Employees are the heart and soul of every team, and their engagement is just as important as the work they produce. Because it can be difficult to measure employee satisfaction in one-on-one or team meetings, purposeful team survey questions can help organizational leaders better understand their employees’ needs.
Use this guide to discover which types of questions to include in your survey, including employee engagement questions, team feedback questions, and diversity and inclusion survey questions.
Organizations use employee engagement surveys to measure the satisfaction and engagement of employees. They can use the data from these team assessments to improve areas where employees are not content. Organizations should administer employee engagement surveys regularly to track satisfaction trends and monitor changes in company and team culture.
If implemented correctly and administered regularly, team surveys can benefit organizations in a variety of ways, such as improving retention, encouraging communication, and continually monitoring satisfaction.
Here’s a closer look at some of the things that regular employee engagement surveys allow you to do:
When planning a team survey, there are three main factors to consider: length, frequency, and the questions themselves. Below, we’ll walk you through each step in greater detail.
There is no one-size-fits-all approach to determining the length of a team survey. However, surveys should be long enough to acquire useful data without inducing fatigue.
Initial surveys can be longer, as they need to be comprehensive — sometimes as long as 30 questions. Regular follow-up and pulse-check surveys should be shorter — between one and 10 questions. In general, research shows that surveys that can be completed between 10 and 15 minutes are the most effective at keeping an individual’s attention.
While it’s important to administer team surveys regularly, don’t overwhelm your employees with too many surveys. Choose a survey frequency that will allow your employees to express their concerns as they arise — perhaps once a quarter — and switch up your survey questions to keep your team assessments interesting and worth everyone’s time.
The final — and most important — part of planning a team survey is choosing the right survey questions. Engagement and satisfaction surveys can provide insight into how employees view a company’s communication, diversity and inclusion efforts, team collaboration, culture, remote work support, upper management, and other business factors.
Allowing employees to answer a variety of questions — including open-ended, multiple choice, and sliding scale questions — can also provide unique insights into their professional satisfaction.
Employee engagement survey questions are designed to allow employees to discuss their feelings about team-building practices, productivity, motivation, and team support.
Challenges at work can both dissuade and encourage employee engagement. Identifying where employees feel under or overwhelmed can help companies support them during their everyday work.
Professional fulfillment and enjoyment should be prioritized in the workplace. Managers should be open to the idea that employee satisfaction can be reached through challenging yet rewarding projects.
Meaningful work can encourage employees to work harder and invest in high-quality products. Committed employees can clearly see how their work impacts their team and organization as a whole.
The weight of an employee's workload can either encourage or discourage their productivity. Managers should evaluate how they delegate work and assign projects to challenge and grow employee strengths.
Honest and open team and company communication is important to almost all organizational employees. These communication survey questions can help leaders identify communication strengths and weaknesses.
Employees want to work in environments where they can share their opinions or formulate suggestions for processes. Leaders should encourage employees to both share and listen to differing opinions.
Employees make up the body of an organization, so they should be made aware of internal process and management changes. Improper internal communication can lead to immense organizational issues.
Managers and employees should communicate about projects, questions, and concerns on a regular basis. This communication sets the foundation for strong management relationships.
Upper management — including CEOs and COOs — should communicate their organizational expectations and experiences with their employees frequently. Irregular company communication can impact an organization at all levels.
Employees engage with their work on higher levels when they are informed of important company matters. If communication is lacking, employees may not feel connected to their work, position, or company.
Timely communication is as important as consistent communication. Employees should be made aware of both essential and nonessential information when it is relevant.
Employees should feel connected to and comfortable with their teams. Team feedback questions should focus on team collaboration and support.
Employees who feel accepted and respected within their teams are able to focus on work-related communication and project completion rather than interpersonal relationships.
Employees who are unable to trust their teammates may not be able to perform their best. Understanding this underlying issue, through assessments and team survey emails, can help leaders identify areas for improvement.
This team survey email template allows you to collect team and project feedback via short, simple email surveys. Open-response questions allow individuals to communicate their personal thoughts concerning tasks and other situations anonymously.
Collaborative teams recognize the strengths and weaknesses of each individual. Successful team collaboration can encourage team relationships and increase retention.
Transparent expectations help employees and companies reach mutual objectives. Leaders should clearly communicate the roles and responsibilities of each team member, including expected timelines.
Setting and meeting expectations can help increase team engagement and success. Teams should know what resources are available to them when questions arise, whether that be other team members, documentation, or tools.
Collective goals are important to the overall success of an organization. If employees don’t believe that the company has the ability to meet its stated goals, they may feel unmotivated to contribute individually. This can lead to lower engagement and potential turnover.
Resource libraries and documents should be readily available to all employees. Additionally, individuals should be able to direct other employees to the correct resources or departments for their projects or questions.
The working conditions of all employees — including physical and mental environments — should be welcoming and flexible. Employees may not perform to a company’s expectations if their working conditions are poor.
Employee satisfaction — both with the work itself and the company — can encourage employee engagement. Dissatisfaction indicated on employee satisfaction surveys can also be an indicator of growing unrest in other areas of an organization.
