Employee listening is how you capture and understand the employee experience at your organisation. With Stress Awareness Month highlighting issues such as burnout and the pressures of the ‘always on’ culture, now is the perfect time to listen to your people.
Why listen?
Listening to employees is more important than you think. Employees want to be heard, and hearing what they have to say can help your business progress and innovate.
A study found that more than 34% of employees worldwide think their company doesn’t listen to their ideas for improvement. This ultimately can lead to low morale, productivity and revenue. And that’s before they walk out the door.
How to listen
- Engagement Surveys
Surveys are a great starting point. Engagement surveys help measure how much your employees are invested in the company, and where you can look to improve. These can be offered on a routine basis and highlight clear measurable objectives to track progress.
- Pulse Surveys
These are a quick snapshot of the company at any given moment and are particularly effective before, during and after something new is introduced. Finding out whether these changes have been effective and understanding how employees have reacted to them can prove critical.
- Focus Groups
An engaging method that empowers employees to share their feedback, focus groups can help gain deeper insight into employee perceptions, needs and wants. They take less time than one-to-one interviews and can also increase engagement as they remove the rigidity formed by questionnaires/surveys.
- Active Listening
As discussed in a previous blog, active listening involves giving your complete focus to what someone says. Paying attention, showing that you’re listening, not interrupting, avoiding bias and being respectful are all key parts.
Not only do we at Tell Jane offer inclusive leadership coaching, which covers a full range of employee listening methods, we can also support you in the design of engagement and pulse surveys, facilitate focus groups sessions on your behalf and analyse findings to ensure you truly understand your employees’ experience. Email hello@telljane.co.uk to find out more.
