Surveys are extremely fascinating things. They hold the power to delight you in multiple ways. They do so by either pushing you to think in different directions or make you question what you already know. There are of course surveys out there that fail to do any of the above, but I believe that they are always worth taking.
Let’s take for example a recent survey that investigated how HR practitioners and managers make compensation and development decisions with or without the annual performance review. The survey pushed me to map intentions behind tangible incentives offered in my organization to things like meeting the organizational objectives (??), to attract talent, to retain talent, to sustain employee performance and so on. It then went a step further and asked me to map the intangible benefits too. Most folks I meet from total rewards couldn’t tell me which incentive impacted what. Not many had ever sat down to think if the retirement benefits had a greater impact on retaining talent or sustaining employee performance. (Just an example)
Surveys like this have the power to knock you off your feet and make you think hard. If strong enough, they will even make you go back to the drawing board and undo legacy. This is exactly why I like them.
& then of course there’s always the added benefit of the top secret survey results sent to helpful participants. 🙂
The HR Business Partner Story 