Why Employee Satisfaction and Employee Exit Surveys Make Good Sense
With the need for many businesses to be more streamlined and productive a company can sometimes find itself with many of their employees working under pressure that can then lead to low moral and possible result in a high staff turnover. The benefits of a company having a highly motivated workforce can be considerable and the two goals of having a workforce that is both motivated and productive should not be regarded as being mutually exclusive to one another.
When problems are left unresolved then there is a risk of companies alienating their employees leading to employee frustrations growing to a point where managers find that they are on the back foot with problems that just cannot be ignored.
Ideally employers would allocate the time to fully understand the needs of their employees and learn from their experiences of working on the front line, but employers are too often themselves tied up with the day to day task of fighting their own fires.
Online surveys provide employers with an affordable and efficient method to automate the process of collating the information and storing it in a format that allows for real-time analysis there by helping the management towards the goals of achieving staff satisfaction and high productivity.
Unproductive & dissatisfied
There are a plethora of reasons why employees may become dissatisfied with their job that can result in them channelling their frustrations into demands for higher salaries and reduced hours. Employers who tackle these issues head on, making it all about salary and hours, will often find themselves dealing with the symptoms and not the root cause.
Not just about the money
The following are the most common problems to achieving productivity, none of which are likely to be resolved by increasing salaries or reducing hours:-
- Inadequate training
- Out of touch management
- Working methods that are past their sell by date
- Lack of proper tools and equipment
There have been many studies that have consistently revealed that financial reward is not the most important motivator for employees, providing an employee is being paid the market rate the employer would be wrong to think that the solution to all employee problems is through paying higher salaries.
Take the case of a single mother who is juggling a full time job with the need to look after four children. Out of frustration she may demand more money so that she feels that she is able to cope where a better solution, for both her and the business, may be more flexible working hours.
Good two-way communications
It is in the interests of all organizations to establish good communications. A company that makes communication between personnel and management difficult, or that takes the view that if personnel have a problem they will say something, can often delude themselves into thinking their workforce is content when it is not. It can very easily start with a small problem and one aggrieved employee for the problem to escalate to involve an entire workforce and generate a ‘them and us’ attitude.
Improving communication
For very small organizations it may be manageable to have regular meetings between the employer and individual employees but for larger companies this would probably prove impractical.
Meetings between management and worker representatives are good in theory but can often spiral into becoming talking shops and losing their purpose as both sides become more familiar with one another and the meetings run the risk of being hijacked by the more extreme personalities.
Having suggestion boxes are useful but can be viewed as token efforts by management as they wait for personnel to highlight a problem.
Newsletters can be useful, but their main purpose is generally to inform and not discuss issues.
Maintaining the initiative
Conducting employee satisfaction surveys on a regular basis you are able to ask each employee specific questions and present a pro-active management initiative where the whole workforce can be consulted on various issues. Surveys are able to provide a level playing field between the quieter and more vocal employees.
Being prepared to consulate with employees should not be seen as a sign of weakness, a confident manager will take counsel from all quarters before making a decision. By retaining the initiative and conducting a survey the employer is able to tackle problems from a position of strength as opposed to waiting for problems to arise and develop out of proportion.
Leave a small problem unresolved and it can lead to a situation where a minor problem might just break the camel’s back and the mood of the employees change from positive to negative over night.
It’s quick and easy
For most organizations online surveys represent a proactive and low cost solution. For the majority of organizations where most of the personnel have desktop computers, they are quick to design and deploy direct to the individual.
Where not all of the personal have access to a computer there are various options available that will allow you to accommodate their responses such as providing a shared computer, conducting telephone surveys or as a last resort, a hardcopy survey where the hard-copy responses can be added to those who competed the survey online.
Job satisfaction
There are combined elements that will contribute towards an employee’s job satisfaction, including company ethics, working methodology, ethos and environment to having decisive and effective management. Job satisfaction brings benefits through improved productivity and motivation from a workforce that feels that they are treated as individuals and not a commodity item.
Inform and educate
An online survey can also be used to educate and pass on to the workforce important information, the ‘message’ is consistently delivered and does not suffer from the Chinese whisper phenomenon where a message can be distorted as it is handed down.
An online survey can explain a difficult situation and get valuable feedback from the employees as to the best solution. In this situation it is rare that the workforce would appear negative and more likely that they will feel informed and empowered that might in itself turn a potentially negative problem into a positive challenge that unites the workforce.
Exit surveys
Exit surveys are an ideal method for management to make sure that when people leave the organisation they are not leaving because of problems that could have been addressed and possibly resolved if they had been appreciated earlier. Although identifying a problem may not prevent a person leaving it could solve an unappreciated issue that may, if left unchecked, result in other key personnel also leaving.
Analysing the results
Having consulted with the workforce using an online survey the results are available for instant analysis. Common and specific problems can be identified and the senior management informed who then will have the chance to address the issues that have been raised.
Summary
Used regularly online surveys represent a simple and productive method of taking the pulse of an organisation and an easy way to establish a two way communication channel between employer and employee with the results providing management with vital, accurate and significant information.
For a Sample Employee Satisfaction Survey:- Employee Satisfaction Survey Template
For a sample Employee Exit survey:- Employee Exit Survey Template
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