Why having happy employees matters

The pursuit of happiness is a fundamental element of American culture—and today’s workers take that directive seriously. Across generations, people in the modern workforce feel more empowered to find happiness at work as well as at home—and to change jobs if they have to in order to find that happiness.

By polling the millions of people who use and respond to our surveys each day, our survey research team can get unrivaled access to the thoughts and opinions of the people in today’s workforce—what drives them, what excites them, and what makes them happy.

Using our research as a guide, here’s a breakdown on why the happiness of your employees is so important and what your organization can do to improve their satisfaction at work:

The relationship between employee happiness, employee engagement, and employee performance has been clearly established through numerous research studies.

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Employees today are looking for far more than simply a paycheck. They want a sense of purpose and the chance to improve their work skills. 60% of employees feel that being able to do what they do best in their job is very important. And having your employees engaged in work that leverages their strengths strongly benefits your company as it allows for productivity break throughs and lower employee turnover.

Once upon a time, people looked at work and “life” as two separate things. But in a world where everyone is constantly connected, these two elements tend to overlap. Employees today consider both their jobs and their personal lives to be equal priorities. They are often unwilling to compromise one for the other. In fact, we’ve seen 53% of employees report that a role which allows them to have a better work-life balance and a stronger sense of personal well-being is very important.

There was a time when the idea of a positive work environment involved putting greens, foosball tables, and group employee activities. But times have changed, and the focus now is on well-being.

We live in a time when employee turnover has become a concern for most employers. In the past, it was expected that employees would stay in their job for an extended period of time—even as long as 20 or 30 years. In today’s world, however, it’s common for employees to spend just one or two years at a company before moving onto another opportunity that offers a better work culture.

So, how do you know if your employees are happy? Use employee satisfaction surveys to gather anonymous and honest feedback from your team. The responses give you an opportunity to identify and address pressing issues as well as prioritize the top areas that lead to happy employees. By focusing on ensuring that your workers are satisfied in their current jobs and with your company, you’ll not only be able to retain existing employees, but also attract quality applicants.

Utilizing the right experience management insights, you can construct custom surveys that help you align your company vision and mission statement with employees. The questions you pose in your survey can be branded to reflect your company values while making them feel heard, because a happy employee is one who feels like they’re being heard. This strategy provides a constructive two-way stream of communication between your company and employees. Through your online questionnaire, you’ll also have the ability to enforce your message while collecting valuable employee insights to increase employee happiness. 

You can also improve employee happiness by making surveys fun to answer by using pop culture or work-related jargon. This approach builds a work culture of positive thinking. Creative survey insights can also work as team-building exercises for employees to learn more about their co-workers and management.

A happy employee is also one who feels appreciated which is why you can use surveys to initiate an employee recognition program. Allow employees to anonymously rate their colleagues’ performance and use these insights to reward the employees with high ratings and also, to find ways to help improve the performance of workers with lower scores. Using surveys for employee recognition rewards happy employees while targeting the ones who aren’t. At that point, you can submit another type of survey that’s designed to help you learn why some of your employees may be unhappy. 

Another way to increase employee happiness is to let your employees contribute to one of your surveys. For instance, invite them to submit an anonymous question. You can also use this approach for teams, departments, and department heads. It can utilized to collect serious feedback or as a fun team-building activity. Imagine the employee satisfaction your staff will have when they see their question was chosen for a company survey. Use this employee satisfaction survey template and customize it to suit your company needs.

At SurveyMonkey, we offer additional resources as well as a custom built employee engagement solution to help you monitor and foster, happy, healthy, and productive employees.

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