What to Think About Before Running an In-House Survey of Employees

 What to Think About Before Running an In-House Survey of Employees

I was an employee at a major corporation for a long time. The HR and IT divisions of these companies were quite sizable. Using these extensive resources to conduct an employee survey was a foregone conclusion. Less than 25% of employees would respond to surveys. No one paid much notice because these response rates were thought to be normal, and there were a few comments that complained about how low it was.

I find myself on the opposing side of the fence today. Over the last nine years, I've provided a variety of staff surveys to business clients. I got the chance to chat with human resources professionals from multiple companies not long ago. Companies like these were gathering questions for their own employee survey by browsing the web. After compiling these questions, their intention was to conduct their own poll internally.

This strategy doesn't seem too far-fetched at first. Nevertheless, I requested that the HR team take the following into account.

Protecting Personal Information

When it comes to employee surveys, privacy and confidentiality are two of the biggest concerns, in the opinion of the staff. We have found that the majority of employees are not very comfortable with the idea that their company's computers may save their survey responses. The fact that company employees are handling the data and performing the analyses persists regardless of how much precautions a corporation takes to prevent unauthorized access to the survey results. Someone has already broken the seal on confidentiality. Many potential for abuse exist under these conditions.

At one point, Entec had to deal with a situation where the business president needed the database and the survey report we were going to generate since he was paying for the survey, but he was also ready to move on with an employee survey. Giving up on this endeavor was our only option. We were unable to give the staff unwavering guarantees that their personal information would be safe.

Notifying workers that an outside entity would handle the entire survey procedure will greatly alleviate these worries. As an example, prior to the survey, Entec informs staff that a firewall is in place to protect the company's network from Entec Corporation. Our computers are off-limits to any employee. Our database is password protected so that no one from your firm may view it. We categorically refuse to comply with any special demands made by upper-level management or anybody else inside the organization to view the data. By the way, there have been a couple of instances like this in the last nine years. Protecting people's privacy and confidentiality is of the utmost importance. Workers' opinions polls have pros and cons. On the one hand, workers are always happy to offer suggestions. When people are even slightly concerned that their privacy might be invaded, they either refuse to engage or give dishonest responses.

Rates of Response
If enough people fill out the survey, the results will be more reliable statistically. A big database is the result of a high response rate. With a big database, you may do data cuts that go deep into the company and provide useful insights. In order to conduct a thorough study that can identify concrete areas for improvement, a tiny database is inadequate. So, getting a lot of people to fill out an employee survey is crucial. The response rates for the Entec survey, for instance, have ranged from 82% to 95%. This enables in-depth examination and is well above average. There is evidence that the response rate for surveys administered by companies to their employees is usually below 30%.

Survey Development

There are three distinct phases to designing an employee survey: question development, scoring system, and question organization. The idea that the efficiency of the analyzes phase is driven by question organization was one that we adopted at Entec. Thus, the questions needed to be structured to represent the desired outcome if we wanted the analyzes phase to clearly lead to recommendations for follow-up implementation. The employee engagement modeling that Entec carried out as a first stage in developing the survey was driven by this line of thinking. Once the modeling was finished, the survey questions were inserted into the relevant areas of the model. To have a better understanding of this procedure, go on to the section on Validity and Reliability that follows. The questions do, in fact, follow a specific sequence. Because of this hierarchy, we are able to conduct thorough analyses and make actionable suggestions for subsequent steps.

Analysis of Surveys

Analyses based on survey questions are vital, but the questions themselves are secondary. There is more to the survey analysis than just giving out percentages. An interpretation of the numbers needs to be provided in the analysis. Take this example: how are the results of one set of questions related to those of another set of questions? Concerning the motivation and performance of employees, some questions are substantially more crucial than others.

One company's data shows a correlation between the following leadership claims and the statement "There is little to no office politics and gossip": “Deal with underachievers in a fair and suitable manner”, “Leads by example and does what is required”. Through this kind of research, additional leadership characteristics that surfaced repeatedly were shown to be crucial to the culture of this specific firm. Based on the results of the investigation, the top leadership behaviors influencing best practices were identified. Consequently, the HR team had a clear list of behaviors that required coaching in a particular order of importance. All employees in the organization who were responsible for supervision were evaluated based on how well they rated against these behaviors in the survey report.

While these claims may be true in some companies, they may not be in others. Depending on the culture of the firm, they can differ slightly. Using office politics as an example, studies have demonstrated that a poisonous work environment is characterized by rampant gossip. In this case, the organization can rest easy knowing they are taking the correct steps to reduce chatter and boost efficiency thanks to this type of analysis.

Validity and Reliability

Gathering questions and constructing a survey is something everyone can do. But now I'm wondering. In what ways can you guarantee that the questions are accurate and trustworthy? What this means is that when an organization makes its own survey, it should ask itself if it has the in-house expertise and resources to assess the survey's reliability and validity to make sure it offers meaningful data.

Entec Corporation dedicated an entire year nine years ago to creating a set of questionnaires. There were several stages to the procedure. Bringing together a diverse team of experts in fields such as strategic management, organizational development, leadership, psychiatry, and behavioral psychology was the initial stage. They used these models as a foundation for their queries and model development. Before being pilot tested, they were put to the test with a large number of focus groups across a variety of industries. Analysis of reliability was carried out. We used principal component analyses. After initial pilot testing, each survey was reevaluated and revised as needed. To guarantee that clients receive surveys that will yield the best potential results, this iterative approach persisted and is still in use today.

Final thoughts

One can do one of two things when they are sick, in agony, and running a temperature. Taking a temperature or seeing a doctor are two options available to them. Due to a lack of information, their options for intervention to restore good health are severely limited if they monitor their temperature. Visiting a doctor and undergoing a series of tests will provide them with important information and help them develop an intervention plan.

It is also the same way to conduct a survey of your staff. Companies are intricate webs of people. The results will be comparable to taking a temperature if you use an unproven employee survey method, an unproven survey procedure, and basic analysis. Taking a temperature more than once makes it harder to zero down on concrete steps to boost performance. Consequently, this de-motivates the individual. Surveys of workers raise their expectations. Employees become cynical and productivity decreases when there is no discernible improvement in the post-survey procedure.

Results from a thorough diagnostic will indicate where to focus your follow-up efforts if you choose to conduct a survey. All the necessary data will be sent to the group so it can proceed and accomplish its goals. For an employee survey to yield useful results, several aspects must be considered, including the survey's questions, structure, methodology, analysis, and interpretation. An organization's capacity to successfully implement all the essential procedures for conducting an employee survey is hindered by the intricate nature of employees' views and expectations.

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