5 Ways to "RAZE" Your Employee Engagement Scores: #3 of 5 - Blame the Questions

Five Ways to ‘Raze’ Your Employee Engagement Scores

#3: Blame the questions!!!

Looking back on the first two ways to ‘Raze’ your employee engagement scores: Laser-like focus on the numbers and Limited Annual Feedback leads us to the third way in which you can bulldoze any impact your engagement survey may have on improving performance which is of course, blame the questions!

It’s those darn consultants!

It couldn’t possibly be that your employees are actively disengaged because of the environment that management has helped to foster… it MUST be those darn questions on the exam! Look to change exam vendors every year or two, dictate the exact questions to ask and make sure not to rely on those pesky validated and reliable questions that they offer you in the ‘real’ survey. It's those darn consultants creating these tricky questions that lead us to think we have a problem so they can get more business, NOT that we have real areas of concern or an area in which we can take advantage of opportunities because of our strengths.

When you can’t blame the consultants – blame the employees!

Employees truly appreciate and feel valued when you tell them that the reason the scores are so low is because somehow, they didn’t understand the question. Now your employees are not just disengaged, but rather upset that you basically called them too ignorant to understand the basic question - “Overall, I am satisfied with my job.” The best way to keep your scores one step away from “open revolt” is not only to blame the questions, the vendor, and the employees themselves but tell them how they need to answer the questions before the survey even begins. Beyond answering the surveys for them, consistency in the questioning is a key consideration for year over year comparison and having a valid and reliable assessment from a trustworthy vendor is well worth the time, effort, and energy you put into it.

Challenge: Look at the real issues behind the poor scores, not simply blame the questions, the consultants, or employees. Doing this from an authentically genuine concern to improve the organization instead of just trying to pacify the C-Suite with the right action plan for this year will go a long way to gaining the respect of your staff and employees. 

About the Author:

David A. Miles, Ph.D. is an organizational leadership and development expert and the Founder & Principal of Dr. Dave Leadership Corp. – A Professional Consulting Firm. Dave helps leaders move from success to significance, helping them build and develop strong leaders, teams, and organizations to improve bottom-line results and profits. Dr. Miles can be found at www.DrDaveMiles.com.