Survey Software Tools For Employee Engagement | #hrmanagement #hrexecutive

Employee engagement has been steadily declining. In 2021, the US experienced its first recorded downturn in a decade—from 36 percent in 2020 to 34 percent. This number decreased by another two percent in 2022, making active disengagement 32 percent. The same could be true for other countries, too.

Minimizing active disengagement means encouraging positive employee engagement for proactiveness, consistency, and adaptability. But this isn’t possible without gathering employee feedback, as developing strategies that align with employees’ needs is necessary.

Feedback gathering is made easy with online survey software tools. With various options available, which ones are worth investing in?

Image by Drazen Zigic on Freepik

What are survey software tools for employee engagement?

Survey software tools for employee engagement are online platforms that provide survey creation, data visualization, and actionable analysis. They are built with features that collect feedback, customize questions, track engagement metrics, and deliver improvement assessments.

These platforms enable management-employee communication for better organizational management. They can promote employee participation, encourage workplace inclusivity, and boost employee retention. 

The Best Software Survey Tools

With many employee engagement survey platforms, finding the right one can be confusing and time-consuming, particularly when unfamiliar with what to look for. To help you out, we listed the best ones with comprehensive features worth investing in below.

1. Google Forms

Screenshot from google.com/forms/about/

Pros

• Beginner-friendly
• Provides other Google Workspace integrations

Cons

• Basic features
• Lacks advanced data analytics

Google Forms is a free survey and analysis tool. It is a beginner-friendly solution and one of the most popular go-to survey platforms. You just need to access this software using your Gmail account.

This platform’s straightforward and flexible editor lets you create and share surveys within minutes. Similarly, your employees can quickly send responses because it’s accessible on smartphones.

With Google Forms, you can select a question type from multiple options and reorder questions. You can even personalize your forms by customizing their colors, fonts, and images based on your organization’s branding. Moreover, you can add custom logic so your employees can quickly jump to the succeeding questions based on their answers.

However, this solution only offers basic features, limiting your customization options. It also doesn’t have advanced data analytics for comprehensive metrics and insights. Although responses are anonymous, you can add questions that require employees to provide personal information.

Other features include:

• Automated and real-time response analysis
• Question-building with your team by adding collaborators, reducing the need to create multiple file versions

2. SurveyMonkey

Screenshot from surveymonkey.com

Pros

• Has a mobile app version
• Supports cross-tabulation analysis

Cons

• Limited customization
• Challenging to use for first-timers

SurveyMonkey is among the top online survey tools. You can use this platform to create and design surveys, polls, and quizzes. It also has question randomization, a scoring system, and a real-time response progress tracker.

Additionally, this solution provides logic integration, templates, and multiple languages. You can use its analytical system to test surveys before launching them. Concurrently, it supports charts and graphs to visualize data and categorizes responses using tags.

SurveyMonkey only has limited customization in their free plan. Advanced features can be pricey. Its reporting dashboard also needs improvements, as first-timers may find it challenging to navigate. It offers three plans: team, individual, and enterprise. 

3. Workday Peakon Employee Voice

Screenshot from workday.com/en-us/products/employee-voice/overview.html

Pros

• Can integrate with other management solutions
• Flexible and customizable

Cons

• Might mislead employees that their responses aren’t anonymous

Workday Peakon is a survey tool specializing in employee engagement and feedback. It captures real-time responses and provides personalized, actionable recommendations. You can also use this to customize forms to meet your organizational needs.

Furthermore, Peakon can integrate with other management tools—like project management, point-of-sale or POS systems, and collaboration solutions—for seamless and comprehensive workflows.

While this platform enables anonymous answers, it might mislead your employees from believing their responses aren’t. You can only view and respond to these anonymous answers through the dashboard, but your response will be forwarded to their emails. Consequently, these emails can make them feel you know who they are.

4. Limeade Listening (formerly TINYpulse)

Screenshot from limeade.com/solutions/employee-engagement/

Pros

• Recognition integrations
• Easy to use

Cons

• Questions are sometimes irrelevant

Limeade Listening is a survey software tool that collects real-time employee engagement insights. It features an anonymous integration allowing employees to share honest feedback without fearing consequences.

This software provides performance tracking and pulse surveys that’ll help you improve employee engagement and productivity. Moreover, its recognition integrations enable you to reward and recognize employees’ contributions and hard work, motivating them to continue their work.

Although infrequent, some generated questions may be irrelevant. Still, Limeade Listening is a great online survey software for employee engagement assessments. Book a demo on their website to learn more about their solutions and pricing.

5. Culture Amp

Screenshot from cultureamp.com

Pros

• Straightforward interface
• One-on-one feature
• User-friendly

Cons

• Organizational charts need a hierarchy

Culture Amp is an online survey tool with customizable forms to assess employee engagement and workplace inclusivity. It provides advanced analytics that enables you to acquire actionable insights from response data by delivering metrics on your management’s strengths and weaknesses.

This platform has a straightforward interface that visualizes data with actionable analysis. It is a user-friendly solution that can adapt to your unique organizational needs. 

Additionally, it boasts a one-on-one feature that enables you to add agenda points for one-on-one meetings. It also has a Slack integration that sends timely reminders to prepare you and your employees before meetings.

The only drawback you may encounter from Culture Amp is its organizational chart tool. One review noted that this integration needs more hierarchy in displaying different departments and subgroups. Other than that, many believe it is an excellent employee engagement survey platform.

Essential Factors When Choosing a Survey Software Tool

Like other marketing solutions, survey software tools are not identical. You must know your management needs before choosing one.

Considering the factors below is essential when searching for an online survey tool to ensure optimal and actionable results from your employee engagement assessments.

• Ease of use: A survey solution should be responsive to any screen size. When your staff switches from smartphones to tablets or desktops, they should be able to access and use the platform on these devices
• Confidentiality and anonymity: Your employees should be able to send honest answers without fearing retaliation and unfavorable reactions from management. Thus, your survey solution should provide confidential and anonymous integrations to hide the employees’ identities
• User experience: Lengthy surveys are challenging and bothersome for some, making them irrelevant. Others may not even bother to finish them. Hence, a good survey platform enables optimal user experience for quick and easy completion 
• Measurable data delivery: The best survey solution delivers measurable data with actionable insights. This integration provides data reporting that outlines the gaps and emphasizes your strengths

Enhance Your Employee Engagement With the Right Survey Tool

Employee engagement survey platforms are worth investing in. They can facilitate seamless feedback gathering, data reporting, and employee engagement analysis. You may also consider a quick website builder with survey creation integrations if you’re in the early stages of website development.

Remember that the best online survey tool depends on your management needs and financial capability.