Employees Provide the Answers
Guiding a Company-Wide Survey Follow-Up
Starting Point:
The new Personnel and Organizational Development Manager had only been in the post for a few weeks. She had inherited a tricky project: The results from the company-wide employee survey. “I want this survey to really change things – and to do that we need even more answers. The data don’t show us what the employees really care about,” she explained in her request for our support in the follow-up process. The goal is to use the survey results to effect change at all levels within the company. “We want to provide systematic support to all managers and their teams,” she told us.
Procedure:
We chose a positive, solution-oriented procedure that would elicit creative ideas. A total of 50 divisions, departments and (management) teams linked networks of participants numbering between six and forty who brought their perspectives on the current situation to a ‘World Café’, combined their insights in a ‘Circle’ on core topics and developed solutions using free thinking and fun in an ‘Open Space.’ The stipulation was this: The team must be able to initiate/implement all measures internally. Six weeks on from the workshop, each manager had the opportunity to attend a coaching session to help with implementation. A comprehensive assessment of the workshop results revealed what the employees really care about. The recurring core topics were addressed by a steering committee and transformed into company-wide measures.
Results:
The atmosphere in and following the workshops was very positive. “We picked the right topics and were able to discuss them critically – and it was even fun. It was great to be able to contribute in this way.” The teams were somewhat skeptical about the implementation. “In the end my satisfaction will depend on whether we really manage to implement our solutions,” many employees told us. Eight to twelve weeks after the workshops we received the first reports of success: Many of those measures had already been implemented. More than a few managers were continuing cross-hierarchy dialogues. Several initiatives addressing the core topics have been drafted throughout the company.
Our Tasks:
We guided the employee survey follow-up process by designing the follow-up architecture, facilitating the workshops, providing coaching in how to implement the changes and evaluating the overarching core topics.