How To Conduct Job Satisfaction Surveys

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All employers would love their employees to be completely satisfied with their work and the company. But in reality, That’s not the case for some employers.

Employee job satisfaction is important for a company to be successful. A job satisfaction survey will allow managers to get a sense of how satisfied employees are with their job. Keep reading to know what a job satisfaction survey is, why they are important, and how to conduct one.

Key Takeaways:

• A job satisfaction survey will be feedback from employees that will contain their thoughts and feelings on the company.

• It’s important to communicate the importance of the survey to employees so they can provide accurate answers.

• After getting the answers to the survey, following up and making the changes employees want will help improve employee satisfaction.

What Are Job Satisfaction Surveys?

A job satisfaction survey will be direct feedback from employees that allows them to share their thoughts and feelings about the company. Employee satisfaction is used to describe how content and happy an employee is at their current job.

Unlike employee engagement which evaluates how motivated and engaged they are in their work, satisfaction will be related to the overall organization. Satisfaction will be related to things like work-life balance, compensation and benefits, and company culture.

A job satisfaction survey should be collected and used to make improvements to the overall company. Some benefits of the survey include the following:

• Help identify common issues among employees

• Allows for employees to be heard by management

• Improve employee retention rate

• Helps to anticipate turnover

• Encourages open communication with employees

• Creates a record of employee satisfaction and how it changes over time

How to Conduct a Job Satisfaction Survey

1. Choose the survey topic. Your survey should focus on a specific topic. This will help you evaluate the results of the survey later on. Having a long survey with multiple topics can also confuse employees and make it harder for them to know the purpose of the survey.

2. Consider when you will be giving it to employees. You should be considering what events and things are occurring during the time you give them the survey. For example, if you have employee training, you should give them a survey relating to the employee survey shortly after the training ends to get the best results.

3. Choose which questions will be on it. Deciding on which questions you want to include will also help determine how long and in-depth the survey will be. You should also determine if they are going to be yes or no answers or open-ended answers. Your questions should relate to the topic of the survey.

   The length of the survey will also determine how often you provide the survey. If it’s a weekly or biweekly survey, it will not be as long as the quarterly or yearly survey that employees will fill out.

4. Clearly communicate the purpose of the survey. Before handing out the survey, you should inform your team of the purpose of the survey and what the outcome will be. Employees won’t want to take it unless they know what type of follow-up steps will take place from the management team.

   You should emphasize the importance of the job satisfaction survey to your employees and encourage all to participate. This will give you a better understanding of employee satisfaction if most employees turn one in.

5. Analyze data. After the surveys have been turned back in, it’s vital that your management team reviews them and comes up with an action plan to make changes. The survey will give the management team an idea of what needs to be improved or changed altogether within the company.

6. Follow up on feedback. Following up with the feedback you received is important. This shows that you are listening to what your employees are saying and the things that they want, and it makes them feel seen and heard.

   The action plan created by the management team should be put into play at this point. Allow for the changes to take place for a few weeks. Send out a new survey to get more feedback from the employees on how they like the changes.

Example Questions to Ask in a Job Satisfaction Survey

The questions that you ask in your survey will help you gauge how the employee feels about the company and their level of satisfaction. Here are some example questions to include in your survey:

Types of Employee Surveys

• Annual review. Annual surveys will be given to employees annually to evaluate their performance. The ultimate goal of this is to provide a performance review and will identify the employee’s strengths and weaknesses. This will allow you as an employer to create a professional development path for them.

• Management performance. This type of survey is similar to an annual review, just for members of management. The employees will fill out the survey to evaluate the leadership and how their performance is. The goal will be to improve how managers and leaders communicate and do their work.

• Company culture. This survey will help figure out if the company’s values and culture will relate to an employee’s own values. This survey will help identify any areas that need improving, such as leadership practices.

• Employee engagement. Engagement surveys will measure how valued an employee feels in the company. It will also determine how engaged an employee will be with their work. This type of survey will identify areas that need to be fixed for employees, and it will result in helping to reduce employee turnover for the company.

• Employee satisfaction. A satisfaction survey will determine how an employee feels about the company. Satisfaction is important because if an employee is not satisfied with their work, it will make them unhappy and disengaged.

• Onboarding. This survey will be given to new employees after they complete their onboarding training. The goal of this survey is to make any changes, if necessary, to create the best onboarding experience for your new hires.

• Training. Very similar to the onboarding survey, this will be used to evaluate your training programs and see how effective they are. This will allow you to improve your training programs.

• Exit interview. This survey will be given to employees when they leave the company. This will allow managers to make any improvements to the overall company, their job, and their responsibilities. This survey should not be included in their personnel file.

Why Employee Satisfaction Matters

Employee satisfaction is important because if an unsatisfied worker doesn’t like their job, they are not going to be productive. Unsatisfied workers can also become toxic over time, creating a negative workplace for other employees.

Happy employees will be more productive and more engaged in their work. This will also help improve customer relations. Satisfied employees will help improve retention rates, increase morale, and allow hiring managers to recruit top talent.

Job Satisfaction Survey FAQ

1. What is the difference between employee satisfaction and engagement?

   Employee satisfaction refers to how an employee enjoys the job, and employee engagement refers to how committed someone is to the company and the work. Just because an employee is satisfied with the job does not mean they are engaged. They can enjoy the job without being motivated to do any work.

   For an employee to be engaged, they are motivated to do the work. Highly engaged employees are often satisfied with their job, and they want to see the company they love succeed so they will stay motivated to work.

2. What is the best method of measuring employee satisfaction?

   A job satisfaction survey will be the best method for measuring employee satisfaction. Other ways to help measure satisfaction is to have one on one meetings with employees and ask about them and their work. Installing an employee suggestion box is another great way to get suggestions and gauge their satisfaction.

3. What are the components of job satisfaction?

   The components that affect job satisfaction include pay and benefits, job security, and engagement. Pay and benefits are important to how satisfied an employee is with their job. When a company provides good pay and benefits, they are less likely to find a job elsewhere.

   When someone doesn’t feel secure in their job, they will be worried about losing it. This will result in them being unsatisfied. Engagement is also important to satisfaction. When employees are not engaged with their work, they can become unsatisfied.

References

1. CDC Workplace Health Promotion – Job Satisfaction

Author

Taylor Berman

Taylor is a freelance writer from Pennsylvania. Taylor got into writing because she enjoys writing articles that help people and loves creating stories that inspire. She earned a bachelor's degree in journalism and public relations with an interest in communications media from Indiana University of Pennsylvania.