Listening Throughout the Employee Lifecycle

Every year, your organization dutifully trots out the annual engagement survey. Overall, that’s a good thing — IF you act on results. But even then, it’s not enough. Not in this shifting and uncertain business environment in which attracting and retaining key talent is paramount.

You must have your proverbial finger on the pulse of your people. And that requires listening throughout the employee lifecycle, from onboarding onward. Your company’s performance depends on it. Read on.

What is “Employee Experience?”

Let’s define some terms. The employee experience distills what an employee encounters, observes, and perceives during their tenure with an organization.

How Important is the Employee Experience?

There’s no question that, due to the lingering pandemic and other societal changes, the business world is amid a great deal of tumult. To thrive during such disruption, when people are rethinking where they wish to work and why, organizations must understand and prioritize the employee experience. After all, organizations that produce a positive work experience generate 25 percent more profits than those that don’t.

What is “Employee Listening”?

It basically means what it says – “listening” to what your employees have to say about their workplace experience. In so doing, you can evaluate and enhance the employee experience, gain important insights, improve performance, and empower your organization to make strategic, evidence-based decisions. Moreover, you can help your company with inclusion, equity, and diversity efforts.

Why is Ongoing Listening Key?

As we say, the annual employee engagement survey is simply insufficient. For actionable results, you’re going to have to “listen” throughout the employee lifecycle, including during key periods such as life events, transitions, and onboarding. Listening on an ongoing basis helps you to associate your employees’ varied experiences with your company’s performance and gives you an opportunity you to come up with solutions.

The bottom line is that you can save time and money by getting a handle on what’s working – and what isn’t – for your workforce. With the goal of a content and engaged workforce, gaining employee feedback on a regular basis generates valuable data that organizational leaders can use to make constructive changes. That means an employee survey – and more.

What Do We Gain from Employee Feedback?

There are definite benefits to listening to your employees. In fact, some of the benefits of gaining employee feedback include:

• The ability to establish and maintain connections. Engaged employees feel as though they can freely express themselves and share ideas. If this is the case, such employees will be there for you.

• The ability to attract and retain the right talent. You can use insights from “listening” to reduce expensive turnovers that have an unfavorable effect on your company’s performance and culture.

• Improved employee engagement. Engaged employees go all out for you, they speak well of the company, and they stick with you.

• Identification of areas that need improvement. Executives can evaluate feedback and produce solutions before whatever the issue is turns into something worse.

How Mercer Can Help

The consultant Mercer produces strategic listening programs for organizations, programs that marry the appropriate methodologies with the right content and nimble technology. It also delivers analytics and insights that are ready for action.

Beyond the employee engagement surveys, Mercer’s listening programs include recurring pulse surveys, employee census, digital focus groups, and more.

In all, “listening” throughout the employee lifecycle is imperative if you want to foster a positive employee experience, which, as we’ve discussed, directly affects your company’s performance. And we’ve found that the firm Mercer, with its experience and expertise, can help get you and your employees where you need to be.