3 ways to boost internal survey engagement: Feedback to follow through

Every year, employees receive emails about employee surveys, asking for their feedback and stating how valuable their input is. Every year, employees often ask themselves the same question: What happened with last year’s survey and did they even do anything with that information?

“Companies do take action based on their surveys, but they don’t always tell employees that organizational changes often come from survey findings,” Anne DeAngelis, executive vice president of employee engagement strategy at Zeno Group, told Ragan. “They don’t close the loop.”

Closing that loop is where internal communicators can have the biggest impact. But it’s also where many comms strategies around surveys fall short.

“I think that’s one of the keys,” DeAngelis said. “Being very clear that the company leadership will take action based on what they hear from the feedback from their employees.”

For communicators looking to boost participation, that means shifting the focus from simply promoting the survey to demonstrating its impact before, during and after it launches. Here are three ways to do it.

1. Close the loop clearly

Employees are far more likely to engage with a survey when they can point to specific changes their feedback created last time. That gap between action and awareness is something DeAngelis sees frequently.

“If the changes that come from surveys are communicated too long after the fact, it’s almost forgotten that the survey was the impetus for the changes in the first place,” she said.

The gap between what employees learn from these surveys and the delay in sharing how they made a difference at the company can erode internal credibility. For internal comms pros, it’s imperative to make the connection between the survey and tangible change visible through messaging. In practice, that means consistently connecting survey feedback to specific actions. This helps employees see what changed, why it changed and how their input played a role.

“You need to be very clear that the company leadership will take action based on what they hear from the feedback from their employees,” DeAngelis told Ragan. “Remember, you always can go back to your colleagues and say, ‘In case you missed it, here are the details about the changes that happened as a result of the survey you participated in.  But it’s also worth noting that if no action is taken on the survey, that can erode trust. which is can prove difficult for increasing employee engagement.

In addition, a “You said/We did/What’s next,” format for messaging can help communicators draw up a plan to operationalize survey results into impactful messaging. Here’s an example of what that might look like in action:

• You said: Communication from leadership felt inconsistent.
• We did: Introduced monthly CEO town halls and weekly updates from leaders.
• What’s next: Comms team rolls out periodic “ask me anything ” sessions for better two-way dialogue.

2. Activate your managers

DeAngelis said that she equips managers with talking points to share with their employees about the differences the surveys can make, and in turn, managers can send employee ideas from the survey back up the ladder to inform future organizational choices.

“Managers need to explain why the company does the survey and share clear examples of the difference it can make down to the team level,” she said.

DeAngelis said that manager comms templates can help get the message across about the importance of survey engagement. They can include:

• Why the survey matters to the team
• A few tangible examples of past changes that came from survey results
• A timeframe to complete the survey
• Reassurance of anonymity of responses

She added that internal communicators should lean into the fact that managers are often an employee’s most trusted source of information and leverage that to boost engagement.

“It’s harder to say no to someone you trust and that you work with all the time,” DeAngelis said. “If the manager can point to specific changes that happened because of a particular survey, that can help build trust in the survey process itself.”

3. Survey storytelling

To build a credible story for employee audiences, communicators and leaders need to resist the urge to interpret survey results on their own. In her own work, DeAngelis has seen how going deeper can change the outcome.

“In one of our recent surveys, I had some guesses of what was behind some of the answers, but I didn’t want to guess,” she said. “So we had a couple of focus groups so we could really hear more from the team about why they answered the questions the way they did and what they thought would help to address it.”

When employees can see themselves in both the feedback and the outcome, participation becomes a natural next step and not something they need to be reminded to do.

“When you can tell the story of how the survey shaped the changes—and how employees helped shape the solution,” DeAngelis said. “That’s when it really resonates.”

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications.