Employee-Satisfaction Survey Gotchas

Here are some common mistakes to avoid when creating employee-satisfaction surveys. Some workplace environments are filled with negativity and paranoia-especially in this economy. Accordingly, you have to be extra sensitive to employee fears.

• Asking detailed demographic information. Respondents realize that you can triangulate answers to different questions to identify them. How many employees are male, over 40, with 15 years of service, in Houston? Ask only a few key demographic questions.
• Assigning unique URLs to every respondent. Most employee-satisfaction surveys promise confidentiality, yet survey invitations go out with different hyperlinks for different email addresses. In a poor working environment, recipients will compare URLs. While an open-participation link enables ballot-box stuffing, that risk is worth it if employees don't trust the survey system's safeguards to confidentiality.
• Trying to cover all aspects of being an employee in one survey. Be focused: are you exploring benefits or ways to improve how the customer is being served? Narrow and deep is often better than wide and shallow.
• Asking employees about things you cannot fix. Do you really want to ask if they get enough vacation time? Or if they want 401K matching?
• Failing to get enough completed responses to have representative results. Since early respondents in employee-satisfaction surveys tend to be on the extremes (very satisfied or very dissatisfied), broad participation is crucial if your data is to be representative. Make sure you get enough completes for your recommended sample size.
• Not sharing the results. The more negative the results, the more important to share them. Of course, when sharing the results, make sure to communicate what your management team has identified as the top priorities for improving employee loyalty.

What common mistakes have you seen in employee-satisfaction research?