All wants best compromise. A motivated and inspired workforce means better retention, productivity, and innovation—results every business leader strives for.
But clearly, just wanting it isn’t enough.
As of 2022, the number of actively furloughed workers increased to 18%, indicating that pandemic-related obstacles were not the only thing preventing people from having a better life at work.
Instead, companies need to take concrete, data-driven steps to help their people feel more connected to each other and to their overall mission. They need to create a action plan for employee engagement.
At heart, this is a simple concept: ask employees for feedback, then show them you’re listening by enacting real change. That is the foundation of any healthy relationship, in the workplace or outside of it.
There is a lot to learn when creating an employee engagement plan. Here, we’ll start by breaking it down into six simple steps. Building an engaged workforce isn’t rocket science, it just means staying in close sync with your people.
Define the values, objectives and priorities of the company.
What do you care about and what do you stand for? What makes your company culture special? How can you stay true to those principles as you work to create more engaged employees? As you begin, take a close look at your company’s core values, mission and vision statements, and organizational goals.
For example, Disney strives to “design work environments that inspire optimism and drive innovation”. Atlassian Core Values they include “play, as a team” and “open company, no nonsense.”
Are strong relationships the most important thing to you, or are you more interested in supporting people? Do you motivate your people with financial metrics or rally around lofty goals like sustainability?
As you progress through the creation of your engagement plan, you may find that your specific goals or objectives change dramatically. But these core values and priorities should still serve as a guiding vision: they tell you what kind of work environment you’re looking for.
Set goals for your employee engagement plan
Using your values and priorities as a starting point, decide which goals you will work with this employee engagement plan.
Are there any specific metrics (like billing) that I need to improve? Or are your goals broader, like increasing employee happiness and a sense of belonging?
For example, if your company values team relationships, you might set a goal to improve the frequency and openness of communication between managers and employees, and build psychological safety across all of your teams.
It’s not always easy to quantify your goals, both in terms of knowing where you stand and tracking improvements. But with the right survey partner, you’ll be able to gather a complete picture of your engagement strengths and weaknesses and take specific steps to do better.
Be open to these goals evolving with the employee feedback you receive. You may be doing better than you thought in some areas, but you’re surprised at how poorly you’re performing in others. As long as you are guided by your core values and your mission, whatever path you take to get there is the right one.
Employee Engagement Survey
Conducting your engagement survey is probably the most important phase. This is where you actually ask your employees how things are going!
These findings will reveal the strengths of your commitment, issues that need to be addressed, and inform the action plan that will help you achieve your goals.
But not all surveys are created equal, and sharing one that is inappropriate or poorly thought out can be not only useless, but also detrimental to engagement and morale.
There are three types of engagement surveys:
- Vanity surveys, designed to generate results that will help you earn awards and recognition for being a good employer
- Self-managed surveys, designed by the HR team itself. Unfortunately, these surveys generally do not allow for respondent anonymity and contain biased and statistically invalid questions.
- Psychometrically valid surveys, which assess psychological drivers beyond employee engagement
To produce valid and useful results, we recommend working with a third-party survey partner like 15Five. Developed with academic experts, executive leaders and HR industry veterans, 15Five has developed a method for measuring 17 key drivers of engagement, across four different “spheres of expertise” at work.
Match Solutions to Participation Gaps
If your survey was rigorous and detailed enough, you should be able to pinpoint employee pain points and specific areas to improve engagement. (On 15Five, users can drill down into these gaps down to the level of specific managers.)
You and your team can then brainstorm projects and initiatives to address these problem areas. Here are some ideas.
- Are employees burned out and lacking in work-life balance?
- Consider mental health stipends or company-wide paid days off
- Do people see a lack of opportunities to advance in their career?
- Offer regular mentoring sessions and launch an internal job board
- Does your virtual workforce feel disconnected and isolated?
- Schedule virtual group lunches, coffee breaks or happy hours
- Do employees feel restricted, controlled or micro-managed?
- Find out which managers the problem is coming from and offer training and refresher programs
- Do people feel ignored, unappreciated, or overworked?
- Consider employee recognition and rewards programs – see our tips for creating a great one
If you’re not sure about a possible solution, don’t be afraid to tell your people. Do a quick pulse check or informal poll – are people on board with this idea? Would they be excited to participate?
Turn aspirations into achievable goals
You’ve collected data, you know where you’re going, and you have a rough idea of how to get there. Now, it’s time to get tactical: the ‘plan’ part of your engagement action plan.
Consider using a goal-setting framework like OKR or SMART goals to lay out the concrete steps you’ll take to bring your engagement action plan to life.
Even a simple goal, like “hold a weekly virtual happy hour,” will be more complex to execute than you might think. Your people are already busy – make sure everyone knows what needs to happen to get these new plans done.
For each solution, answer questions such as:
If you need help making things doable, 15Five’s surveys connect users with executive advisors and manager coaches, who can advise you on the best course of action.
Evaluate the results regularly
Keeping people highly engaged is an ongoing process, not a one-time task. This is one of the main benefits of 15Five ‘pulse surveys’, as opposed to the standardized annual engagement surveys of yore. Managed virtually on a regular basis, this model gives you a consistent, near real-time picture of engagement across your organization.
As you put your plans into action, evaluate and review them regularly. You need to monitor whether they are running according to plan, but more importantly, whether they are having the effects you want. Be prepared to modify and adjust your employee engagement strategy based on the results you see.
Measure, take action and increase engagement
Unless your engagement survey is valid, rigorous, and anonymous, it can actually make things worse. You’ll collect biased and incorrect data and hurt morale if employees don’t see their responses put into concrete action.
That’s why HR leaders and executives should consider 15Five Engage. We’re an easy-to-use, science-backed platform for measuring employee engagement, finding actionable insights, and taking action to drive real change.
