Leveraging the Connections between Employee Engagement, Customer Satisfaction and Organizational Strength

Companies with high levels of employee engagement earn returns that are more than double those of the overall market" While there is no magic pill or instant solution for employee engagement, Insightlink's years of experience with organizations of different sizes and spanning various industries reveal clear connections between employee engagement and organizational strength. One of the strongest connections is often customer satisfaction. Connection is the link - whether it has the strength of a chain or the precariousness of a thin thread - that correlates employee engagement to an organization's strength (most typically financial strength).

Engaged employees function as the beginning of the link and, ideally, the other side or end is the organization's strength as a whole…the customer satisfaction in between is the crux of the link. That link takes the strength of employee engagement and leverages it into revenue growth and profitability. Engaged employees perform in a manner that leads customers to act more loyally, which generally leads to greater profits and future growth. Disengaged employees (such as what Insightlink's 4Cs framework calls "Dissatisfied Compromisers") do just the opposite.

So how do we help organizations build and strengthen this link? When it comes to employee engagement, the process and practice for appropriate alignment of survey results with subsequent action planning optimally include:

Leadership involvement from senior executives, particularly the top executive
Clarifying and establishing overall objectives
Determining drivers of engagement
Effectively communicating the objectives to the internal audience at all levels
Aligning to objectives, including appropriate accountability
Measurement of the work-life environment
Acting on the results

The underlying premise is that successful organizations need to retain people who care about their work, who care about how they perform it and who care about the overall success of the company. Ready to see how you can benefit from increased engagement? Get an instant quote now or call us at 866-802-8095 x705. Like so many of our customers who return year after year, seeing an average of 6-7% points improvement in their overall employee satisfaction, you'll be glad you did.

Does Employee Satisfaction Lead to Higher Profits?

Or more importantly, does low employee engagement lead to a drop in profits? A recently published article from Wharton University of Pennsylvania examines the issue. In a paper titled, "Does the Stock Market Fully Value Intangibles? Employee Satisfaction and Equity Prices," the stock returns of companies with high employee satisfaction are compared to various benchmarks -- the broader market, peer firms in the same industry, and companies with similar characteristics. This research indicates that companies with high levels of employee satisfaction earn returns that are more than double those of the overall market.

Organizations of all sizes see that employee engagement is directly correlated with employee productivity and company performance. Despite this, senior management sometimes forgets it's still critical to focus on engagement, even during an economic downturn. Some figure, why bother making sure employees are satisfied when they are likely to stick around and perform anyway? See how investing in employee satisfaction surveys can help not only your workplace, but your bottom line in 2009. For a guided Webinar walking you through Insightlink's 4Cs survey process, contact us at info@insightlink.com or call 866-802-8095 x705.

Boosting Participation without Incentives

Embedded Questions - Even Cookie Preference - Can Boost Participation on Employee Engagement Surveys.

Insightlink's 4Cs survey is designed to be sufficiently engaging and motivating to achieve high participation and completion without the use of incentives. During our issues meetings with clients, we discuss the nature of the organization's work force to assess whether incentives are warranted. Incentives are something many survey providers grapple with, since there are pros and cons to using them. The issue of whether or not to use incentives to boost participation in employee surveys comes up regularly. Inevitably, somebody suggests encouraging managers to tell their employees that there will be a company-provided celebration (probably the most common is a pizza party or other type of lunch) for any department that can boast 100% participation in the survey. Other organizations set up "contests" where departments vie to see which can achieve the highest participation - again, with some sort of company-sponsored prize going to the winner(s). A few have attempted to enter individual participants into drawings, often with multiple prizes. So what does Insightlink recommend?

As a general rule, we advise clients not to make participation in the survey a competition. We generally recommend against individual winners or rewarding teams. If you do choose this route, however, be sure to communicate the incentive plan often and well. Be sure you have consistent and fair rules. Instead, consider a company-wide incentive. Make it meaningful to employees and feasible for the organization. For some, this may be donating to a charitable cause if they achieve their participation goal. Employees are less likely to view this type of incentive as a bribe, since it does not benefit employees directly. Insightlink's research team recently experimented with a new way to encourage survey completion that is employee-driven, not externally driven. Our client planned to have an "Employee Cookie Day" at the conclusion of the employee survey. So at the end of the survey, we added a question giving employees the opportunity to vote for their favorite cookie.The primary goal was to create a concrete way to show employees that HR was really listening to the survey results. A secondary benefit was that the symbolism of treating employees to a day with cookies, provided in quantities similar to the vote outcome, gave the organization time to do short, medium and long-term action planning. That such actions boosted participation was an added bonus. Adding a question about cookie preferences concluded the survey in a positive and unexpected way - and even provided a survey question that was okay to discuss around the water cooler. It created buzz about the survey and prompted more staff to want to offer their two cents - which they only could do by answering the entire survey, since the cookie question was strategically placed at the end.

And yes, chocolate chip was the winner!

FAQ: conducting an employee loyalty survey

Common Questions-How do I use the information?
Friday, April 24, 2009 by Chris Woolard

The last question in this series on five common questions in conducting an employee loyalty survey is, how do I use the information?One of the worst things a company can do is conduct an employee survey and do nothing with the results. It would be better for a company to do nothing than to ask for employee opinions and not act on them. What I have seen work best is to create a cross-functional team of 5-10 employees. Their job is to digest the information, help communicate the results, solicit feedback and suggestions, and create the final action plans. The team should be comprised of employees from various departments and positions, although I would not recommend putting an employee on their boss on the same team. You can have team work on all of the action items or have a different team assigned to each action item. I like having different teams (with maybe one or two common members across all teams to help coordinate and facilitate) as this gives more employees the opportunity to help create change in the organization. Not only does this create buy-in because it is no longer just an "HR" initiative but it also helps the employees grow and develop by doing something that is not part of their typical job but is valuable to the organization. These teams can be at any level of the organization. Some clients will have teams at the total company level only while others may have teams going on at different regions or even different departments in the organization. It really depends on the culture, size, and complexity of the organization as to the specific structure of the teams. Once action plans have been created, smaller implementation teams can be created to ensure the action plans are carried out. It is generally not necessary to have 5-10 people on the implementation team as the implementation team is more about execution and less about brainstorming. The implementation team's responsibility is to ensure the specific actions are carried through.