Employee Experience Survey Questions That Work

From the very moment someone sees your job posting to the day they leave your company, they’re having an experience with your company. Everything they do, learn, see, and contribute is part of their employee experience at your company. The employee experience matters. Companies putting their energy into crafting an exceptional employee experience find themselves in the spotlight and are 4.4 times more often listed on North America’s Most In-Demand Employers and 11.5 times more likely to be listed on Glassdoor’s Best Places to Work.

So what can you do about employee experience at your organization? Well, about 92% of companies will have a big focus on employee experience in the next 3 years by utilizing employee experience management and strategy. This includes many elements throughout the entire employee lifecycle. One important factor in a good strategy is that you build in opportunities for feedback to show that your company is committed to an environment of positive behavior.

How can you get that employee feedback though? One way is an employee experience survey. Discover what these surveys are, why they’re important, how to conduct them, and even sample survey questions that actually work.  

What Are Employee Experience Surveys? 

So, what exactly do these  surveys entail? They provide a means to  gauge how employees are interacting with your company, how they perceive you, and how that perception is affecting their behavior. It’s important to remember that employee experience is any moment of interaction with your company, so the survey is to determine how that experience has been and what actionable items could improve the overall employee experience.

Keep in mind, employee experience surveys aren’t the same as an employee satisfaction survey. An employee satisfaction survey is all about how the employee is feeling, and it’s a great way to check in on how employee wellbeing is going. But an employee experience survey is all about how positive it has been for an employee to interact with you as a company.

But what does that actually mean? Here are some key metrics of an employee experience survey:

• Satisfaction. Whether or not an employee is satisfied with their position says a lot about how their interaction with your company has been. Measuring satisfaction can help you see how your work world is affecting employees. It can also be valuable to create employee journey maps. 
• Engagement levels. Only 36% of employees are actively engaged with their jobs, so watching your company engagement levels is crucial. 
• Attrition rates. An average company might experience 18% turnover in a year. That’s not great news, so that’s why companies will watch attrition rates that show up in their employee experience surveys. 
• Morale. What’s the pulse on employee morale? It’s crucial to measure how employees are feeling overall about their current experience with the company. 
• Productivity. Productivity can boost morale and engagement. Being able to measure productivity in your employees’ experiences is a great way to see how your company is doing. 
• Motivation. You may measure employee motivation. But what can you do about employee motivation? Research shows that recognizing employees for their accomplishments (in any way from a shout out to a bonus) can increase motivation.

These surveys can be long and thorough and infrequent. They can also be short check-ins. However you choose to administer employee experience surveys, they can be a powerful tool. 

Why Conduct Employee Experience Surveys? 

So why should you take the time to conduct these employee experience surveys? The good news is that employee experience surveys benefit both the company and the employees. So let’s look at some key benefits. 

Corporate Benefits

Understanding your employees’ experience at your company can obviously help you improve your employee experience. But what does that do for you? There’s a key benefit of improving your employee experience: retention. It can cost you 33% of an employee’s salary when they leave, so it’s crucial to keep your retention rate high.

Employee experience surveys are a way to do just that. There’s a 16% drop in retention when employees aren’t comfortable with giving upward feedback. An employee experience survey can directly combat that. It’s an opportunity to let the company know how they’re feeling, and it’s an opportunity to give feedback. So your company benefits from these surveys because they can help you increase employee retention. 

Employee Benefits

Employee experience surveys aren't just for companies; they're a win-win for your team too. Let's dive into how your team benefits from these surveys:

• Improved job satisfaction. Employee experience surveys give you insight into employees’ job satisfaction. With this insight, you can use the actionable insights to actively work toward improving job satisfaction for your team. Job satisfaction is all about how your employees feel about their jobs. Companies with higher job satisfaction have higher profits, so utilizing the employee experience to improve job satisfaction is highly beneficial to your company as well. 
• Better organizational culture. Employees value culture over higher pay. Having a great organizational culture is important, and employees benefit when you’re able to provide that (you do too since they value culture so highly). Employee experience surveys are a way for you to tap into how the culture is and in what ways you can improve it. 
• Improved work environment. There are so many aspects of a work environment, including the physical environment and technology environment. Whatever the environment looks like for you, checking in with employees on a regular basis about it can help you find spots to improve, which can help improve your work environment. 

