There is not a paper or web based survey out there that can magically give you an engagement percentage. I’ve been involved in engagement focus groups and surveys from the periphery and not one of them has offered any level of enlightenment beyond what we knew before we started the engagement exercises.

I work for an amazing company. The CEO is a visionary and just a dam nice down to earth guy. We sell a product that kicks ass in our niche market and the campus reminds me of Swiss chalets nestled in the mountains. Our compensation is beyond fair and our benefits package Rocks the Casbah. Yet, people still bitch.

And I guess that’s my point. No matter how well an employer treats the serfdom at an organization, you will always have the people that are still dissatisfied. If I had to venture a guess, I would have to say these people are probably as cantankerous outside the office as well.

Cantankerous Wife: Honey, we just won the lottery.

Cantankerous Worker: Really how much did we win?

Wife: 1 million dollars.

Worker: Oh that’s nice. Two million would be better, but a million is nice.

These are the same people that when you give them free WaWa coffee, they want to know why we didn’t get Starbucks. They are the people that when they get three weeks of vacation wonder why Groundhog Day isn’t on the list of company holidays.

Want to measure engagement? Ask yourself the following questions.

Are we profitable?
Is everyone receiving high marks in their employee reviews?
Are nooses hanging from the drop ceilings?
Do we have high turnover?

There’s your engagement.

I wish I was old enough to remember the days when people were just happy to be employed.

So, my company changed the name of the Engagement Survey this year. Now its the Employee Survey, because you know, engagement is merely one aspect of the total experience.

And i'm guessing the scores last year sucked.

I don't know that I have an answer for you. There are ALWAYS folks who will try to convince you that things have NEVER BEEN WORSE, EVER and oh, for the salad days of 2003. Of course, in 2003, these folks were claiming things have NEVER BEEN WORSE, EVER.

Please.

Not a good idea to try and make everyone happy for the sake of making them happy, which is always what the surveys seem to represent for me - tell us what you dont like and we'll fix it! Or not!

Run the business well - when everyone is feeling secure about their job and making money you'll never hear about "engagement" - they'll be too busy being successful.

Mark Five to Survive! Fantastic! I'm glad I finally have a snappy catchphrase to apply to my approach to employee surveys. Of course, I learned to "mark five to survive" the hard way. My company has an engagement survey known as the Employee Satisfaction Survey. It's filled with a litany of questions about your satisfaction with your job, your level of understanding with respect to the company's vision, mission, etc., your understanding of your purpose and role within the company, and your satisfaction with your immediate supervisors and managers.

The survey results are SUPPOSED to be completely anonymous and confidential, so in my first year with the company — being young and idealistic and thinking I could contribute to the overall success of the organization — I foolishly answered these questions honestly, including a few questions about my superiors. By and large, I was very happy with things, but I thought there were a few areas that could use improvement and I used the survey to indicate my dissatisfaction.

HUGE MISTAKE.

The communications department here is very small. The organization itself is only about 100 employees. Little did I know, but although the results were anonymous, HR broke down the results by department. That stripped away much of my anonymity right off the bat. Being new also didn't help, because apparently the more seasoned employees were already living by "Mark Five to Survive," so my results drastically altered the annual averages. It wouldn't have taken a rocket scientist to figure out who had indicated dissatisfaction. But my fate was completely sealed when some of my co-workers forgot to complete the survey altogether, leaving my results as the only results!

When it came time to review our department's scores in a group meeting, the co-workers who failed to complete the survey quickly piped up to make the point well known to the group, leaving me twisting in the wind.

So there we were around the table: me, my co-workers, my supervisor and my manager, all reviewing results that had dropped dramatically in some cases, and that cast a bad light on the leadership abilities of my supervisor and manager. No one could actually come out and say the results were mine, but everyone around the table knew it. Going through those results line by line was one of the most excruciating moments in my professional life ("My supervisors actively listens to new ideas and acts upon them: 2.0").

Needless to say, things were quite awkward for some time afterwards. My supervisor and manager knew what I thought about certain aspects of their management style, and I knew that they knew, but no one could directly do anything about it.

Also needless to say, the scores miraculously rebounded to straight fives the next year, and they've stayed there ever since.

Here's what this always comes down to for me:

1) Treat employees like intelligent, involved, committed adults in relation to your business, and generally speaking that's how they will behave.

2) Understand and respect the fact that they have other responsibilities in addition to their job with you (i.e they aren't indentured serfs).

3) Offer a reasonable salary, decent benefits and the opportunity to grow your skills and advance within the company.

I can never understand why "management" can't seem to manage to do these things. I don't think they're that difficult, but apparently they are, because so many companies can't/don't.

