- Olivia Jackson, HR Generalist at Outback Team Building & Training
Our team recently sat down with Olivia Jackson, HR Generalist at Outback Team Building & Training, for a podcast interview on employee engagement. In this episode of Outback Talks: The Employee Engagement Podcast, Olivia shared how Outback was able to improve our employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS) by over 100% in one year.
Outback has been collecting eNPS since 2016 via monthly online surveys, and uses these scores to closely monitor employee engagement. People within the company are asked to rate, on a scale of zero to 10, how likely they are to recommend working at Outback to friends and family.
Unlike an average rating out of 10, a Net Promoter Score is determined by subtracting the percentage of detractors, ratings between zero and six, from the percentage of promoters, ratings of either nine or 10. Scores of seven or eight are considered neutral, and do not affect the NPS calculation.
In 2017, Outback’s score was hovering around a 35. As Olivia explained, this isn’t actually such a bad eNPS: “When I went to calculate that score, I don’t even think we had any [detractors], we just had more neutrals.”
However, Outback’s leadership team wasn’t satisfied. They wanted to figure out how they could improve employee engagement in an impactful and meaningful way.
Listen to the episode of Outback Talks: The Employee Engagement Podcast below to hear directly from Olivia, or keep reading to find out how Outback more than doubled our eNPS over the course of just one year.
Here are three things Outback Team Building & Training did over 12 months to help improve employee engagement.
An initial step that Outback took towards improving employee engagement was adding a question to the already established monthly surveys via web-based platform Officevibe. This follow-up question prompted individuals to explain their eNPS rating if it wasn’t a 10.
From this simple addition, Olivia shared that, “We’ve been able to get some really great feedback from the team. People might give it a nine and they could say, ‘I’d be a 10 if I had an extra week vacation,’ or, ‘I’d be a 10 if I was allowed to work from home a couple extra days a week.’”
Olivia believes collecting the feedback has been so successful because the surveys are quick, easy, and can be completed anonymously.
After receiving some great comments and suggestions through Officevibe, Outback’s leadership team decided to provide even more opportunities for employees to share their feedback. This took shape in the form of quarterly, in-person sessions with HR and Outback’s CEO, Murray Seward.
Twice a year, employees are given a platform to be heard by senior leaders in what we call a Start-Stop-Keep session. By department, groups meet with HR and our CEO to discuss three things they’d like to see the company:
The other two feedback sessions that happen throughout the year are called “Stay Interviews.” These are individual meetings with HR where employees are asked about their roles – what they love, what they’d change, and what would entice them to leave. These sessions are meant to help prevent turnover by finding out how people are feeling about their job and the organization.
Each of these meetings have given the leadership team more opportunity to keep a pulse on engagement levels and employee job satisfaction.
Outback is committed to taking action on employee feedback whenever possible, shared Olivia. With the responses collected through online surveys and in-person sessions, leaders now have a much better understanding of what’s important to the team.
Here are a few examples of improvements or changes that were made in response to employee feedback:
According to Olivia, it’s vital to take action on the feedback you receive to show employees that they are being heard and are valued.
Since early 2018, Outback’s eNPS has been hovering around the 71 mark.
“Our score today is 71,” said Olivia, “Which is – looking back at past data – is one of our highest scores to date. So, you look into the data that went into that, we have no [detractors], very few neutrals, and the majority of our team are actually promoters.”
Coming from last year’s 35 eNPS, Outback’s rating has improved by over 100% from 2017 to 2018.
When asked how Outback plans to maintain this newfound high score, Olivia said that it’s all about continuing to gather regular employee feedback, and consistently taking action.
Get in touch with an Employee Engagement Consultant and learn about training programs, such as Active Employee Engagement, which can offer your team strategies and tactics to help drive higher engagement.
