Insights
When we’re designing surveys with clients, we often hear the question “Should I ask about things that I know we can’t change?”. Sometimes we also hear the question “I know that staff are going to be very negative about this – can we leave it out of the survey?”.
Your survey is only as good as the questions you ask, and there are competing views about whether to include topics like these.
We’ve pooled our knowledge at Agenda and WorkBuzz to give you the reasons why you might not want to ask tough questions, and the reasons why you should anyway.
Why You Might Not Ask:
Too Many Questions
Even a full engagement survey should only be 40-70 questions long, so you can’t ask about everything. It is sensible to rationalise, and to prioritise questions that you know are actionable – where you’ll be able to make improvements if you need to.
No Ability to make Changes
If you ask about things you have no intention to even consider changing, this could be seen as dishonest, and only paying lip-service. Not taking action from a survey erodes staff’s confidence in it, and impacts their engagement with the organisation.
If you are still building trust and confidence in your survey process, it could be best to ask about a smaller number of more actionable topics – and build up to a fuller temperature-check on the employee experience.
No Need to Ask
There might be topics where you’ve already engaged in employee listening – if your flexible working policy has already been the focus of extensive consultation, it might not be valuable to ask any more about it in your engagement survey.
The things you don’t ask about, if they’re wide-scale issues, are going to come out in the open comments anyway. If staff want to talk about pay and benefits, they will.
Why You Should Ask Anyway:
Why You Should Ask Anyway:Get the Big Picture
It is important to understand how your staff feel on the whole range of engagement survey topics – to get the big picture of their experience at your organisation. This means you can see the relative contribution of each piece of the puzzle, e.g. how much of a difference benefits vs. health services are making to wellbeing.
Get an Unbiased View
It’s good to test your assumptions. You might be pleasantly surprised by the results of a survey, especially when you’re able to compare to an . What you think is a general view might actually only be held in certain parts of the organisation. Understanding these differences can help you target initiatives and mobilise best practice.
Standardise Feedback
Key issues for the organisation are going to come up in open comments anyway, so it is better to include a couple of questions that standardise responses, and give you comparable data. You can ask these questions sensitively, but they are well worth including.
For example, even if you don’t want to ask a full section on compensation, it’s always worth including as an option for the question “Why are you considering leaving?”
Openness to Feedback
It’s also important to give your people the opportunity to comment on areas of their work-life that matter to them – and topics that they rightly expect to be asked about.
We know that the most engaged organisations have cultures that encourage open, two-way communication, and where leaders and managers understand the views and opinions of staff.
A good survey helps staff to share their perspectives in a way that organisations can leverage for change.
Openness to Action
Although you might think that there’s no action the organisation can take in response to a particular set of questions – for example, because policies or terms are set in stone, or because of the organisation’s or leader’s strategy and priorities – once you have the results, things might change. There may be actions you can take around how policies/strategies are communicated, or about future consultation processes.
Feedback on things you think can’t be resolved helps you understand how people feel and lets you respond appropriately. For instance, you could share, “We know this issue is causing frustration, but here’s why it’s happening.” People might not always be aware of the constraints you’re dealing with. This kind of communication opens up a conversation instead of making it seem like management is shutting things down.
These discussions might feel challenging or even frustrating for leadership, but clear and honest communication often wins people over. Most staff members are willing to listen and understand when they feel heard and valued. It’s all about creating space for open dialogue, even when the answers aren’t easy.
Even if change isn’t possible now, it may be in the future. It’s still helpful to have some data now, even if it can’t be actioned yet. It will provide a useful baseline, and will help to build the case for future actions (and identify where they’re most needed).
So what is our advice?
When you run an employee engagement survey, it’s best practice to be transparent about why you’re asking the questions you are asking.
It’s always best to get the ‘big picture’, but you should be open about why particular topics might be priorities for this survey.
There are some topics that you should always include – questions about leadership, for example – because of their importance for engagement and organisational culture. You might check in on other topics less regularly.
But no matter the questions you ask, you can – and should – set realistic expectations about how the results will be used, and the challenges in making changes.
Get in touch to speak to a survey expert about asking the right questions.
