How to gather effective employee feedback and act upon it

The recipe of a happy relationship

Ever been frustrated filling the long feedback form from those e-commerce websites and wished someone could just do the whole thing for you? What’s even more frustrating is- even after you spent a considerable amount of time reciting your ‘trouble’, the problem persists.

Result?

You stop caring. You accept that things are not going to change.

Employees are no different.

How many reminder emails do you have to send to urge employees to fill that ‘annual’ feedback survey? Five? Twenty-five? Wait, fifty?

Why am I not surprised? Why would they be interested in filling an hour-long feedback form unless they’re convinced that it’s going to benefit them. Why would they care when they know nobody is going to listen and all these feedback surveys are just a big show-off? Most often, this kind of negative surprise comes when organisations’ idea of employee feedback is vague and lacks purpose.

By now you must have gathered the essence of this blog- things needs to change. The process needs to be handled differently. It’s time that you start acting on the feedback — Listening just isn’t enough.

There’s plenty we can do, but let’s talk about how we can actually make that happen-

Listen to your employees while they work

The most important management skill is, listening.

Yes. You heard that alright.

Listening to your employees has great potential to transform the way you manage your organization. Employees want to be heard. Having an employee engagement policy is one thing. But making persistent efforts to reach out to your employees for their inputs is another. And this is exactly what defines how serious you are.

As a policy maker, you might slip on some thoughts while formulating a decision. Setting up regular feedback meetings or one-on-one sessions periodically is one method where you can take other people’s opinions.

Decide on the frequency, decide on the topics you want to discuss. Questions as simple as- how has it been going, is the work exciting enough, what changes would you like to see- can make a huge impact. Giving employees an opportunity to voice their opinion- that’s the key for an effective employee feedback.

Do it anonymously

Imagine yourself working in an organisation in a leadership role. Some of the policies work well, some don’t. For things that need to improve, you have ideas. But you are not sure. You think they can be better than they already are. However, when you send feedback surveys, no one responds. No one gives you consultation.

Now one reason can be- people feel prohibitive to voice their opinions. Now, let’s not get into those reasons. Rather think of what you can do to reduce those inhibitions.

Take for example- a work for home policy which people have been misusing. Now you know about it but you can’t pull it off. A better way to solve this problem is- do it anonymously.

This way employees do not have to reveal their identity and they can voice their opinions in a much better way. Candid and comfortable.

Share the results transparently

Organizations which are effectively motivating and cultivating inspiring work environment are the ones who practice transparency. Sharing the good (and the bad) results, bringing out everything out on the table, is one of the biggest reasons why their employees are much engaged. Do not let the results go into a black box. Especially the negative results.

Consider this situation- You left office on a Friday evening happily and came back Monday morning to see that a bio-metric attendance system has been introduced over weekend. Wouldn’t that shoot a hundred questions in your mind? People do not like surprises (unless it’s a Friday evening beer party) and they want to have a greater clarity of thought.

Eliminate the unknowns, do not let doubts to creep into their minds. Be transparent and let a happy relationship foster. When you bring your vulnerable side out in the open, you become more real. Nobody is perfect. All of us strive to be perfect. A work in progress, that’s what we are. So if you have been dodging to share the good, the bad and the ugly feedback with your employees, you need two spoons-Trust and transparency, one for each.

Devise an action plan around pain points

Now that you know what’s hurting you, take that feedback seriously. Listening is an art, and you need to master it. Value your people’s opinions and implement those suggestions.

A lot of suggestions might sound as inappropriate. So what? Some of your decisions might not work out either. Devise a strategy and be ready for some things to fail. The good thing about failure here is- atleast people won’t complain that their advice was not headed to. Don’t eat up on your people’s suggestions.

Follow up

You asked for suggestions. You got them. And you decided to act on them.

Come on, you must be unreal.

Give yourself a pat on the back. You are God-ish.

Just one last thing. I know you must be thinking- I have a business to run. It’s not too much, I swear. Follow up with your people. Ask them, how has it been going-the new change! Does it suit their need? Don’t do the whole process just for the heck of it. Do it because you want to improve your culture.

Only if you commit time to gather meaningful feedback and then act on it, you will start to see positive changes in your organization. Give it a try, these five steps. And be ready to see the good vibrant changes in your culture.