P.S. Rob - Can I come work at your company????

Ah ... I remember when we piloted the Gallup Q10 a few years back. I remember reading the questions, the promo materials and the glowing Gallup collateral material and stats and saying to myself ...

"This is the biggest crock o' shit I have ever seen."

The best friend question was my favorite because none of us could figure out how to interpret it, let alone how it proved anything. The guys in "Office Space" were best friends, at least the best of work place friends, and would you say they were engaged?

Need fast cash? Create a new management fad!

Kristen, you read my mind! I dunno what field Rob works in, but I'm ready to sweep floors there if I have to. Sounds pretty picturesque =)

Wow, it makes me really sad to read all these comments. I guess deep down I'm an optimist (albeit a very sarcastic one), and I believe that the only way things can improve is if people are honest in these types of surveys (and to give candid feedback to their managers throughout the year). At my company, we have rules in place to protect employees from having to go through what Jimmy did, so I guess that helps.

Sometimes I feel a bit like Charlie Brown though, because unfortunately I don't always see a lot of action coming out of these surveys. Sure, people get pumped up for a little bit, but then by the time next year's survey comes around, I can't really look back and point at much that has changed. So those of you who are laughing at me, along with a virtual pat on the head and a "that's cute," probably have reason to do so.

Sorry guys, but I doubt anyone on this board is a tax consultant or an ERP guru. Those are the positions that we are currently hiring in droves.

I do work for an amazing company. I actually turned down a position recently for much more pay simply because I love where I work.

As a communciator it's the perfect place to work. They aren't afraid to take chances. Their courage actually allowed me to be highlighted by Ragan for the montly newsletter I write. not many companies will let you write a headline "California Cuts Through the Purple Haze of Marijuana Taxation"

A very timely post, Steve ... not 15 minutes ago, I finished struggling through a two-hour presentation on employee engagement, during which the presenter said this: "Employees are similarly impacted by these engagement levers."

I haven't a clue what that means, but I saw lots of people nodding, so I wrote it down just in case.

Truth be told, it sounds rather painful ... This actually harkens back to the previous topic on this blog -- "impact" is one of the current mangled phrases du jour. Somewhere along the way, it replaced "affect," and we're all the worse for it.

Man, where can I find a coworker that will wear only a hard hat and boots AND bring the grease gun?

I'm in agreement with Rob Patey. If a company is making money, not losing employees or customers and lawsuits aren't rampant, then employees are as engaged as they are going to be.

From my experience, companies tend to hold too tightly to the survey results and not see the forest for the trees. Example: Employees leaving a department like it's the Titanic and no one looking at the manager as the possible culprit! Can't get more disengaged then everyone's homepage being the help wanted ads!

For me - it's all about the cause. If the cause is presented strongly and compellingly enough people will self-select to be a part or apart from it.

Neruda's comments hit home for me -- a couple of years ago our corporation bought into the Seven Habits of Effective People program (yeesh.). Part of it involved a 360 degree survey by your supervisors, peers and subordinates. I, too, was naive and thought some honest feedback would do some good for my supervisor. When she got her feedback report she came right to me to find out why I didn't like her -- the way the results were presented made it very easy to see where the scores came from. Next time I'm trying the Five to Survive strategy.

On the same note I would imagine that telephone surveys have a similar outcome -- I'm guessing most people answer 4 or 5, or good or very good (or whatever the top and near-the-top scores are) for most stuff just to get through it, especially if the questions are long and painfully worded (you know -- the questions edited by a committee of micro-managers).

I'd be interested in finding out if there are any studies done about studies -- maybe a comparison of different ways of measuring satisfaction or "engagement" or whatever and seeing what the various outcomes are (i.e. phone, anonymous online, focus group, etc.).

Great piece! "The Carrot Principal" has some great ideas on measuring engagement, but I have no idea how one neutralizes the threat of the phenomena you've termed "five to survive".

Just an aside: In your second paragraph, you mean highly engaged workforces lead to HIGHER retention, right?

Not to change the subject, but I love the code words Steve refers to.

It reminds me of when I worked for my last corporate employer. What a fun group of people (really!). And nearby the office was this gas station -- yes, a gas station -- with the biggest walk-in beer cave you've ever seen and all kinds of indoor and outdoor seating. After work we'd often head for the gas station, fill up several buckets with a wide variety of golden beverages and have the greatest time ragging on whatever was giving us heartburn that day.

Our code for those after-work gatherings?

"Hey, I think it's about time for an oil change. See you at the gas station at 5."

Robert

Steve, where are you? And WHO are you -- Curly from "City Slickers?" I've been holding my breath for more than a week, waiting to learn "the one thing."