HR is left to shoulder the responsibility for follow-up on its own. Our clients believe that employee feedback should not be an HR project, but an essential part of the business.
Does that sound familiar? You’ve spent months putting together a brilliant employee satisfaction survey (ESS). The questionnaires have been finalised, the expensive agency has been selected and the internal communication campaign has been launched.
You’re enthusiastic, but the rest of the organisation seems to be watching from the sidelines. The board is waiting for the report to land on their desks, and managers sometimes see it as ‘an HR thing’. By the time the results are finally in, the reality on the shop floor has often already changed.
That’s not down to a lack of effort on your part. It’s down to the way we traditionally organise feedback: as an annual event rather than a continuous process.
A traditional employee survey often results in a massive report. Although insightful, following it up in practice is a struggle. Managers sometimes see follow-up as extra work on top of their already packed schedules.
The result?
At askemo, we believe that employee feedback shouldn’t be an HR project, but an essential part of the business. To turn that “HR exercise” into an organisation-wide success, we’d like to share three insights from our recent webinar with Carmen (HR expert at askemo) and Jack (Competenza).
Managers focus on figures and continuity. So talk about the ROI of engagement. Carmen emphasises: “The departure of a single employee costs on average over €15,000”.
If your feedback process helps reduce staff turnover by just a few percentage points, you’re soon talking about savings of hundreds of thousands of euros a year. At that point, the energy in the boardroom shifts: feedback is no longer just a ‘tick-box exercise’, but a strategic tool for achieving business goals.
The workplace doesn’t change because of an action plan in a desk drawer, but because of managers’ behaviour. Jack advises against giving managers thick reports, but rather targeted, manageable insights.
Help them to engage in dialogue with their team. Instead of looking for “who said what”, encourage the question: “Why do we feel this way and what can we improve this month?”. When managers realise that feedback makes their team stronger and their work easier, they will embrace the process.
Why do we let the organisation decide when employees can give feedback? You want to hear about what’s happening today, not in a report six months down the line.
By making feedback continuously and easily accessible, you increase the employees’ sense of ownership. They are no longer merely “form-fillers”, but co-owners of the improvement within the organisation. This prevents a build-up of frustrations and makes engagement tangible.
Stop measuring, start moving
At askemo, we believe in action-oriented research. That means: measuring briefly and effectively, making insights available in real time, and engaging in dialogue immediately. We call this the Feedback Flywheel: a flywheel of small actions and rapid feedback that keeps the organisation moving.
As soon as people see that their input is actually being acted upon, the response increases and trust grows. Then feedback is no longer a solitary HR exercise, but the driving force behind a healthy organisation.
Do you want to make the transition from an annual report to an action-oriented culture? Discover what staff turnover and absenteeism really cost your organisation and use this data to initiate a dialogue with senior management.
