Today, consumers can provide brands with instant feedback before, during, and after nearly every interaction—and when they do, they expect a speedy response and an effective resolution. As a result, this “consumer first” mentality is starting to spill over into the employee/employer relationship.
Employees no longer just want to be heard; they want to play an active role in shaping their workplace on an ongoing basis. They want a voice in determining what actions are taken, when, and by whom—and they want to see results.
In fact, according to the IBM Institute for Business Value and IBM Smarter Workforce Institute, 83 percent of employees said they would participate in an employee listening program (https://ibm.biz/Bdrygz). In other words, employees want to serve as the eyes and ears of the organization. They want to alert leaders to customer issues, product perceptions, and opportunities for improvement. They want to be involved— and to help the organizations they work for be successful.
But listening alone, without insightful analytics and direct action, isn’t enough. Organizations need simple, efficient, and effective tools to tap into and act on employee voice. Luckily, today’s technology provides organizations powerful ways to tap into employee sentiment and extract actionable insights that will create a more effective, productive, and engaged workforce to fuel business momentum.
Changing the Conversation
Traditionally, organizations have gathered feedback through a point-in-time annual census, where employees share feedback, discuss pain points, and suggest changes. From there, managers review their results and make decisions on what practices to change or new ideas to implement—but as we all know, ongoing follow-up on action plans can be difficult to maintain. In today’s always-on society, and with the technology at our disposal, this approach can easily be evolved into one that is more continuous in nature and more effective at driving actions.
Employees’ needs and wants evolve on a daily basis. If they are only surveyed once a year and benchmarked against that point in time, how can organizations be sure January’s problem is still the issue that needs to be addressed in June? How can organizations ensure solutions are resonating with employees, driving improvements, and addressing pain points?
Organizations are starting to shift away from solely using traditional listening approaches, to solutions that enable a more active conversation with their employees. They are taking their “pulse” on a regular basis, and pivoting their actions accordingly. By expanding listening methods and increasing the frequency of touch points, organizational leaders can foster an ongoing dialogue with employees. And we know that it is effective. In fact, in a recent IBM Institute for Business Value and IBM Smarter Workforce Institute study, organizations using multiple listening methods had 24 percent higher-rated performance and reputations than those that didn’t (https://ibm.biz/Bdrygz).
Continuous listening allows leaders to better understand and respond to the ebb and flow of workforce issues, so they can spot warning signs, answer questions, foster innovation, and cultivate an ongoing conversation. By encouraging an open dialogue with employees and sharing the critical insights organization-wide, employees will feel more compelled to contribute to the strategic goals and success of the entire organization.
Unlocking Employee Insights with Cognitive Analytics
The next step in helping organizations ensure employee concerns are heard and acted upon is analyzing results— unlocking insights from employee data through advanced cognitive analytics—and highlighting areas in which to take direct action. Today, cognitive analytics can easily be used to help organizations analyze employee responses in conjunction with virtually any other data possible (e.g., Human Resources Information System data, performance metrics, learning, etc.) to highlight employee pain points or issues that will move the needle on the business’ bottom line.
For example, a sales leader might wonder what factors directly contribute to the sales team’s success. Using a cognitive- enabled analytics platform, the leader could pose a simple natural language query and ask, “What is the relationship between engagement and sales results?” By layering survey data with data from other parts of the organization— including financial results or performance metrics—the leader can obtain a holistic picture of employee performance, with key indicators of levers to pull to drive even higher sales.
The system may highlight that the sales team is more effective when members receive more timely communication, leading to quicker response times to their prospects and yielding higher sales (and, of course, higher engagement). Managers then clearly can see how to help their teams be more effective, and can engage with them in a way that encourages success, thus having an impact on business goals.
Establishing an Employee Listening Program
Taking action based on employee voice insights goes beyond simply listening to concerns; organizations need to listen with purpose. Ask yourself: W hy are we listening? This will drive not only how you listen to employees, but the type of tools you should use. Here are a few key areas you should focus on when establishing a continuous listening program:
1. Create a cohesive strategy.
- Listening is an ongoing activity— not just a point in time. Organizations musttruly understand what is being said and why— and to do so requires a strategy. Listen with a purpose, but also listen for key areas of opportunity.
- Use an initial survey to draw out issues that should be addressed, and build on those learnings to cultivate discussions that prompt even more input and action. Create a strategy around an ongoing, active two-way conversation with your employees that continuously drives the business forward.
2. Establish multiple channels for communication.
- This includes channels for employees to provide feedback, opinions, information, etc. This allows your organization to monitor, take part in, guide, and react to the conversation in an agile fashion.
- Start with a strong annual census survey to create a solid foundation. Add quarterly pulse surveys to target specific opportunities for improvement. But don’t forget to layer in other ongoing touch points (quick polls) that are relevant to your business.
3 . Understand the data to drive powerful new actions.
- Cognitive analytics provides powerful, yet accessible tools to help you truly understand and draw linkages from your survey data to business metrics— showing a direct impact of your actions.
- Analysis without action is meaningless. Establish a culture where a continuous conversation results in direct and iterative actions. Continue the conversation to ensure that actions taken result in the desired changes. Organizations no longer can hope their actions are effective— they need the proof. Have you ever asked yourself, “I wonder if this program is working?”
- Lastly, don’t limit your focus to HR. The tools available today can enable you to listen, analyze, and act to deliver immediate, clear, and compelling insights across your organization. This allows every employee in every department to drive success.
As the employee/employer relationship continues to evolve beyond the four walls of the workplace, it is critical to foster open conversations with your employees and tap into technology to derive valuable insights from their voices. Taking advantage of advanced cognitive analytics embedded with continuous listening solutions can allow you to engage in a more effective conversation with your employees that ultimately will address pain points, boost engagement, and directly affect the bottom line. Ready to get started?
With more than 20 years of human capital management consulting experience, Dr. Jay M. Dorio serves as the director of Employee Voice and Assessment for IBM Kenexa. Dorio’s primary objective is helping organizations improve their business performance by guiding the delivery of Employee Voice and Assessment solutions. For more information about IBM Kenexa, visit www.ibm.com/employeevoice.