Don’t forget, you can also tune into Olivia’s interview above, or download the episode by subscribing to our podcast, Outback Talks: The Employee Engagement Podcast, on iTunes, Google Play, SoundCloud, Stitcher, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
If you’d prefer to read Olivia’s interview, see below for the full transcription of the podcast episode.
Kara Sy (KS): Hi everyone, and welcome to “Outback Team Building & Training Tips,” a monthly audio resource for HR and business professionals. This podcast is produced by Outback Team Building & Training, a leading team building, training, and consulting provider for organizations across North America. I’m your host, Kara Sy, and this month I’m joined by special guest Olivia Jackson, HR Coordinator at Outback Team Building & Training. Thanks so much for joining me today, Olivia!
Olivia Jackson (OJ): Thanks so much for having me, it’s great to be back!
KS: Yeah! So, our topic this month is how Outback was able to drastically improve employee engagement, and Olivia will be sharing practical tips and advice to help you do the same. But before we begin, let’s start out with our quick tip of the month. Each month, we begin the episode with our quick tip for our listeners. Olivia, what’s the most effective thing Outback’s done to help improve employee engagement?
OJ: Great question, Kara. You know, it’s hard to pinpoint it at just one but, if I had to choose one, I’d say it’s really about gathering and soliciting regular feedback from the team and taking action where appropriate. I can get into that in a little bit more detail throughout the interview but, that would be my number quick tip I’d say.
KS: Yeah, so it’s not just gathering feedback but actually doing something about it.
OJ: Absolutely.
KS: Great, so with that, let’s get to our main interview.
OJ: Great!
KS: Alright, Olivia, so what does employee engagement mean to you and Outback?
OJ: Here at Outback, employee engagement is really all about having a collective group of employees that are committed to Outback’s goals and values. They’re a group of people that show up each day, ready to put their best effort forward to achieve both their own personal goals and the organization’s goals.
KS: And so, do you ever see it as being something that you do outside of work? Do you – does Outback want to encourage employee engagement in cultural aspects, so like, after work?
OJ: Yeah. So, absolutely, culture does play a big part in employee engagement. We are always, sort of, planning our next employee engagement initiative and activity to reward the team. So, for example, you know, in the summer we have regular lunch barbecues for the team, where we get the team out of their desks and out in the social area together where, you know, they are sort of given the opportunity to have lunch, but also engage with people not just from their department but from all departments in the organization. We’re always looking for how we can reward our team, whether that might be a baseball game all together or maybe something like snowmobiling. Every year, we go white water rafting. Yeah, I mean, they vary year to year, but a big part of employee engagement also ties into the culture, and having a team that’s excited to see their colleagues, not just on a work level, but also on a personal level.
KS: Right, and so, how do you track that?
OJ: So, we track employee engagement using employee Net Promoter Scores, so eNPS for short. So, these are polls that are sent out monthly through anonymous electronic surveys and we use a platform called Officevibe.
KS: And so, for people who might not know what Net Promoter Score means because, you hear “10 out of 10” or “eight out of 10,” but that’s not how NPS works exactly, right? There’s a bit more to it. Can you give me a bit of insight into how that works?
OJ: Yeah, so Net Promoter Scores are calculated by asking individuals the question on a scale of zero to 10, how likely are you recommend Outback as a place to work to family and friends. So, zero is the lowest possible score and 10 would be the highest. So, essentially those nine or 10 are considered promoters, meaning that they will go out of their way to tell those around them how great Outback is. Sevens and eights are considered neutral, meaning they likely aren’t going to go out of their way to say positive or negative things about the company. And those six and less are considered demoters, meaning they may be likely to share negative feedback with family and friends about Outback. So, to calculate your Net Promoter Score, you simply subtract the percentage of demoters from the percentage of promoters. So, for example, let’s say we polled 10 people and we ask them the question, “How likely are you to recommend Outback as a place to work to your family or friends on a scale of zero to 10?” and let’s say four of them answered a nine, one of them answered a 10, let’s say two answered eight, one answered seven, and two answered six. So, that’s a total of 10. So, five out of 10 promoters that answered had scores of nine or 10, we then have three neutrals, so three out of 10 neutrals being sevens or eights…
KS: And then, does that not play into the final score, being a neutral? Do they just get nullified?
