The benefits of employee surveys for growing your business

It goes without saying that if you want your business to succeed, you need to survey your people. Most organisations survey their customers, asking for feedback on their products, customer service, and website, while very few organisations take the time to survey their employees. 

Gathering feedback from your employees is one of the best ways to grow your business and in this article, we are going to discuss why by looking at the benefits. 

Measure Employee Engagement 

Do you know how engaged your employees really are? How many hours of the day do they spend actually working? According to Workplace Insights, employees can spend up to 13 hours per week on social media during work time. That’s time they’re not working and it has implications not only for them but also for your business. So, how do you engage your employees more effectively? 

Firstly, you need to measure employee engagement. Measuring the engagement of your employees by asking questions around recognition, training opportunities, interest in projects, motivation, holiday allowance, and more can provide helpful insight into what engages your employees and what doesn’t. 

According to WeThrive, employee surveys help to understand “the things that are preventing your employees from fully connecting with the visions and values of your business to deliver change and improve employee engagement.” You can then use this information to introduce positive changes, such as more holiday time, shorter working weeks, more responsibilities, etc that will help to boost engagement and employees’ job satisfaction. 

Show You Actually Listen to Employees 

Particularly in large organisations, employees can feel unseen and unheard. They can often feel like they are coming to work each day and all their efforts are going unnoticed. In cases such as these, carrying out staff feedback surveys is absolutely vital as it allows said employees to share their thoughts in a non-committal and anonymous way. Surveys provide unhappy employees with a place to express their honest feedback and actually have it read by managers. 

Many employees enjoy this way of working as it allows them a platform from which they can express how they feel about certain issues in an honest way that will not jeopardise their job. What’s more, there is very little pressure attached to this form of communication (unlike an email to the boss which, at times, can have some people quaking in their boots). Asking for feedback from employees helps them feel heard and can often support company retention rates. 

Help Employees Feel Valued 

Did you know that just asking your employees for feedback helps them feel more involved in the company? If you want to motivate your employees to care more about the growth and success of your organisation, employee feedback surveys are a great option. 

Through surveys, you can establish an effective two-way form of communication that gives them a direct voice into your company and the way you do things. As soon as a manager asks an employee their opinion and allows them to have a say in the planning process, said employee feels more valued and takes more ownership of the company. As a result, they are increasingly motivated to work harder and perform better. This only means good things for your organisation. 

Surveys Provide Actionable Data and Drive Growth 

How do you know what’s working and what isn’t if you don’t ask the right questions to the right people? Many company directors just assume that everything is running smoothly and don’t take the time to question their employees, at all levels, to understand where there is room for improvement. 

Employee surveys provide actionable data that can help drive the continued success of a business. And often, the feedback provided will raise points you may not have considered. What’s more, by analysing the results of the surveys across different departments you can discover why some departments are engaged more than others and use this information to implement positive changes across your organisation. 

Prompt Self-reflection 

Are you struggling with employees who simply aren’t pulling their weight? It is not uncommon for employees to become unmotivated over time and reduce their productivity as a result. And while a survey may seem irrelevant at this point, surveys can actually provide an excellent vehicle for promoting self-reflection. 

Just as with therapy or counselling, the act of being asked a question prompts a person to stop for a moment and think. In fact, The Journal of Consumer Psychology found that asking the right question was key to individual change. Furthermore, according to Forbes, “discomfort is what motivates people to change. When an individual isn’t exhibiting healthy behaviour, the question serves as a reminder of their choices […] Researchers found that questioning effectively produces consistent and significant change across a wide variety of behaviours.” As such, employee surveys can be an excellent tool for changing customer behaviour. 

Show that You Care 

Organisations always claim to care about their employees. However, this care is unfortunately rarely shown. We think it is one thing to say that you care about your employees and it’s quite another to take the time to show them.

Proactively seeking company feedback from your employees is one of the best ways to show that you care. Organisations that reach out to their employees for feedback and actually ask how things could be improved are showing how much they care. 

Surveys give employees a space to share their concerns. Sometimes, just being asked the question ‘what can be done to improve things for you?’ is enough for employees to feel cared for. However, the very best organisations are the ones that take the feedback and use it to improve their organisation. 

Employee surveys enable you to find out what matters to your employees and they allow you to incite real, valuable change. Surveys are an excellent way to establish trust between managers, employees within your organisation as well as potential candidates interviewing for a role at your company. And the more your employees trust you, the more likely they are to go above and beyond in their role. 

Streamline the Feedback Process 

Do you remember the days when gathering feedback involved calling your employees into your office, one at a time, to share their thoughts about the company? This method of gathering feedback literally took days at a time. What’s more, many employees would feel uncomfortable about being completely honest. 

Employee surveys can be completely anonymous. They are a streamlined way to gather valuable feedback and do so quickly. What’s more, the data can be organised in percentages, pie charts, graphs, and other visual representations to provide a helpful and accurate overview of your company. There is no better or faster way to gather the information you need and get to work on implementing new changes. 

Final Words 

As you can see, there are numerous benefits to carrying out employee surveys. If you have not considered employee surveys before, we hope this article has encouraged you to give it a try. Surveys are one of the most invaluable tools businesses have to further employee engagement and company growth.