are two imperatives that companies must adhere to post the survey;
1. Share all feedback.
Let’s face it, not all the responses you’ll receive will be comfortable. However, sharing feedback within teams or company-wide is critical to their engagement. It also demonstrates that the company is in fact listening and that surveys are not just HR check-box exercises.
2. Create an action plan.
If are serious about changing your organisation then you have to develop an employee action plan. You can address any problems using the feedback from the survey as a good base.
Survey data can offer C-suite executives deep insight into employee satisfaction, and management performance to mobilise their most valuable resource – people.
Do you have any employee engagement survey questions that always gives you great insights? Tell us in the comments section below, we’d love to hear them.