OJ: Exactly! They do not play into the final score. And then we have two, let’s say we have two out 10 demoters, so six or under. So, essentially we have 50 percent, five out of 10, promoters, and 30 percent who are neutral, again, not playing into the score, and two out of 10, 20 percent, who are demoters. So, like I said, we don’t use the neutral in the calculation but instead, we simply subtract the 20 percent demoters from the 50 percent promoters for a score of 30.
KS: And I feel like that may be surprising to some people because you don’t necessarily think of a six as being a bad score. In my opinion, I would think of a six as being more neutral – anything around a five – but, the way NPS is calculated, it’s actually not a good thing. It takes away from, say those five people who did give you the promoter scores. And someone giving a seven or eight might think, “Oh yeah, that’s a pretty good score,” but it’s actually not playing well into your overall NPS, which means that, even if you are a company with a great reputation or really high employee engagement level, you get those few detractors and it can have a huge impact on your final eNPS, correct?
OJ: Absolutely, or even just having neutrals. So, you could have zero demoters, and still have a score of 30 simply because you only had three out of 10 that were promoters and the rest that were neutral. You then have 30 percent promoters, you’d have zero demoters, but 30 minus zero is still 30. So, even with seven out of 10 of your team answering sevens or eights, which to many are fairly decent scores, you could still end up with a Net Promoter Score of 30. So, you know, if you’re in the Net Promoter Score range of about 70, it essentially means that you have mostly promoters in your organization, and maybe just a few neutrals and likely, no detractors, and if you do have a detractor, they’re an odd one out.
KS: Right, and so that actually is quite different than an average score out of 10, which, when you hear people saying, “Oh, I got 10 out of 10, you know, NPS or feedback,” it’s not as straightforward as just taking an average of those numbers. So, you mentioned Officevibes. Are there any other tools or resources that you’d recommend to track this type of employee engagement, to track something like NPS?
OJ: Yeah, so we have found great success using Officevibe. Officevibe is a web-based employee engagement tool that is suited for organizations of all sizes and essentially conducts anonymous weekly employee engagement surveys. It’s also a tool to receive feedback to measure employee satisfaction and engagement. The other great thing about it, is it allows for business input from employees. You can create custom questions, custom polls, and that way you can target specific issues or ideas that you might be looking to gain, to gather from employees. Each survey takes, you know, roughly two minutes, so, the team doesn’t mind spending the time to complete the surveys.
KS: Right, they don’t feel like it’s a waste of time.
OJ: Yeah, exactly! It’s quick, you know, either five or 10 questions, and because of those surveys we were able to get some really great feedback from the team. And, you know, because Officevibes is anonymous, it also gives the team a platform to provide open and honest feedback if they don’t feel comfortable addressing that with their manager or HR.
KS: For sure, so how important do you think it is that it’s anonymous?
OJ: Well, employees have an option to select whether their feedback is coming through as anonymous or they can identify themselves if they want.
KS: Do they ever identify themselves?
OJ: Once in a while. I’d say the majority of the time they remain anonymous. We do have a very open and honest culture around here. But sometimes, you know, they don’t want to identify themselves if they have constructive feedback that might be geared towards a process or system that seems the rest of the team has brought into, or they have specific constructive feedback in regards to, maybe, their leader. It also kind of allows two-way dialogue between HR without the employee having to identify themselves, which is important because sometimes they might have personal issues that, you know, they are not quite ready to discuss with their manager or HR. So, if they are looking for specific information or input, or an idea on how to deal with a situation, they can get that without having to put their hand up and say, “Hey, it’s me.” The fact that it’s anonymous like this, I think, is important because employee engagement scores do fluctuate and, sometimes, it could be based on what’s happening both inside and outside of the office. So, you know, it’s important for us to know how people are feeling that month. One month, they might feel like they’re a 10, and the next month they might be down to a seven or eight.
