Human Resources

4 Reasons an Employee Engagement Solution Is Key

For businesses to remain competitive during times of uncertainty and transformation, understanding employee sentiment is critical. That’s where employee engagement software gives you the edge.

Blaise Radley

Editorial Strategist

Workday

In this article we discuss:

In the modern world of work, knowing what your employees think is more important than ever. According to Workday research, 75% of industries are showing an increase in high‑potential voluntary turnover. To ensure your organization retains its top talent, you need to listen to your employees.

That’s where an employee engagement solution is crucial.

The power of employee engagement software is in bridging the gap between people and data. As we continue to face changes to the way we work, the businesses that succeed will be those who listen to their employees—and act on the findings.

What Is an Employee Engagement Solution?

An employee engagement solution is a tool designed to track trends in engagement and gather employee sentiment from across an organization. That data is then used to drive business decisions, improve employee engagement and retention, and directly address employee concerns.

Here are the most critical functions employee engagement tools perform for HR teams:

Employee engagement survey: Whether delivered annually or weekly, the employee engagement survey is the cornerstone of all employee engagement platforms. It provides employees the opportunity to give feedback on a variety of different topics, usually either as a score or a written response.
Employee dashboard: An employee dashboard enables employees to see their own engagement metrics over time and the drivers that are influencing it (whether positive or negative). It can also enable conversations between an employee and their manager and suggest relevant training courses or support.
Manager dashboard: A manager dashboard gives managers the ability to see the full scope of their team and its engagement scores, typically highlighting areas that may need attention. In addition to highlighting the number of engaged employees, an AI-powered dashboard may also provide suggested manager actions.

Regardless of functionality, employee engagement solutions aim to create a positive work environment and develop a more connected workforce. In doing so, they contribute to increased productivity, retention, and employee satisfaction.

The power of employee engagement software is in bridging the gap between people and data.

Choosing the Right Employee Engagement Platform

Having a reliable method of measuring engagement is integral for promoting high team performance. But it's not enough to solely measure engagement—you need to empower managers to act on the insights you uncover. That's why you have to ensure that the engagement tool you select is well suited to your organizational needs.

Here are five tips to help you find the best engagement software to support your company’s employee engagement strategy.

Ensure you have access to real-time data

The major benefit of employee engagement software over traditional annual surveys is that you have access to real-time feedback and metrics. That means if your workplace culture sours or there’s widespread discontent over pay, it’s easy to identify the problem as it occurs. The ability to get a regular read on what your employees are thinking and why is invaluable—make sure your engagement solution is equipped for the job.

Prioritize tools that utilize AI

Another advantage employee engagement solutions have over traditional surveys is the reduction of HR admin work. Without artificial intelligence (AI) to surface relevant, actionable insights as and when your company needs them, sorting through large amounts of people data can be difficult. Make sure you understand how machine learning is integrated, both in terms of how the platform selects survey questions and how it presents employee data.

Compare and contrast methodology

There are multiple theories about the best way to measure employee engagement. From the Likert scale to eNPS to text-based responses, there’s not a definitive answer for which approach is best. What’s important is that the data you gather is flexible, enabling managers to see multiple different viewpoints and categorizations, providing a rounded picture of their team.

Seek out seamless integrations

An employee engagement survey is only as useful as the number of people who complete it, which is why meeting your employees in the natural course of their workday day is crucial. Providing feedback should be seamless, meaning that solutions should have easy integrations with other HR platforms and communication tools such as Slack or Microsoft Teams, as well as mobile access and consumer-grade interfaces.

Be wary of tools that promise anonymity

By nature of the survey process and the close relationship between managers and their employees, true anonymity is near impossible. Though an employee may aim to remain anonymous, they may leave identifiable markers in their responses (purposely or accidentally), such as a reference to a specific project they worked on or referencing an in-person conversation. Instead, survey software should prioritize confidentiality, ensuring employee details are removed.

When management ensures that frontline employees feel a sense of ownership, transformations see a 70% success rate.

How Engagement Software Solves 4 Key Challenges

As businesses face pressure from competitors as well as increased turnover risk, employee engagement can’t fall behind. In order to avoid turnover, business leaders must use engagement solutions to assess employee sentiment toward all aspects of the employee experience.

In this section we’ll explain four common challenges businesses face, before outlining how employee engagement solutions can help you overcome them.

1. Employee Disconnect From Company Values

The shift to hybrid working environments has required many companies to rethink how they communicate their values to employees. As part of that process, organizations should take the opportunity to further redefine their values. If your values and culture are only clear at in-person locations, you risk alienating huge numbers of employees.

The Engagement Solution: Create Space for Regular Feedback

When trying to improve any aspect of employee experience, good internal communication is key. But communication doesn't just cover the information you share, such as all-employee meetings, internal newsletters, or Slack and Teams updates. If employees can't share their own thoughts back, that's a problem.

Here are three areas where an engagement solution can help create space for frequent employee feedback:

Institute regular employee engagement surveys. Issues that employees are facing shouldn’t only come to light during a performance review or exit interview. The cornerstone of any successful engagement initiative is pulse surveys (short, frequent questionnaires). By delivering surveys at a higher frequency, you ensure you can act on data that is accurate and relevant.
Touch base with your managers. People leaders are at the heart of your company culture. That’s why an employee survey is just as important for management as it is for the teams they manage. Bring your managers into the fold at every level, listen to what they have to say, and respond with meaningful, measurable actions.
Enable your managers to act. Company values mean nothing if you don’t act on them. With the best employee engagement solutions, managers can take action straight from their dashboard, highlighting areas their team members are having issues with and engaging in confidential conversations.

