Propel Action-taking through conversations - Viva People Science

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The likelihood of employee feedback fueling organizational success hinges on the actions taken based on that feedback. Many companies build excitement and energy around taking the survey: "We want to hear from you!" and "Thank you for the feedback!". However, the momentum often slows somewhere between "Here’s what we’re going to do about your feedback!" and what actually gets done to address issues and make positive incremental changes.

Compelling data points reveal why action taking is critical

  • People who don't believe action is taken are 7x more likely to be disengaged than people who do believe action is taken.

  • Teams where the manager uses action planning in the Glint platform show a 7% increase in scores on average.

  • Teams that score high on action planning are more likely to say that they have confidence in the leadership team. They are more likely to be excited about the future prospects of the company.

  • A single quarter is enough time to see increases in scores across varying teams when action is taken.

  • Regardless of the area on which action is taken, there is a high likelihood that confidence in leadership increases, and this sentiment has an indirect effect on engagement & performance.

Why isn't action-taking working today?

Screenshot of the five challenges managers face when trying to take action.

Ownership of action is unclear

Everyone agrees that acting on feedback is important. However, often it’s unclear who is responsible for action taking or the necessary actions are unequally distributed.

In some organizations, taking action on engagement results is seen as HR’s responsibility. Glint data shows that employees typically expect HR and leadership to own the actions that result from survey results. That result isn't unexpected as in many organizations, front-line managers don’t receive results for their teams. If they do receive results, they receive them weeks or months later. This is often viewed as a good practice because it gives each level of leadership time to synthesize results and prepare responses. Inadvertently, it signals to managers that engagement data is not theirs to own and improve.

As a result, managers often shift the responsibility of acting and communicating actions to leadership and HR. This may cause HR teams to feel responsible for addressing all feedback and that feeling is overwhelming for already stretched teams.

And importantly, limited interaction between senior leadership and employees means that employees have less visibility into the actions being taken.

Even in organizations where ownership is shifted to front-line managers, challenges exist. Managers often believe that they bear the entire responsibility of action-taking and must respond to every opportunity surfaced in the results. This gives managers hours of work spent combing through results and countless problems to fix. Instead of feeling empowered, they feel deflated.

Support and enablement are limited

Managers play a critical role in fostering engagement and learning within an organization, but many lack the tools and support needed to contribute effectively to team performance and development. First-time managers on the front-line manage nearly as much as two-thirds of the workforce. Over half of these managers don’t get adequate training.

Complex action plans are unsustainable

Many action-taking processes overthink on the planning instead of the execution. Creators of the Agile Manifesto know that it’s more important to respond to change than follow a plan. When 80% of action-taking effort is focused on developing long, detailed action plans, the process feels cumbersome. Cumbersome processes are easy to de- prioritize them when other business needs arise. This sentiment is especially true when surveys only occur once per year or every other year. When managers feel they have 12 or more months to make improvements, they’re more likely to overplan and overcommit. And it’s likely they lose momentum before they actually start to take sustainable action! Bottom line, lengthy action plans, built into a silo can take months to act upon. Unless people are enabled to build good, simple habits around sustainable action taking, it’s likely to run out of steam.

Feedback can feel hard to act on

Whether giving or receiving feedback, people shy away from being direct because it feels uncomfortable, especially on teams that might lack psychological safety. Feedback, which is perceived as negative doesn’t always result in improvement because most people want to avoid it. Feedback may feel like a personal attack when managers see it as a reflection of their abilities. Some assume it’s their responsibility to fix all the issues while others may feel like the issues are not under their control and defer the responsibility. Rather than feeling empowered to make change happen with their teams, they end up feeling deflated or helpless.

Use an agile approach to taking action

In order for actions on feedback to be effective, they must become part of the flow of how we work. This action is called “an agile approach” to engagement. There are three key components to making engagement (or any HR program) evolve to meet the changing needs of today’s world:

  • People who have the right mindset, skills, and behaviors to support the shift.
  • Technology that puts the right information at people’s fingertips with in a simple and delightful way.
  • Strategy that aligns with the priorities and flow of work in a business.

Let’s unpack each of these components:

People

It starts with awareness and education about the role everyone plays in making your organization a great place to work. Show that everyone can participate in productive conversations about survey results and feel ownership over action. Start by releasing results to all managers as quickly as possible. It’s critical that all managers are part of this process so it feels transparent and inclusive. Outline clear expectations for everyone, define straightforward steps, and equip your HR teams to coach managers and leaders to model the right behaviors. No one person should be responsible for creating an engaged and high-performing workplace.