KS: And you still want to collect that feedback, even when they aren’t feeling a 10. So, if it’s anonymous, they’re more likely to provide that feedback for you.
OJ: Absolutely, and one of the great follow-up questions that we’ve added onto this poll question is, “If your score is not a 10, what can we do to bring your score up to a 10?” Now, we’re getting the input of what employees are looking for from us as employers. We need to obviously make sure that we are getting what we need from employees, but we also need to make sure they are getting what they need from us as an employer. We’ve also been able to get some really great feedback from the team that way. People might give it a nine and they could say, “I’d be a 10 if I had an extra week vacation,” or, “I’d be a 10 if I was allowed to work from home a couple extra days a week.” Or, “actually there’s nothing you can do to become a 10 because my next career move is elsewhere,” whatever that might that be. So, yeah, it’s a great way to get that feedback without having to ask employees to essentially out themselves for whatever they are looking for, or feel like what they’re asking for is out of reach.
KS: Right, absolutely. And so, are there any other ways that you can keep a pulse on employee engagement other than a web-based anonymous service, such as Officevibe?
OJ: Yeah, so apart from the regular pulse checks that we have with Officevibe, we also have regular pulse checks with leaders. So, weekly meetings and monthly reviews to, sort of, engage the employees about what’s going well, where they might be struggling, how we can help them, how can we help move their goals forward. On top of that, we also conduct regular Start-Stop-Keep meetings.
KS: Can you explain those?
OJ: Yes, absolutely. So, the Start-Stop-Keeps are open dialogue meetings with each team, also with HR and the CEO, where we ask each member of the team to show up with three things that they’d like to see their – either their department or the organization to start doing, three things that they’d like to see their department or organization to stop doing, and three things that they’d like to see their department or organization to keep doing. So, out of these meetings, we’ve had really interesting ideas come out, and many that we have actually been able to implement as a result. You know, simple things. Sometimes people want more plants in the office, or they want to feel like, you know, there’s a little more life around the office. We’ve had people say they’d like to have a better setup to work from home, or be able to work from home more often. So, you know, a lot of things that employees are looking for are actually quite easy to implement. And, as a result of these meetings, I think people also come to the table with ideas that maybe they think, “Oh, you know, that’s kind of farfetched and I’m not going to address that.” But, when you give them an open platform to do so, a lot of the time, they surprise you with these sort of ideas that they come forward with, and also some good business strategy ideas have come out of this as well.
KS: Right, so as you said, something simple – something as simple as bringing in plants to the office, which you know, you might not ever think of being in HR or being the CEO that that would be important to someone, but give them that open dialogue and that opportunity, I think that’s really great.
OJ: Yeah, exactly.
KS: Is there anything else that you do?
OJ: Yes. You know, the Start-Stop-Keep meetings are done collectively with the team, apart from that, we also do what we call a “Stay Interview.” These are done individually with HR and each member of the organization, so…
KS: Is that like the opposite of an Exit Interview?
OJ: Exactly! So, essentially we’re asking the team for feedback on, you know, what’s going well, but also we’d like to know what could essentially draw our top performers away. You know, we do have an amazing team here at Outback, and we want to do everything in our power to keep them and keep them happy in Outback so that, you know, they do want a lasting career here and they do want to continue coming to work here, and they remain engaged.
KS: So, asking those questions before it’s too late.
