CLIMATE SURVEYS

Organizational health depends on senior management having an accurate pulse on the morale and mood of the employees.

Managers should be visible and have frequent contact with employees perhaps best exemplified by the Hewlett Packard notion of 'management by walking around.' But there are times when organizations need more comprehensive information, both quantified measures and qualitative impressions systematically accumulated.

Formal Employee Climate Surveys are the vehicles for this.

AFS Consulting has assisted many NGOs, small technology companies, and divisions of government departments in finding out what is going on in the hearts and minds of their staff, then help them determine what steps need to be taken to improve organizational effectiveness.

Factors to be surveyed include:

We have two approaches to data gathering in organizations, depending on the client's expectations, size and budget:

Smaller Organizations (<50 people)
We typically interview half the staff following a structured questionnaire, and then assimilate the findings in a narrative report. This is often followed by a facilitated workshop or staff retreat to provide feedback from the report and to begin action planning.

Larger Organizations
We produce a representative sample (1/3 to 1/2 of the population) and conduct 'focus group' sessions of 10 -12 employees: we spend about an hour brainstorming and getting responses to general climate questions; then we administer a structured questionnaire, collecting their rated a responses to 72 questions as well as any written comments they choose to offer. The data and remarks are assembled in a report and presented to the management authority. We then undertake to assist the management to present the findings to the employees and advise and consult in undertaking action planning.