Tips for Conducting Employee Experience Surveys 

Employee experience surveys are gold for you and your team. Now, let's look at a few tips for conducting your surveys, so you can take advantage of all the best benefits.

• Identify your survey’s purpose. Is this a regular check-in or a thorough evaluation? Knowing what you intend for the survey helps you curate the questions to get the insights you’re looking for. 
• Communicate your survey’s purpose to employees. Employees might not know how great employee experience surveys are. So before starting one, tell them! Communicate clearly the purpose of the survey and how it will help them, so employees know to prioritize taking the survey and providing great feedback. 
• Keep the survey short and concise. Surveys that take 7–8 minutes to complete can see a completion drop off rate of 5 – 20%. Keeping it short and sweet will mean more people will actually complete the survey. 
• Have a follow-up plan. Once you get feedback, what are you going to do? Before you start, have a follow-up plan in place to put the feedback into action. 

Sample Survey Questions

Without any further ado, here are a few sample survey questions that you can use for an employee experience survey:

• What accomplishments are you most proud of?
• Does your company value employee engagement?
• Do you feel valued by your employer?
• How happy are you with your role (scale of 1 to 5)
• Which employee initiatives would you like to have implemented?
• What three words would you use to describe your experience here?
• How many hours of your workday would you consider to be productive?

The Bottom Line

There you have it: employee experience surveys are a way you can work to improve the work environment, culture, and job satisfaction levels for your employees. Ultimately doing so can improve your retention. After all, who doesn’t want to work for a company that values their feedback and works to improve their experience?

But here's the kicker: employee experience surveys are just the starting point when it comes to demonstrating your commitment to their wellbeing. Another powerful avenue to underscore your dedication is by enriching your benefits package. Eager to take the next step? Chat with a Wellbeing Specialist today and make employee wellbeing a reality for your workforce.

References

• Akhter, M. (2022, September 2). What is employee experience and why is it important? Envoy. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://envoy.com/blog/why-is-employee-experience-important/ 
• Chudoba, B. (2023, May 30). How much time are respondents willing to spend on your survey? SurveyMonkey. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.surveymonkey.com/curiosity/survey_completion_times/ 
• Gaba, I. (2023, May 18). What Is Productivity Management and Why Is It Important in 2023? Simplilearn. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.simplilearn.com/tutorials/productivity/what-is-productivity-management 
• Harter, J. (2021, July 29). U.S. Employee Engagement Data Hold Steady in First Half of 2021. Gallup. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.gallup.com/workplace/352949/employee-engagement-holds-steady-first-half-2021.aspx 
• Holliday, M. (2022, July 26). 50 Employee Turnover Statistics to Know Today. NetSuite. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.netsuite.com/portal/resource/articles/human-resources/employee-turnover-statistics.shtml 
• Mann, A., & Dvorak, N. (2016, June 28). Employee Recognition: Low Cost, High Impact. Gallup. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.gallup.com/workplace/236441/employee-recognition-low-cost-high-impact.aspx 
• 19 Employee Retention Statistics That Will Surprise You. (2023, January 2). Apollo Technical. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.apollotechnical.com/employee-retention-statistics/ 
• Steben, R. (2022, March 1). The Importance of Employee Feedback. Officevibe. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://officevibe.com/blog/importance-of-employee-feedback 
• Taylor, C. (2019, July 11). Workers value a strong company culture over higher pay, study claims. CNBC. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.cnbc.com/2019/07/11/workers-value-a-strong-company-culture-over-higher-pay-study-claims.html 
• What is EX? Your ultimate guide to employee experience. (2021, January 27). Qualtrics. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.qualtrics.com/experience-management/employee/employee-experience/ 
• What is job satisfaction and why is it important? (2022, May 12). FutureLearn. Retrieved July 23, 2023, from https://www.futurelearn.com/info/blog/what-is-job-satisfaction