{"id":9255,"date":"2019-04-08T11:32:41","date_gmt":"2019-04-08T15:32:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/opsweb.wpengine.com\/?p=9255"},"modified":"2022-02-28T11:37:50","modified_gmt":"2022-02-28T16:37:50","slug":"your-employees-probably-dont-realize-what-you-have-done-to-engage-them","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ourpublicservice.org\/blog\/your-employees-probably-dont-realize-what-you-have-done-to-engage-them\/","title":{"rendered":"Your employees probably don\u2019t realize what you have done to engage them"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

During a recent training I facilitated on employee engagement, I asked participants a simple question: How has your agency\u2019s leadership responded to the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey? <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their answers were\npessimistic. \u201cIn my opinion, leadership doesn\u2019t care about us at all,\u201d one\nparticipant said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe take the survey every\nyear, but nothing ever changes,\u201d said another. I didn\u2019t want them to get too\nfrustrated so early in the session, so I changed the subject. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later, I asked them the same\nthing but rephrased the question a bit. \u201cWhat activities are happening at your\nagency to improve employee engagement?\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Their responses changed\ndramatically. One participant mentioned a new mentoring program that helped him\nlearn about available career opportunities. Another talked how top employees\nwere being recognized for their hard work. With a slight reframing of the\nquestion, participants painted a completely different picture of what life at\ntheir agencies was like. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was clear leaders in their agency were paying attention to the survey results and trying to respond\u2014but because they did not explicitly connect new initiatives to the feedback in the survey, these employees were left feeling like responding to the annual survey had little effect. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is happening across government. Last year, only 37\npercent of government employees responded positively to question 41 on the\nFEVS, which asks, \u201cDo you believe the results of this survey will be used to\nmake your agency a better place to work?\u201d It\u2019s possible not all leaders are using\nFEVS data to improve their agencies, but I would be willing to bet that the\nnumber is higher than 37 percent. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The FEVS is going to be administered to employees soon. Now is the perfect time to start explaining to employees how you responded to last year\u2019s survey results and the Best Places to Work in the Federal Government\u00ae<\/a> rankings, produced by the Partnership for Public Service and Boston Consulting Group. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When communicating your efforts to employees, highlight as\nmuch data as possible to emphasize that you have responded, and to show how\nthose efforts have paid off to make the workplace better as a result. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ideally, senior leadership should lead out on communicating\nthese efforts, so employees can see that employee engagement is a priority and\nleaders want to be held accountable for the results. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Don\u2019t be afraid to promote your efforts to respond to the\nFEVS and improve employee engagement. Failing to do this will only lead to\nfurther disengagement, fewer people responding to the annual survey and\nconsequently less-valuable results overall because too few agency employees\nwere represented. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

If leaders have tried to improve engagement, it\u2019s okay for them to toot their own horn. That said, they need to be humble enough to acknowledge there is still a long way to go\u2014if that\u2019s the case in their agencies. Only through this process of leaders responding to feedback, communicating what they\u2019ve done and genuinely seeking more input from employees can you start to see a change in engagement. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cameron Kober<\/a> is a manager with the Partnership for Public Service, where he designs and delivers trainings that help agencies improve employee satisfaction.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Want to learn more about employee engagement? <\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Subscribe to receive our emails to stay up-to-date with our blog posts, events and research to help you improve your workforce.<\/p>\n\n\n\nSubscribe now<\/span><\/a>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

During a recent training I facilitated on employee engagement, I asked participants a simple question: How has your agency\u2019s leadership responded to the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey? Their answers were pessimistic. \u201cIn my opinion, leadership doesn\u2019t care about us at all,\u201d one participant said. \u201cWe take the survey every year, but nothing ever changes,\u201d said…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":8738,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"sort-date":"","content-type":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_searchwp_excluded":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7589],"tags":[9136,1044,9048,9066],"class_list":["post-9255","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-employee-engagement","tag-career-resources","tag-engage-against-the-machine","tag-leadership","tag-management"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nYour employees probably don\u2019t realize what you have done to engage them • Partnership for Public Service<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Most of the time, agency leaders listen to and act on the feedback provided in the Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey\u2014but the workforce doesn’t know it. 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