Employees are crucial for any business, be it a Multi-national Corporation, a small-scale entrepreneur, an army or even a drug mafia. And, to be an employer of choice has its benefits…
Attracts top talent
Maintains better retention
Creates a Healthy workplace culture
To become an employer of choice is not difficult. Great Place to Work, Glass door, Willis Towers Watson, BCG consulting are a few names that award you that crown. But first, you must pass their test.
Yes! An employee satisfaction survey, that benchmarks your organisation under themes like, Brand, Transparency, Manager, Career, Leadership, Pride, Innovation, Teamwork, Trust, Agility, Fairness – The list can be endless- based on the school of thought the experts come from.
It so happened, in the past, we did decide to participate in one of the published survey’s. Our leadership was all excited, HR team and communications teams were enthusiastic. We embarked upon a month-long journey to find ourselves a spot in the top 50 or top 100 employer of choice companies. Guess what! We made it to the Top 50. We patted ourselves on the back and painted the town red with our achievement.
In the following year, it was is time for another ranking to be achieved. And because we are still on a high of last year’s achievement, we participate again. This time, we do not make it to the top 50.
We asked ourselves, what did we do wrong? For the next couple of months, we were consumed by this question and Yes! We sliced and diced the result in as many ways we could. Finally, we pulled out some real time data over the past 3 years and compared them.
Year 1: The year prior to the first survey;
Year 2: The year of the first survey;
Year 3: The year of the second survey. We compared
Our employee referrals
Offer to joining ratio
Walk-ins
Retention percentage and
The data of an internal survey that we used to conduct.
The result, there was no stark difference, in the data- year on year, which simply meant that we were still doing a good job – Considering we had some incremental numbers on the positive side year on year. This exercise taught us two fundamentals to be an employer of choice.
Rule 1: Do the right thing.
Rule 2: Don’t forget Rule No 1.
“Doing the right thing”, is an expression that is 2-fold – From a point of view of the A) the organisation and B) the employees. It is about striking the balance that benefits both.
Just as every employee is different, every organisation is different too. You need to remember – One size does not fit all. A survey is just reflection of once self, however at some stage, participating in these surveys can become a rat race, with us launching initiatives, just to move the needle.
Use the information from the survey, to introspect. And not as data to prove something to the world. Your employees will do that for you anyways!