Companies that stop caring, stop growing.

Businesses are agile and organisational change is not only inevitable, but a real opportunity to skyrocket levels of employee engagement, morale and staff retention. If processes aren’t working, they need to be altered and if business practices are proving to be toxic, they need to be eliminated. But how do we know what needs to change and when? It starts with communication — more specifically, by listening to your employees and tackling the issues they’re highlighting. 

One listening strategy that is known to get great results when executed effectively is the employee survey. By carrying out surveys, you show your employees that you care about their opinions and you are interested in enacting positive change. 

At People Insight, we work with organisations to analyse their company culture and employee experience, ultimately providing surveys and data-driven recommendations for organisational change. If you are considering carrying out an employee opinion survey, you might want to know what you’re in for — below, we’ve listed a few survey questions we have found are fundamental to assessing the employee engagement, diversity and wellbeing of an organisation.

It’s worth noting that employee opinion survey questions are generally posed as a statement — employees are then asked to mark on a scale how much they agree, or disagree, with the given statement. This provides businesses with thousands of data points to explore and analyse.

Employee Opinion Survey Questions To Assess Engagement

The PEARL™ employee engagement model looks at employee engagement by asking questions designed to explore purpose, enablement, autonomy, reward and leadership. 

Organisational psychologists and data scientists teamed together, reviewed the latest literature and carried out client research over 20 million data points to determine what questions are most revealing when it comes to employee engagement. Such questions will tell managers whether or not employees feel supported and encouraged, whether they have space to grow and whether they feel a connection to the company’s overall goals.

Below are a few examples of questions designed to reveal how employees feel about their position, their managers and their company as a whole:

1. I know how the work I do helps my company to achieve its aims
2. The purpose of my company makes me feel good about my work
3. I get the training and development I need to do my job
4. My job makes the best use of the skills and abilities that I have
5. I can comfortably cope with my workload

Employee Opinion Survey Questions That Explore Diversity and Inclusion

The BELONG model drills down into issues relating to diversity and inclusion to see where improvements can be made. Diversity is something that should be high on your priority list as a business leader — not only is treating people fairly and compassionately the decent thing to do; it’s also a wise business move. 76% of employees say that a diverse workforce is an important factor when looking at companies and studies have shown that diverse businesses are more profitable.

Among others, we ask employees the following questions:

1. Perspectives like mine are included in the decision-making
2. My company promotes a culture of openness and honesty
3. Senior leaders understand the issues impacting people with backgrounds like mine
4. If I raised a concern about my treatment or the treatment of others at work, I feel confident that I would be treated fairly and taken seriously
5. I feel able to challenge the inappropriate behaviour of others in the workplace

Employee Opinion Survey Questions That Tackle Wellbeing

Wellbeing initiatives have surged in popularity over recent years, and for good reason. Wellbeing programmes and mental health benefits are a massive draw for top performers and what’s more, employees who feel their wellbeing is being taken care of are a staggering 70% less likely to look around for opportunities elsewhere.

Our THRIVE wellbeing model poses questions that explore pressing issues relating to wellbeing, mental health, recognition and workload pressures:

1. I am satisfied with the flexibility of my hours
2. My company really cares about my health and wellbeing
3. My manager cares about me as a person
4. If I had an issue regarding my wellbeing, I would feel confident raising it with someone at work
5. I feel able to cope with the stresses of my job without it affecting the quality of my work

What more can you do?

These are just fifteen employee survey questions that you can pose to your team to get an idea as to where you stand and where you can improve — but there are so many more. Every organisation is different, as is every employee survey. Knowing what to include is a complicated but necessary question to ask, and as experienced professionals in this area, we can guide you through every step of the way.

When it comes to supercharging productivity and performance, it all starts with your employees. You want to make sure they are content, motivated and engaged. To do that, you need to listen to them. Get in touch today for a tailored employee survey and begin your journey to meaningful organisational change.