If businesses that strives to become more streamlined and productive are not careful their efforts to become more competitive can result in a workforce that is working under pressure which in turn could cause low moral and possibly a high staff turnover. The benefits of a company having a highly motivated workforce can be considerable and having a workforce that is both motivated and productive should not be regarded as being mutually exclusive to one another.
If problems are left unresolved then companies run the risk of alienating their employees and events can then cause employee frustrations to boil over resulting in managers finding themselves on the back foot, faced with problems that 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 can automate the intelligence gathering process allowing the collated data to be instantly analysed thereby providing the management with a low cost and effective method to help towards achieving a pleasant working environment with the aim of promoting employee satisfaction while still ensuring that productivity is high.
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.
It’s not just about the money
The following are common barriers to achieving productivity, none of which are likely to be resolved by increasing salaries or reducing hours:-
- Insufficient training
- Out of touch management
- Working methods that are past their sell by date
- Lack of proper tools and equipment
Paying higher salaries is not always a solution to an employee’s problems nor as many studies have revealed is it the most important motivator for employees.
Take the case of a single mother who is juggling a full time job with the need to look after a child. 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 company, may be more flexible working hours.
It is all about communication
It is in all companies interests to encourage good communication. An organization that makes communication between management and personnel difficult, or that takes the view that it is the responsibility for personnel who have a problem to say something, can often deceive themselves into thinking their workforce is content when it is not. It only takes one small problem and one disgruntled employee to feel aggrieved for an entire workforce to develop a destructive ‘them and us’ attitude.
Improving communication
Ideally management would hold one to one meetings with each employee but in practice this would only seem practical for very small businesses.
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.
Suggestion boxes can be useful but can be viewed as token efforts by management as they wait for personnel to highlight a problem.
Newsletters can provide a positive contribution, but their primary function is to inform and not discuss employee 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 issuing a survey and keeping the initiative the employer is able to tackle problems from a position of strength as opposed to waiting for problems to fester and then develop out of proportion.
Small problems left unresolved can lead to a situation where a minor problem might break the camel’s back and the workforce mood change from positive to negative over night.
Easy and quick
For most companies online surveys represent a proactive and low cost solution. They can be created very quickly and for the majority of organizations, where most of the personnel have desktop computers, they can be deployed directly to the individual.
If there are situations where individuals do not have personal access to a computer there are still options available to using the online survey solution such as through the use of a shared computer, operator input or, as a last resort, a hardcopy survey.
Job satisfaction
There are elements that together will help towards providing an employee with job satisfaction, including company ethics, working environment, methodology and ethos to having effective and decisive 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.
Educate and inform
An often overlooked benefit of online surveys is that they can be used to educate and pass on important information to the workforce, ensuring that the ‘message’ does not become corrupted as it is handed down by the phenomenon of Chinese whispers.
An online survey can explain a difficult situation to the employees and get valuable feedback 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 represent are a good way of making sure that when people leave an organisation they are leaving for the right reasons and not due to reasons that if appreciated earlier could have been addressed and resolved by management. Identifying a problem may not be enough to prevent a person from leaving but it could lead to an unappreciated issue being resolved that may be all that is required to stop other key personnel from also deciding to leave.
For a Sample Employee Satisfaction Survey:- Employee Satisfaction Survey Template
For a sample Employee Exit survey:- Employee Exit Survey Template