Measuring employee satisfaction can help leaders identify areas of improvement and concern. This template allows individuals to communicate their current feelings about workplace engagement using a sliding scale.
This question is designed to encourage employees to discuss benefits they need or want without requesting formal meetings. If employees feel comfortable answering this question with an honest response, organizations should truly consider their requests.
A company’s culture should be founded on its own values and beliefs. If these are not upheld within the culture, employees may feel betrayed by their company, and may be less likely to recommend the company to clients or prospective employees.
An organization’s mission and vision statements should be reflected in the work it produces. Employees should feel connected to these values, which should increase their commitment to their projects and the company.
Employees who are satisfied with their work are more likely to recommend their organization to potential employees or clients.
Organizations that are flexible allow employees to voice their concerns and opinions. Employees may engage in different organizational activities or set loftier goals if their companies are open to pushing boundaries.
Employees who feel valued and understand their organizational purpose are more likely to stay with their current company. Additionally, understanding team member values can help managers organize and create projects and team-building activities designed for their employees. This template can help facilitate conversations concerning values and employee purpose.
Organizations that don’t have any diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives and values are more likely to see higher turnover rates and lower job acceptance rates. These team survey questions address employee concerns about DEI.
All employees should feel they have equal and equitable opportunities within their organization. Leaders can use this question to guide DEI conversations.
Even if an organization prioritizes DEI initiatives, coworkers may not hold the same values. Employees should be allowed to express their concerns about their working environments openly.
Employees, managers, and organizational leaders should all prioritize workplace comfort and belonging. If employees feel uncomfortable in their workplace, they are more likely to feel disengaged in their work.
Remote teams have different needs and experiences than in-person teams. Team surveys should address each employee’s experience as a remote worker.
Remote workers — especially those who work from home — may have more distractions than team members who work in an office or structured coworking environment. Managers can support remote employees in different ways when they understand their work environments.
Companies that prioritize employee workspaces may see higher engagement and productivity. This question alerts leaders to issues outside of general working concerns.
Almost 50 percent of remote employees find it hard to connect or fit in with their teams. Feeling unsupported can lead to retention issues, so identifying this issue early on can allow companies to invest in culture changes.
Many remote workers find it difficult to connect to their teammates." width="1300" height="553" />
Remote teams may have a difficult time connecting with each other. Leaders can encourage employee engagement through remote team-building ideas and other events.
Employee engagement and satisfaction can be directly tied to team morale. These morale survey questions address internal team recognition and employee gratitude.
Even if organizations encourage employee recognition, it can only make a positive impact when employees see and feel the recognition. This question can help organizations see where they need to improve their internal recognition processes.
Inconsistent recognition can be as dangerous as a lack of recognition. Organizations with regular recognition and gratitude opportunities often see higher employee engagement.
Recognition for recognition’s sake has little to no effect on employee engagement and satisfaction. Recognition and gratitude need to be meaningful, like showing employees how their contributions make a difference in their professional workplace.
These questions address how an organization prioritizes employee development for both internal growth and external professional opportunities.
Many employees will leave their current company when there isn’t a clear path to professional advancement. Addressing this question allows organizations to create intentional advancement paths so employees know what’s available to them.
Employees should know how to access courses, readings, and other resources to help them be successful in their current roles. This question can guide leaders and organizations to reevaluate the professional resources they offer.
Employees may be able to succeed with their current knowledge and skills, but they should have access to professional development opportunities to grow their other skill sets. This can help increase retention rates while encouraging employees to engage with company opportunities.
Managers can act as professional development mentors, but employees should also have access to specific individuals with professional experience who can answer career questions and recommend development courses.
At the most basic level, dissatisfaction with compensation and benefits can lead to a lack of employee engagement. This dissatisfaction can also morph into anger and frustration, which can lead to higher turnover.
An employee’s relationship with their manager can make or break their engagement and success levels. The following manager survey questions are intended for employees to fill out, and can show both the health of the manager-managed relationships, and how those relationships evolve over time.
Employees should feel safe reporting issues, questions, or concerns to their manager. If an employee trusts their manager to lead them, they are able to focus on projects and company work.
The management skills of a leader are constantly developing, and employees have a firsthand look at their manager’s skill level. This question is designed to allow them to express where they feel their manager is performing well and where they need to improve.
Constructive feedback from managers can help guide employees in the right direction on projects and other company-specific tasks. It is also a key part of the employee’s professional development over time.
Specific — rather than general — feedback can help strengthen projects completed by employees. This question allows employees to express areas they wish to learn more about.
Because employees can’t implement or grow from unactionable feedback, receiving it is of little impact and can even negatively affect engagement. If unactionable feedback occurs too frequently, employees may feel burnt out; consequently, their performance may suffer.
Employees should feel valued as individuals outside of their job positions. Managers should encourage employees to take care of their mental and physical health to the best of their ability. Plus, employees who feel valued are more likely to focus on the work they produce.
There are several best practices to consider when distributing team surveys, including organizational objectives, confidentiality, and how you will actually follow up on the information you receive from the surveys.
Let’s take a look at these best practices in more detail:
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