Imagine unlocking the full potential of your onboarding process with just a few strategic questions. New employee surveys offer exactly this kind of opportunity. Serving not only as a means of feedback collection but as a strategic asset for improving employee integration and satisfaction. In this article, we delve into the significance of new employee surveys as part of your onboarding practice, highlighting their critical role in enhancing engagement, retention, and overall organizational effectiveness.
3 key takeaways you need to know
- New employee surveys serve as a proactive tool for improving the onboarding process by providing organizations with valuable insights into areas of strength and opportunities for enhancement.
- These surveys foster a culture of inclusivity and engagement by signaling to employees that their opinions matter from the outset.
- The benefits of new employee surveys make them an indispensable tool for organizations committed to fostering positive employee experiences and driving success.
What is a New Employee Survey?
New employee surveys, also known as employee onboarding surveys, are structured questionnaires designed to gather feedback from freshly onboarded employees about their experiences, perceptions, and suggestions regarding various aspects of the onboarding process and organizational culture. These surveys help you understand how well your employees are likely to start to feel at home in your company.
Unlike traditional employee surveys, which may focus on a broad range of organizational issues, new employee surveys focus on the early experiences of employees as they navigate into their new roles.
By capturing feedback during this period, organizations can proactively address potential challenges and optimize the onboarding experience for future new hires. This helps prevent future hires from encountering the same obstacles or setbacks over and over. This can have many benefits.
Why These Surveys are Important
They contribute to improved onboarding processes by providing valuable insights into areas of strength and opportunities for enhancement. By understanding new employees’ perspectives, organizations can tailor their onboarding programs to better meet the needs and expectations of incoming team members.
New employee surveys also signal to employees that their opinions matter from the beginning, fostering a sense of inclusivity and engagement.
“Employees who feel valued and heard are more likely to remain committed to their organizations, leading to higher retention rates and increased overall satisfaction.“
Culturemonkey
By capturing feedback early on, organizations can proactively address any issues that may arise, preventing potential disengagement or turnover down the road.
Pros and Cons of New Employee Surveys
While employee onboarding surveys offer numerous benefits, they also come with certain considerations.
Pros
- The surveys facilitate enhanced communication between employees and management, fostering transparency and trust within the organization.
- They enable early problem identification, allowing organizations to address issues promptly and effectively.
- They contribute to the cultivation of a positive company culture by demonstrating a commitment to continuous improvement and employee satisfaction.
It’s also essential to acknowledge the potential drawbacks of these surveys.
Cons
- Employees may be hesitant to provide honest feedback if there’s no option for anonymity or if their previous company was not a safe place to give open feedback.
- Your organization may lack the resources or processes to implement necessary changes effectively.
- Mismanagement of employee surveys can cause distrust among employees.
Despite these challenges, the benefits of new employee surveys outweigh the drawbacks, making them a valuable tool for organizational development.
10 Questions to Ask on a New Employee Survey
Writing effective survey questions is key to obtaining meaningful feedback from new hires. Here are ten recommended questions to include in your new employee survey. These questions are phrased in alignment with the Likert scale (rating from Strongly Disagree to Strongly Agree) to help you gauge where your employee stands and how effective your programs are:
- I have a clear understanding of my role and responsibilities.
- I feel I have a good understanding of the company’s culture and values.
- The onboarding training has adequately prepared me for my job.
- I have access to the resources and tools I need to perform my job effectively.
- I feel welcomed and included by my team.
- Communication from my manager and colleagues has been clear and helpful.
- My manager has been supportive in helping me adjust to my new role.
- I am able to maintain a healthy work-life balance.
- I feel confident in my ability to perform my job well.
- Overall, I am satisfied with my onboarding experience so far.
Each of these questions serves a distinct purpose, providing insights into various aspects of the onboarding process and organizational culture. By reviewing the responses, organizations can identify trends, pinpoint areas for improvement, and take targeted action to enhance the employee experience.
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When to Send a New Employee Survey
Determining the timing for administering new employee surveys is crucial to capturing how new employees feel while allowing sufficient time for meaningful experiences to unfold.
You could send a new employee survey after each training session, introduction, or other important events, or you could wait and send them after a set period, like 30 days into the new role. Some suggested intervals include:
- After the first week — this is done to capture immediate impressions for new hires
- After the first month — this allows employees to start to get accustomed to their role and environment but still be fairly new hires and be close enough to plenty of their onboarding experiences
- After the first 3 months — this allows you to gather insights from the initial hire, the first month on the job, and once an employee should be mostly settled into a role (in most cases)
You can pick one, or all of these periods and send one or multiple onboarding surveys. Just be mindful of participation rates and survey fatigue!
How to Increase New Employee Survey Engagement
Employee surveys are super important for companies to learn what their employees think. To get more new employees to take these surveys, companies can do a few things.
1. Incentivize and educate employees
Educating new employees from the start about the surveys and including information about incentives, such as a small prize for completion, can gain excitement and encourage employees to partake.
2. Involve senior leadership
Senior leaders can either sit down with new employees and ask the survey questions in person, or they can assist them in completing online surveys by providing time and computer access after training. Leadership can also provide clear communication as to why the surveys are so important for the organization.
3. Offer flexible survey completion options
These options can include mobile devices or designated kiosks for deskless workers. This ensures accessibility and convenience for all employees.
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Let’s Recap
New employee surveys represent a powerful tool for organizations seeking to optimize their onboarding processes and cultivate a culture of continuous improvement and employee satisfaction. By soliciting feedback from recently onboarded employees, these surveys offer invaluable insights into the early experiences and perceptions of new hires, enabling organizations to tailor their onboarding programs effectively.
Through strategic implementation and thoughtful consideration of survey responses, companies can enhance communication, foster transparency, and address potential challenges proactively, leading to higher engagement, retention, and organizational effectiveness.
While challenges such as survey fatigue and potential reluctance to provide honest feedback exist, the benefits of new employee surveys in terms of communication, problem identification, and organizational development outweigh these drawbacks, making them a great tool for organizations committed to fostering positive employee experiences and driving success.
Want to check out how Peoplelytics’ new employee surveys work? Check out the free demo here.
