When it comes to building and sending out surveys, the focus is often on the customers. Without the loyalty of customers, money doesn’t flow into the business. However, employees’ skills are essential to the success of your business.
Employees are often one of the largest expenses any brand has. And it can cost more than half of an employee’s annual salary to replace them when they leave. These costs may be unnecessary if you can retain staff better.
To retain your staff, you need to know more about them. While talking to employees can sometimes yield good results, it doesn’t always. Staff can be unwilling to provide constructive feedback in fear of being seen as a complainer. Therefore, you have to rely more on internal surveys answered by your staff.
So here are some of the views, news and advantages you can get about your business from employees.
What do your employees think about your business?
When it comes to work, employees have to follow set processes. For instance, they have to complete paperwork, use systems in certain ways and speak to customers with specific phrases and manners. These are important because standardisation makes it easier for other employees to help and it creates a brand image.
However, standardisation doesn’t mean that you have the right processes. Those on the front line might think that some operations are inefficient for the work. Perhaps work is being completed twice when it only has to be done once.
If you ask employees, they might tell you what processes are taking too long or are unnecessary. Then you can look at adjusting the operations to shorten them. Less work will save costs as well, making your business more productive, earning more revenue and cutting costs.
Discover when systems aren’t fit for purpose
As a manager, it is easy to think that all your equipment is how it should be. However, staff who work on the IT infrastructure all the time might have a different story. They might say that your printers only work part of the time or the software you’re using keeps crashing.
If you know that something is wrong, then you might be able to fix them. Or you could use this information in the next round of your IT infrastructure development. You can take their comments and give it to your IT team to build a new, more suitable IT system.
Spot opportunities that you are not taking advantage of
One of the biggest mistakes made in businesses is not realising they’re missing out on opportunities. Those on the front line are talking to customers every day. Customers ask lots of questions. And those questions rarely get pushed back up to senior managers who make decisions.
Yet your staff could tell you in surveys. If customers are asking for slightly cheaper packages or new product options, then you have opportunities. Or perhaps your employees realise that you’re working towards the wrong customers and other customers are more loyal and spend more money with you. These little insights that only those on the front line can give should be collected and used to improve revenues and profit margins.
Identify Key Employees For Promotion
As a senior manager, you might think that you have an eye for talent, but research has shown that half of all hiring decisions are wrong. That means that the best candidate for a position is often left out because someone else has been more persuasive.
Promoting the wrong person has a wide range of problems for your business. It can disrupt the work that is done by your current set of employees. It can make those who are key employees leave. And finally, it can increase costs within a team.
Senior managers should seek the opinion of those who are working within an environment on who to promote. The team are the ones that the promoted person will work alongside. They also have more insight into everyone working in the department. So they will know the good and bad of everyone.
Do not look for the bad in potential promotion contenders. This strategy can create a bad culture in your team. Instead, search for the value that candidates can offer the role. So ask questions that relate to leadership, support and ability to manage workloads.
Are your employees happy?
Finally, using surveys internally allows you to take the pulse of employee satisfaction. Satisfaction plays a massive part in the success of your team. Just a small increase in employee satisfaction can lead to lower costs, higher revenues and less staff turnover. Therefore, your profits will be much higher. You can then spend less time replacing staff.
The average employee turnover for a UK company is about 15%. If your turnover is more than that, then you need to find out why. Something as simple as no career progression, little financial compensation or, not having flexible working conditions could be the cause.
Being undervalued at work is the main reason why employees leave an organisation, not because they are underpaid. And this is why surveys can be so valuable. You can demonstrate that you value your employees by realising the responses from surveys and making improvements.
This simple trick can improve staff turnover, reducing your rate and costs associated with it.
Listening more to employees can also improve retention. If employees tell others that you are a forward-thinking company, more talent, of a better quality will apply for open positions. Therefore, you will improve the quality of your team at the same time.
Conclusion
Internal surveys are often not done. And can be viewed as a search for praise by senior managers. Employees often feel undervalued when their responses are not acknowledged. By acknowledging employee views, several aspects of your business will improve.
Using apps like Tapapp can often help you find out more about your organisation and help it grow. You can find out opportunities, improve staff retention and discover new ways to increase profits. Using surveys can do more for your business than some marketing campaigns or releasing a new product.
Create your first internal survey with Tapapp. Quick and easy, no fuss!
More in our blog:
