How can you boost response rates and beat survey fatigue?

The best way to short-circuit survey fatigue that I've found is to describe a survey as a "communication improvement exercise" - especially when it's a follow-up to a previously conducted survey. This has two benefits: 1) Employees want to improve communication and see it as positive that their organizations are working on this. 2) The follow-up to improve communication can be seen as a positive impact in and of itself.

D'après mon expérience, les collaborateurs sont plus réactifs quand le sondage est proposé comme outil de mesure et d'amélioration d'une situation bien défini. Il faut donc opter pour des titres et des descriptions simples et droit au but. Ils considèrent cela comme une attention à leur égard et un premier pas pour améliorer un sujet qui les concerne. Il faut que l'enquête soit courte et porte (idéalement) sur une seule problématique destinée à une population bien segmentée.

Simplify as much as possible: One suggestion: If you have some time to collect the rhetorical feedback you're looking for, consider one question each time you sent out an email or newsletter. Draw attention to it in a banner or distinct typeface, and make the response options clickable. This won't feel like a survey as much as simply gauging your audiences interest. Plus, who doesn't like clicking on a button? However, this doesn't work if you need all your data in one go - or if you're looking for long form responses.

When you segment your audience, you can precisely tailor your approach. For instance, you wouldn't ask the same questions to a manager, a collaborator, or a project participant. You'd also consider variations in language and device preference, such as computer or smartphone usage. This segmentation ensures that your messaging is highly effective and relevant to each group, ultimately leading to a more significant impact.

Apply nudging as your polling technique. As an example, rather than issuing a stand alone survey use eyes-on-moments like all hands, newsletter articles, CEO messages, performance updates to add a few pulse questions and polls. It's much easier to get someone in the moment because this feels much less intrusive and contrived than a survey. In a formal survey setting, human behaviour often denotes we respond in the way that we feel will be most positively received or is expected of us. So using this nudge approach can also give more instinctive responses.

Also choose the right universe. You don't need to hit the whole organization every time. You can do a random sample, or you can focus on different audiences at different times - like the folks at a plant where the next town hall is taking place, or new hires from a university where your recruiting team is headed next week.

One of the practices that have worked well is a campaign; like you said, we did showcasing the changes implemented as a direct result of the survey. recognizing people for their ideas that made a difference.

@Jyoti Khan is right. One of the great uses for internal communication is to amplify the changes made as a result of employee listening and feedback. Indeed, demonstrating responsiveness in some areas can buy leadership time and credibility for addressing more difficult and intricate problems.

Is it survey fatigue or do employees feel like they aren’t listened to? Make sure that you are truly listening and communicate what you have learned from the survey. Highlight how you are making changes, share the feedback, and be transparent. This act of accountability and humility by leadership earns the trust of employees. People love to give their opinions…but only when they known their opinion will be listened to.

Survey fatigue—the boogeyman of the corporate world. But let's pause and ask: Is it real, or is it just a convenient excuse for poor engagement? We talk about "fatigue" as if we're running marathons here, but we're talking about ticking boxes and sliding scales, not physical exhaustion. Let's dissect this. The complaint is often that there are too many surveys, but could the issue actually be that there are too many irrelevant or poorly designed surveys? And about this idea that only the "overly enthusiastic or deeply disgruntled" respond—well, isn't that data too? If you're only hearing from the extremes, maybe that's a signal that the middle ground is too disengaged to even bother. That's not fatigue; that's a red flag.

Complementing the survey with focus groups to get additional insights works well. Consider segmenting the audience for focus groups as per your audience demographics.