2. Employee Wellbeing and Burnout Risk

Across different industries, we’re standing on the edge of an employee burnout crisis. According to Workday research, 27% of employees are currently at high risk of burnout. Not only does that place a strain on individual team members, but it places a strain on their managers too. But how can businesses address employee wellbeing concerns and prevent employee burnout?

The Engagement Solution: Use Real-Time Data for Real-Time Responses

Fundamentally, you can’t address a problem you don’t know exists. As the pace of workplace change continues to rise, your ability to respond to employee concerns also has to improve. Having access to to-the-minute data insights ensures that your employees are heard before they're completely overwhelmed.

Here are three ways an engagement solutions can help address burnout risk:

Focus on real-time data. With employee engagement software, not only do you provide employees with a platform to voice their thoughts, you also get access to live insights. In doing so, you dramatically increase the relevancy of your data and significantly decrease HR workload.
Empower managers to take action when it matters. Since an employee engagement solution provides managers with real-time survey data, managers can take action as soon as a problem emerges. To do so, they need support from senior people leaders, and the assurance that low engagement scores aren't a sign of failure.
Search employee comments with machine learning. Employees may not always use the same words to discuss an issue, but consistent sentiments still emerge. Using natural language processing technology, AI-powered tools enable managers to search employee comments for semantically-related insights, ensuring you always know what’s top of mind.

According to Workday research, 27% of employees are currently at high risk of burnout.

3. Decreased Levels of Psychological Safety

Psychological safety refers to an employee’s ability to share their thoughts without fear. That fear may stem from a concern that speaking up could impact their chance for progression, or that their ideas may be shot down and mocked. If your employees don’t have space to raise contribute constructive feedback without negative consequences, you risk decreased engagement and increased turnover.

The Engagement Solution: Enable Confidential Two-Way Conversations

When employees feel heard, that recognition contributes to feelings of safety and engagement. That might be reflected in an opportunity to raise questions during an all-company meeting, or in having a regular 1:1 set up with their people leader. The role of employee engagement software in enabling psychological safety in those instances can’t be overstated.

Here are three ways an engagement solution helps your organization improve psychological safety:

Embrace confidentiality. By using an engagement solution that enables confidential conversations, you ensure your employees can speak up with conviction. Plus, by surveying employees regularly on a variety of different topics, you encourage them to contribute in areas where they may have otherwise lacked confidence.
Promote a feedback culture. Regularly surveying your employees and informing them of the actions being taken as a result lets your people know that what they say matters. More than that, it shows that speaking up isn’t a problem—it’s welcomed. That feedback culture will serve your business well in both good periods and bad.
Enable greater visibility. Confidentiality doesn’t preclude the involvement of senior leadership. In Workday Peakon Employee Voice, people leaders at each level can see relevant conversations from employees in their department. That way, employees know their comments won’t hit a wall due to an uncooperative manager.

4. Lack of Career Growth and Opportunity

Tackling issues around growth can be difficult when budgets are tight and the future is unclear. But growth doesn’t always have to manifest as a new promotion or a pay raise. Instead, businesses should look to create a culture of continuous learning across their company, encouraging smaller moments of growth and recognition.

The Engagement Solution: Create a Culture of Continuous Learning

Research from Gallup shows that managers who received training focused on coaching and people development saw up to 22% increases in their own engagement and up to 18% higher engagement among their teams. That's why an engagement solution should be at the foundation of any performance management strategy.

Here are three ways to embed conversations around growth and development at every stage of the employee journey:

Meet employees where they work. Learning needs to happen in the natural flow of an employee's working day, in much the same way as engagement surveys. That means providing integration with different apps, mobile device access, and gentle reminders. If learning disrupts an employee's core responsibilities, they're not likely to follow through.
Don’t ignore the warning signs for attrition. A robust engagement solution provides managers oversight on much more than just engagement scores. By asking employees questions about career growth, you empower your managers with insights that can prove invaluable in retention. Finding out the issues during an exit interview is too little, too late.
Create personalized learning pathways. Education resources should be tailored to the individual, providing relevant learning material based on an employee’s tenure, seniority, and area of expertise. Additionally, they should be tailored to an individual’s specific issues—another area where searching for semantically related insights promotes a more nuanced understanding of declining scores.

Managers who received training focused on coaching and people development saw up to 18% higher engagement among their teams.

Implementing an Employee Engagement Tool

Regardless of whether your company has had multiple engagement solutions before, or is about to trial one for the first time, a good implementation is key to success. If employees find the process frustrating or confusing, not only will they likely ignore the surveys, but their engagement might even decline as a result.

A successful implementation relies on three factors: education, consideration, and a trusted partner. Assess your needs as a company, look at the market leaders, and ensure you've done a full comparison of the available features. Only then can you begin your journey to improving engagement at an organizational talent.

Is your employee listening strategy outdated? Download this Workday guide to launch an active listening approach in three easy steps.

This article has been updated since it was first published in February 2023.

About the Author

Blaise Radley Editorial Strategist Workday

Blaise Radley is an editorial strategist for Workday. He covers topics including future of work, employee experience, and medium enterprise.

Blaise has more than ten years of experience in content marketing and journalism. In that time, he’s worked for a large variety of organizations, covering everything from Jaguar Land Rover to the latest independent film releases.

He holds a bachelor’s degree in English and American Literature from the University of Birmingham. If he’s not writing, he’s likely at the cinema.

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