OJ: Exactly! So, you know, sometimes – a lot of the time, managers steer away from doing these. They get a little nervous thinking that, you know, they’re going to ask for a raise or something unattainable. But, a lot of time, people come to the table with – you know, money sometimes plays a small part in it. They may say, “If I was to be offered ‘X’ amount, I might consider leaving.” But, a lot of the time, when we ask what they’d like to see included in our perks and benefits package, what could lure them away, how we can counteract that to keep them here, it’s actually quite simple what comes out of it. And, you know, when you give employees the platform to be heard, and then actually take action on that, it really helps to solidify the organization’s commitment to the team. And it shows them that we’re committed not just to achieving our strategy and our goals, but we’re also committed to making this a great place to work.
KS: Yeah, and keeping them engaged in the workplace.
OJ: Absolutely. And you know, that keeps the employee engagement scores because they see that we are engaged and committed to them, as much as they are committed to us.
KS: Yeah, absolutely. And, so, with the Officevibe, I know you mentioned that you are sending those out on a weekly basis. With something, obviously, that takes a bit more time and requires possibly the entire department or CEO to be available, how often are you doing these Stay Interviews and Start-Stop-Keep sessions?
OJ: Yeah, so the Stay Interviews are fairly new to us, but twice a year, and then the Start-Stop-Keep meetings also twice a year. So, essentially one quarter you’d have a Start-Stop-Keep meeting with the team, the next quarter you’d have an individual Stay Interview, the next quarter you have, again, a Start-Stop-Keep meeting with the team, and then the next quarter you’d have a Stay Interview individually. So, essentially each quarter you’re given sort of that opportunity to have an open dialogue discussion with HR and/or the CEO. You know, and the Stay interview takes 20 to 30 minutes, depending on the individual and what you are talking about, but the Start-Stop-Keep meetings take sort of anywhere from 45 minutes to an hour. So, it’s not a huge time commitment that we are asking for, but what comes out of these meetings is actually pretty exciting.
KS: Yeah! And so, earlier you mentioned barbecues and going out to baseball games, you’ve mentioned plants, all these ways that Outback has improved employee engagement, are there any other examples that you can give me that Outback has done?
OJ: Yeah, so I mean, you hit the nail on the head there with giving the team a platform to be heard and actually taking action on that, but yeah, we’re also big believers of rewarding our team when success is achieved. So, each quarter, you know, we have specific sales targets and company goals related to strategy, people, or execution, and, when we achieve those goals, we celebrate together. So, you know, in the summer months we have regular barbecues at lunch, every last Friday of the month we have monthly socials where, you know, we all get together in our social area and maybe play ping pong and pool, order some food in, and have some drinks. Now, we also have an annual employee engagement retreat. So, these events really just help the team build lasting relationships with their colleagues, which helps strengthen their commitment to the team and the organization, so it helps to make work a little less like work, which is one of our mottos around here.
KS: Yeah, and for those quarterly celebrations, from my understanding, they’re a bit bigger in event size than, say, the barbecue or the monthly drinks, and I think that it’s great that they’re tied to the company’s successes because that keeps people engaged, right? That keeps people wanting to continue to do well and wanting to be involved in how the work is going.
OJ: Absolutely. So, when they get to reap the rewards of their hard work and their commitment to achieving those goals, it’s that much more rewarding. You know, like a couple of quarters ago we went snowmobiling. So, a lot of the team had never done something like that before. We got to get out of the office and experience something new like that together. It helps re-forge those lasting relationships and create those memories with the team that, you know, a lot of people remember forever.
KS: Right, and then, I mean, like you mentioned earlier, you’re getting that opportunity to interact with someone who’s not in your department or that you may not necessarily interact with all that often. So, you come back from say, a snowmobiling trip, with someone who you never get to work with in the office, and then you have that relationship that’s been built outside, which makes that odd chance when you do work with them, you’re way more likely to want to engage and help them and make their job easier.
OJ: Absolutely!
KS: So, since implementing a lot of these things, how much has Outback’s eNPS improved?
OJ: Actually, over the past years we’ve increased our employee engagement scores, or eNPS, by just over 100 percent.
KS: How does that work?
