Getting to the Truth: Why You Should Survey Your Employees Often
How happy and fulfilled are your employees?
Could hidden issues be undermining your company’s performance or profitability?
Are toxic employees or bad managers eroding your corporate culture?
Unless you survey employees often, you’ll never know.
Gathering employee feedback is critically important to your company’s success.
But if you try to get meaningful, constructive input from your team during a typical meeting, you might not be getting to the real truth. Here’s why:
- Employees may be too shy or intimidated to speak up in a group. This is especially true among newer and more junior members within your company.
- Employees may be afraid of repercussions. If their feedback is critical, they may fear that sharing it will negatively affect how they’re perceived.
You don’t know what you don’t know, and you can’t improve what you don’t measure. To get the candor and facts you need, you should survey your employees often.
Here are just a few benefits regular surveys provide:
Surveys allow employees to speak their minds honestly.
Anonymous feedback surveys help them feel actively involved in improving company culture, processes, and more, thereby increasing engagement.
Surveys build trust.
It’s one thing to tell your team that they’re important; it’s quite another to show them. Proactively soliciting feedback demonstrates that you respect your employees, care about their concerns, and value their input. Your actions speak volumes, building trusting relationships over time.
Surveys overcome communication barriers.
A properly structured survey can open the lines of communication both laterally and horizontally within your organization – breaking down management “silos” and improving information flow in all directions.
Surveys help you to understand what matters to employees.
The workplace has changed dramatically over the past year; your employees’ values and priorities may have changed, too. Gathering your team’s input allows you to stay on top of the drivers of engagement and job satisfaction – as well as the things that could drive your best employees out the door.
Surveys provide meaningful data over time.
When you gather information systematically, objectively and frequently, you can compare changes over time – spotting trends, identifying opportunities and addressing small problems before they escalate.
Survey results help drive organizational growth and change.
Gathering employee input adds a perspective that leaders might not otherwise have. Armed with those insights, managers, and executives can make decisions that are right for the company and employees.
Honest, constructive feedback is essential to helping your people and your company grow. If you’re ready to get started, use these tips to create a targeted, effective survey – and get the truth from your employees.
Need honest feedback on your hiring or workforce management strategies?
Schedule a free consultation with your local PrideStaff office today.
