5 Tips For Creating An Employee Retention Survey

What are some tips for creating an employee retention survey?

1. Make sure to conduct an employee retention survey regularly
2. Keep the survey short
3. Keep the questions specific
4. Avoid leading questions
5. Make employees answer the survey anonymously

If you have not yet set aside time to conduct an employee retention survey, then this is the best time to do so. Today, almost 4 out of 10 employees are unmotivated to work compared to before the pandemic. Meanwhile, a study from Eagle Hill Consulting found that 1 out 4 employees plan to leave their job once the pandemic is over. There is a struggle to retain talent across industries at every organization level. Companies need to combat their impending turnover problems. This is why in this article, we listed down five tips for creating an employee retention survey. Continue reading to learn more.

What Is An Employee Retention Survey?

An employee retention survey is a type of survey that finds out what employees like and dislike about their job. The idea is to understand your workers’ motivational needs better.

Rolling out an employee retention survey can be a benchmark for future employee engagement efforts. It allows business owners and managers to find out if employees are fulfilled with their work.

In the survey, you can ask about the worker’s thoughts on the company culture, management style, or their job in general. As an employer, you will have a guide on what policy adjustments to make. This way, you can avoid remaining unaware of what needs changing until it’s too late (e.g. when the employee has already resigned).

The survey will bring to light the attitudes of employees planning to stay or leave the company. Read on.

Make Sure To Conduct An Employee Retention Survey Regularly

A high employee turnover rate can affect the bottom line of your business. Several factors increase employee turnover rates, such as poor compensation, lack of growth opportunities, negative work culture, poor work-life balance, and more. Fortunately, giving out an employee retention survey is one of the most proactive ways to increase employee morale and reduce turnover rates.

To make sure you get to monitor satisfaction rates effectively over time, an employee retention survey must be conducted regularly. As a rule of thumb, the survey must be disseminated every 6 months.

As an employer, you may also consider conducting an employee retention survey when there is a company policy adjustment (e.g. salary adjustment, new manager) to evaluate if the change has positive impacts on the employees. Lastly, an exit survey or interview should always be done when an employee resigns to pinpoint potential turnover rate problems.

Keep The Survey Short

According to a study, completion rates drop from 5% to 20% when surveys take more than 7 to 8 minutes to finish. Shorter surveys keep respondents more engaged, resulting in higher completion rates and higher quality data. When making an employee retention survey, the same fact is applicable.

This being said, aim to keep your employee retention survey short. A good way to go about this is to create Likert-scale-type questions that are less than 30 in length.

Keep The Questions Specific

Another effective tip for creating an employee retention survey is to be specific. The survey should be designed in a way that gathers valuable data. Make sure that each question is drafted so that the employee will know exactly what to expect.

For example, instead of adding the question “Do you think your work is meaningful?”, ask “How many hours do you spend doing work that you think has a purpose for the company?”. Being specific is particularly useful for close-ended survey questions as they would be easily understood by the respondent.

Avoid Leading Questions

Leading questions refer to suggestive questions that prompt a respondent to answer in a particular manner. In this case, the question will already contain the answer that the business owner wants to hear. Some examples of leading questions are “Do you have problems with the company culture?” or “How much do you appreciate the management?”.

Asking leading questions in an employee retention survey will provide heavily-biased feedback. The employee will be framed to provide answers that are not necessarily what they think so. In general, having leading questions defeats the purpose of having an employee retention survey: to gather accurate insights.

Avoid leading questions. Make it a point to truly understand your employees’ experiences while on the job.

Make Employees Answer The Survey Anonymously

When employees are given the chance to remain anonymous, they would be more honest and confident when answering the survey. They wouldn’t fear being singled out for giving bad feedback. When business owners do not know which employee submitted the survey response, they would not be able to put undue pressure on those employees who are afraid to speak up as well.

Key Takeaway

Employee retention surveys significantly reduce turnover rates and increase employee morale. Start building a better work environment for your employees today. Follow the tips for creating an employee retention survey we’ve stated above.

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