OJ: Yeah, so last year at this time we had an eNPS of 35 and…
KS: Which was, as we talked about earlier, which isn’t actually that low of a score…
OJ: Nope, it’s not. And, when I look at the result of that score in the data – when I went to calculate that score, I don’t even think we had any demoters, we just had more neutrals. But you know, our score today is 71, which is – looking back at past data – is one of our highest scores to date. So, you look into the data that went into that, we have no demoters, very few neutrals, and the majority of our team are actually promoters. You know, when you have a high eNPS like that, when it comes to recruitment, it helps a little bit. Or, you know, putting our name out there with our family and friends, you know how great of a place we are to work. When they get asked about how work is going, you know they are excited to talk about it. They are excited to talk about what the company is doing, what we’re doing for the team and, you know, they talk about some of those exciting events that they may have participated in that week, or they’ll talk about, “They have barbecue at lunch,” or, “No, I can’t meet you at lunch on Friday afternoon, I’ve got a monthly social,” or, “Oh yeah, how was your day? Mine was great. I went snowmobiling!” Or, whatever it is. So, you know, it helps to sort of spread the word about Outback and get people excited about who we are and what we do.
KS: Yeah, and correct me if I’m wrong, but that seems pretty outstanding to have come that far in a span of a year.
OJ: Yes, absolutely. That is due in part a lot to our team. We do have a really hard working team and, like I said, employee engagement is about having a team that shows up ready to put their best foot forward every day, and they do! And because of that, we’re achieving results and we’re reaching our goals and then we get to celebrate together, so, it helps us sort of keep the momentum. And the important thing is really about, you know, putting continuous effort in it, and paying continuous attention to maintaining those high levels of employee engagement, having those regularly scheduled meetings and having those employee engagement initiatives, having the commitment from the leadership team to continue doing so.
KS: Yeah, I was just going to ask you, how do you go about maintaining a high eNPS coming from a lower score and then being able to bring it back up? How do you maintain that momentum? But, you know, you just answered my question.
OJ: Yeah, I mean, it’s really just about not letting it fall by the wayside. We’ve got it up to a great score right now, and now the focus is on maintaining that and ensuring that we are doing everything that we can, through having these open and honest discussions, gathering feedback, and actually taking action when appropriate.
KS: Yeah, well, and of course you’re going to have a team that wants to put their best foot forward if they feel like they’re being heard and you’re giving them, you know, weekly opportunities to do that anonymously, and then more opportunities to do that in person with someone like the CEO. You’ll feel heard when those opportunities are there, and then when you see your suggestions or other suggestions being put into action, I’m sure that that will really motivate people to continue to be engaged.
OJ: Yeah, and you know, the nice thing is because we have that sort of open level of communication, you know, people feel like it’s okay to, you know, say, “Hey,” to the CEO, “I’ve got an idea.” And you know they‘re actually listened to. It’s not like, you know, “I’m the CEO and I make the decisions.” We know that people have good ideas and, you know, they’ve got great feedback and we’ve been able to implement new initiatives because of that, so, it’s exciting to see.
KS: Do you have any final tips?
OJ: Yeah, I mean, the main thing would really be just to listen and take action when appropriate and show appreciation to your team when a job’s been done well and reward them appropriately. And, you know, do what you can to make your organization a great place to work.
KS: Yeah! Well, thanks so much for joining me today, Olivia. That’s it for this episode of Outback Team Building & Training Tips. Outback Team Building & Training helps organizations across North America build relationships through memorable team building, training, and consulting experiences, and our team has been recommended by over 14,000 corporate groups in the United States and Canada. For more tips and expert advice on improving employee engagement, visit the Downloadable Resources section of our website at outbackteambuilding.com to download your free copy of “A Manager’s Guide to Employee Engagement.” And don’t forget to subscribe to our podcast on iTunes, Google Play, Stitcher, or wherever you may listen to your podcasts. Until next time! Thank you for listening.