For the Amélio initiative to be successful, employees must see the benefits generated by the tool and feel the sincere interest of their employer to generate a motivating work environment.
Here are several techniques to increase participation.
Explain the benefits
The benefits of conducting employee surveys may seem obvious to you and management, but what are the benefits to employees? Make sure they understand why their participation in the surveys will help them be happier and more motivated at work.
How will the results be used? Why do you want to create an ongoing communication channel with employees? What changes can employees expect? What can they expect in terms of their careers, work methodologies, relationships with peers and managers, and well-being at work?
Don't be afraid to be firm and clearly communicate your expectations of everyone's participation in surveys. Of course, it shouldn't be forced, but if the shared benefits are real, everyone should understand that it is in their best interest to make their opinion known.
Create a routine
Implement a routine in your organization. On such and such a day of the week and at such and such a time, everyone completes the Amélio survey.
If your employees are used to having lunch together, implement in your culture the routine of completing the Amélio survey before going to lunch on Friday.
The manager does a quick walk-around at 11:50am to remind team members to complete the survey and everyone leaves together for the cafeteria afterwards. Make the survey a small recurring event before lunch.
Identify internal influencers
Generally speaking, we all seek peer approval. The more employees take action, the more others will follow. Use this to maximize survey response rates.
Identify employees with natural leadership skills and ask them to participate in the initiative and demonstrate to their peers the benefits of the initiative.
This can become part of their role and involve their creativity: "We want an 85% response rate from our team. Can you help us get there?
Create small competitions
Competition is a powerful intrinsic motivator to achieve goals. You could create a small contest for the team with the highest quarterly participation rate and offer the pizza dinner to the team with the highest participation rate.
But be careful! Don't confuse participation rate with engagement rate. No contest should be based on the highest engagement score as this may skew employee responses and the purpose of the initiative.
Make managers accountable
When management holds managers accountable for their team's participation rate, they will be more involved in increasing it. Include response rate targets for your managers. If the goal is not being met, ask why it is not being met.
Ask managers what actions they have taken to increase it and what they plan to do to achieve it. Also ask them how they are tracking results with their team.
In return, when employees feel that their managers value their participation and consider their opinions, they are more likely to take the time to respond.
Temporarily disable some questions
Are you noticing survey after survey that there is a generalized problem with a specific engagement factor (e.g. workload) in teams? We advise you to temporarily deactivate the questions associated with this factor so that engagement discussions with managers do not always revolve around it.
Otherwise, it can make the process redundant, add a certain amount of fatigue and, above all, dilute all the other important elements.
Of course, the specific recurring problem must be addressed or at least recognized and communicated as such to employees. You may not have the ability or the solution to address the issue in the short term.
Why not involve employees in finding an innovative solution?! Perhaps by forming a committee on the issue, by proposing an ad-hoc survey dedicated to this issue or by capitalizing on the Amélio’s innovation module to leverage the intelligence of your organization's internal network.
Create a common goal
Create an attainable goal to motivate teams to complete surveys. If your organization reaches the goal, offer ice cream or pizza at the next employee gathering.
Sometimes it's small, benign rewards that generate a spirit of cooperation.
Incorporate discussion into team meetings
Make sure each manager has a recurring meeting with their team and shares the results of the survey.
What did they observe as strengths in the team and what are the 2 priorities they identified for the next month(s)? This meeting is an opportunity to discuss certain topics in greater depth with the team in order to identify solutions.
The manager should also share the changes that have taken place in the last few months thanks to the responses of his team.
For example, he/she can give a brief reminder of what was identified as an area for improvement in the last survey and what actions were taken to address this situation.
Employees need to feel that their responses are meaningful and that they benefit. Seeing a change, no matter how small, reminds them that their opinion matters to the employer.
Show the changes at a meeting
More generally, use a general meeting to say a few words about the observations that were made during the year in the surveys and the actions that were taken.
Also indicate your understanding of the survey results and what you will be working on in the coming months.
Most importantly, identify the issues that have been raised that you are unable to address at this time and why.
This will let employees know that they are being listened to and that their employer is genuinely considering their opinion.
They understand that the employer needs to prioritize changes. Employees understand that an employer can't fix everything, but they will feel involved as long as they see changes.