Methods and tools to include in your employee listening strategy
Employee listening has attracted more attention among business leaders as it has a positive impact on employee engagement and retention. However, despite having a desire to implement it, many leaders may not fully understand what it entails. Research can be a valuable component of employee listening programs, but there are many more ways to use it. Using multiple channels to gather feedback from employees, it provides a spherical view of how employees continue to engage and perceive their work. This article covers six examples of employees that can help you create diverse approaches that will give you the best possible outcomes.
Examples of employees listening to implementation at your company
Pulse and Annual Survey
Let’s start with the most popular example of employee listening: research. This choice justifies businesses because research has many advantages. They require minimal time and resources, allowing employees to quickly complete daily tasks without significantly disrupting them. As a tool for employee listening, research is ideal for capturing real-time responses to employees’ specific topics and situations, and the data can be easily compared over time. Shorter, targeted pulse surveys can be managed regularly, monthly or quarterly, to gather insights on a particular issue. On the other hand, annual surveys tend to be more comprehensive and provide further details on overall engagement, satisfaction, and corporate culture.
In-person employee listening
While research provides a wealth of quantitative information to businesses, it is also essential to explore the qualitative aspects of employee listening. In-person meetings allow informal conversations with employees, allowing for more detailed discussion of issues and clarity. Additionally, these meetings allow you to observe nonverbal clues such as employee representation and body language. In-person employee listening usually occurs between the employee and the manager or HR representative, but it can also occur in group settings. You can create focus groups where several employees engage in promoting conversations about specific issues or topics. This method is time-consuming and difficult to analyze, but can be eye-opening for leaders.
Skip-level meetings
An example of direct employee listening is a skip-level meeting. Employees will directly talk to the manager with a senior leader who is at least one level above. The purpose of such meetings is to provide direct insight into leadership into employee experience and struggles without resorting to intermediaries. Another advantage of this approach is that it creates a transparent, reliable work environment and enables frontline employees to build meaningful relationships with leadership. Given that employees may be nervous in these situations, leaders need to know how to approach employees in a way that creates a safe and understanding environment. Following up after the initial conversation to thank employees or refer to topics discussed will encourage additional trust and improve future interactions.
Suggestion Box and Employee Resource Group
The suggestion box is another example of indirect employee listening, which allows employees to share their thoughts anonymously. This is a particularly effective technique for employees who may alienate, underestimate or displeased to speaking their mind in face-to-face conversations. The proposal box can be physical or virtual and is suitable for streamlining hybrid workforces and feedback processes. In many companies, employee feedback is collected by employee resource groups (ERGs). This will prevent you from hearing the voice. ERGS provides valuable insight into employee satisfaction and engagement to leaders and managers and plays a key role in the steps they take to improve their business in the future.
Stay and finish the interview
Exit interviews are a way of listening to employees that most companies know well. Before employees leave the company, the HR or supervisor will have conversations with them, leading to the exit and understanding why they have identified areas of potential improvement. However, many companies overlook the importance of conducting stay interviews. This includes discovering what is loyal to the organization to speak to long-term, high-performance employees. This will give you better ideas about what the company is doing and what changes can further strengthen your engagement. Combining the findings from both exit and stay interviews allows businesses to identify patterns that contribute to employee turnover and take action to address them.
Always On Feedback Tool
The final example of employee listening leverages the various digital platforms already available in the organization. Always On Feedback Tool can refer to a social listening platform that monitors conversations employees have on corporate shared communication channels about organizations, clients, specific products, etc. Additionally, you can assess engagement levels based on the frequency and type of response employees have and responses to cocker and leadership posts. These tools provide a wealth of information that can provide an overview of general sentiment across the organization, although difficult to analyze. Leadership should encourage the use of these platforms by ensuring their ease of use and by initiating regular conversations.
Find the perfect mix
We have looked into various examples of employee listening methods that can be integrated into your strategy, but we don’t put any pressure on you to use them all. Depending on the size of your organization, culture, and available resources, some methods may be more effective than others. To make the right decisions, it is important to consider what you are trying to achieve by implementing employee listening strategies and how to communicate that will make employees more open. However, because diversity is important, it is best to combine some of the above methods. Finally, if you find that the method doesn’t provide the results you have in mind, don’t hesitate to pivot. Try different approaches until you discover the best mix for your organization.
Conclusion
Employee listening can take a variety of forms, from organizations to organizations. However, even if you rely on research, direct conversations, and social listening tools, there is plenty of information waiting to be discovered. The key is to be systematically about collecting and analyzing this data while ensuring that employees are communicated continuously and taking appropriate action. In this way, you develop trust within your organization and encourage your employees to invest in moving the company forward just like you do.
