Hiring talent is a real challenge in today’s competitive market. Once you’ve found your dream candidate, you’d better make sure you know how to retain them. Employee satisfaction surveys are an effective way for any organization to receive invaluable feedback and reduce employee turnover.
Voluntary turnovers cost American businesses over $1 trillion a year, according to a recent study by Gallup. More than half the number of employees who voluntarily switched jobs said that their employer could have taken action to prevent them from leaving. Some of them claimed that none of their managers had asked them about their levels of satisfaction in several months leading up to their departure. They simply left because nobody checked in on them to see how they felt about their role, team, or work environment.
When encouraged and properly analyzed, feedback should provide an honest look at where leadership is succeeding and what can be done to improve employee retention. By using some of the following methods, you can work towards fostering more engaged employees along with a culture that supports your company’s values.
Encourage mutual feedback during performance reviews
Talking one-on-one with your employees is a great way to collect employee feedback on engagement and satisfaction. These performance reviews, however, shouldn’t be few and far between.
Show your employees that their input is valued at least once every three months. Create an atmosphere of open honesty where they can bring up things without fear of being reprimanded. Making sure the focus is on a common goal can aid review anxiety and extract constructive information in the process.
Share your thoughts on regular team meetings
Talk together and listen to each other. It’s often easier to share and give input in a group setting, which is where team meetings can come in handy. Using team meetings as a way to provide feedback can encourage employees to speak up when they feel they have the support of their fellow colleagues.
Get anonymous feedback with a suggestion box
The anonymity of a suggestion box can provide a great outlet to collect employee feedback. It also lets your employees know that their opinions are welcome outside of other formal feedback collection methods.
This will work if you check the box regularly and actually address any issues posted. Otherwise your employees will feel cheated that none of their feedback was taken into account.
Measure employee satisfaction with employee feedback surveys
Satisfaction surveys are one of the best methods for monitoring a variety of work-related issues, such as job satisfaction, compensation/benefits, company policies, retention, work hours, etc. When done anonymously, feedback surveys make employees feel less threatened that their feedback will result in negative consequences.
The best way to increase engagement with employee surveys is by making them as short and convenient as possible, while allowing as much information as possible to make its way to the manager. With PDFfiller, human resource managers can collect employee feedback online in less than 24 hours. Generate a fillable employee satisfaction survey or simply check out our online collection of employee satisfaction survey samples for one that best fits your goals.
