Make It Count: UBC Surveys Through Points of Connection
Consider who really holds social influence in your organization in order to communicate important initiatives effectively.
The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a dual campus and multi-city university comprising numerous academic and administrative departments. It is a large and dispersed organization with notable diversity in staff roles.
To account for its organizational structure, UBC’s Equity & Inclusion Office opted to involve Department Heads and Deans in communicating the data collection initiative directly to their staff, rather than sending the message from the Associate Vice President of Equity & Inclusion or from the University’s President.
Their team noted that staff tended to take the request more seriously when coming from their direct supervisor, rather than a department they may have limited interaction with.
Lesson to apply
Messaging from the top may not be the most effective strategy. Consider who really holds social capital in your organization.
UBC’s workforce also includes employees with roles in operations, food services, cleaning services, and residences, many of whom do not have an associated work email. They also do not have regular access to a computer through which they could complete an online survey.
To better engage with employees in this category, UBC tasked surveyors with attending team meetings to speak with staff about the survey and positioned surveyors at shift change locations to collect responses in-person.
The result was an increase in response rate from 22% to 48% for this category of employees, as well as an increase in awareness and use of services offered through the University’s Equity & Inclusion Office.
Lesson to apply
Low tech surveys can still get strong results.
It requires more labour, but can also provide a valuable touchpoint for you and your dispersed workforce.