Technology

The Glint platform was designed to put meaningful insights into the hands of managers so teams can move to action. This process starts with an intuitive interface that surfaces key insights based on modern OD science. Viva Glint makes it easy to identify focus areas and provide guidance on what to do about it through:

  • Strengths & Opportunities: A simple and highly actionable summary of what a manager does well and their growth opportunities.

  • Narrative Intelligence: An award-winning natural language processing (NLP) engine that surfaces key themes and associated sentiment from comment data so you can better understand employee feedback.

  • Action items: Curated recommendations for actions that can be taken as well as an extensive resource library for how to improve in any specific focus area.

  • Manager Concierge: An in-platform coach that provides step-by-step guidance. The guidance should take into account the actions a manager has taken and make intelligent recommendations for actions to take next to help their teams be more successful.

Strategy

You need a sustainable and simple strategy to move from one-way listening to effective action in an organization centered around the right habits. Rethink how you invest your time. Instead of improving your listening strategy, shift your focus and develop a conversation strategy. Help your organization make quality feedback conversations a habit. Quality conversations help managers and teams use data to fuel action and change behaviors. Here are some key elements of a simple, agile strategy for taking action:

  • Share feedback more frequently. Timely, relevant data informs important business decisions and priorities and allows managers to build habits through repetition. If people only get feedback once per year, they have to learn interpretation and conversation skills all over again every 12+ months.

  • Reduce the time between feedback and action. Get out the data as soon as possible in the hands of teams so they can get started working on it.

  • Have a laser focus on one impactful shift at a time. Don’t focus your team’s energy on creating long action plans.

  • Make adjustments and learn together. Evaluate what’s working and what’s not. Course correct along the way.

  • Create a simple check-in process. Help teams collaborate and hold each other accountable. This process can be a 30-minute check-in from initial results and then 10 minutes on your monthly weekly team meeting agenda to keep it alive. The key is not only to discuss action when the survey results come out.

Understand that conversations matter

Even the best-laid action taking efforts often lose momentum a few weeks after survey results are released. After the initial fervor that comes with new information, other priorities take over. It’s not uncommon for robust action plans to see little progress because there is no simple mechanism to hold teams accountable for progress. The missing ingredient to creating sustainable focus on taking action on feedback is obvious and often overlooked: Conversations.

Screenshot of the five reasons that conversations matter.

Why do conversations matter?

Research shows that checking in and having conversations in the workplace are critical to productivity and well-being. Unfortunately few organizations fully grasp the art of having conversations that are meaningful and propel progress.

What is the problem with conversations?

People have lots of reasons for avoiding important conversations. It’s not always clear how to facilitate a good conversation and therefore the value is unclear. Conversations about feedback can feel awkward or intimidating.

The reason Viva People Science developed the ACT Conversation.

The ACT Conversation Guide serves as a simple framework for having productive conversations that foster meaningful connection and continuous improvement. The conversation framework allows managers and teams to practice the critical steps of a quality feedback conversation and make it a habit.

Why ACT works

The ACT conversation guide is built on a combination of behavioral science and practical expertise on what fuels change within organizations.

  • Acknowledge
  • Collaborate
  • Take one step forward

Manager Quick Guide to Results and Conversations

Share this guide with your managers to help them navigate the Glint platform and interpret and use survey results.

Managers using Viva Glint ACT Conversations)

Read this article from Viva People Science for a deeper dive into the ACT conversation and how your managers can use them:

  • ACT conversations create trust on teams
  • ACT conversations help employees appreciate each other and reinforce the positive
  • ACT conversations drive focus
  • ACT conversations get to the root of the behaviors that help or hinder progress
  • ACT conversations identify individual commitment
  • ACT conversations foster an environment of ongoing learning
  • Create an agile, continuous improvement mindset
  • Are ACT conversations just one more thing we have to do?
  • Should action planning be a separate meeting?
  • Work on a problem that’s unrelated to key business activities or that you can’t easily influence
  • What is the manager's role?
  • Tips for making ACT work for your organization

Summary

Having meaningful conversations that drive connection and focus is hard. ACT conversations require skill. By providing a simple framework focused on repeating the right habits, skills are learned. Once managers understand feedback and connection, conversations become habits, which propel action and continuous improvement. And these habits won't be dependent on HR. When this culture embeds itself into an organization, people feel heard and valued, and they can thrive.