Post-survey Action Plan

You just looked through the results from your employee satisfaction or engagement survey. What is the most important action you need to take now? Develop a realistic action plan to address the highest priority areas of concern and then communicate that.

The first template I am sharing helps you to describe and be clear on which specific feedback you plan to address. Then capture planned actions and make sure they are measurable and include a definition of done. How will you know that this action have been completed?

The second template (see below) relates to the regular updates that management typically expect from those who are managing the post-survey action plan implementation. This simple template simply uses a traffic-light approach to summarize the progress of actions against planned timelines. Add a comments column if your manager requires more details than the traffic-light indicator of progress to date.

Some reminders:

• Remember to communicate the survey results, the actions planned and action status updates to those who participated in the survey. It motivates employees to participate in future requests for input and establishes credibility in the process and management’s intentions to ensure a good working environment and fair and supportive treatment of employees.
• Don’t pick more than four high priority areas to address. If you pick too many focus areas and activities it could easily lead to feelings of confusion and being overwhelmed by the bulk of changes that are taking place.
• Don’t survey employee opinion too often – this leads to survey-fatigue and your participation rate can drop. How often? Depends on the length of your survey. A short “employee happiness” check with about 10 questions or rated statements may be done on a quarterly basis. A full-blown survey with between 40 and 80 questions should not be considered more often than perhaps 18 to 24 months apart.
• Explain the context of actions from employee surveys. Most people dislike being expedited on the actions that they need to take according to the action plan. It is not always true that the individuals responsible for these actions understand how the action that he or she needs to take relates to the overall action plan and the employee survey. Knowing the context of their activities and how these activities relate to a greater cause can be very motivational and may simplify your job of ensuring progress on action plans.