Before the pandemic most savvy organisations understood the importance of employee voice. It has always been able to boost employee satisfaction, innovation, to gain frontline insight, and to improve overall company balance and strength.

Now the pandemic is here, many businesses have been boosting their communication with employees. Namely, this has been quite a linear communication that works around letting employees know about new hygiene regime, safety information and about when and where they are able to do their jobs.

As an enterprise, you have likely put a lot of effort in with employee engagement and wellbeing during this time, but have your employees truly been heard throughout the pandemic? If they haven’t, is there a chance you could use employee voice as an opportunity to strengthen your response?

The Employee Pandemic Experience

On a personal level, we have all learnt a lot about our own lives throughout this pandemic. Understanding what really matters to us, what we want to change when we get the chance again. We have also had to think differently about how we speak and see loved ones, and how we show we care. Even food shopping has had to be planned differently. We’ve all had to problem solve and grow.

This approach has also happened in your business. As a company you have worked differently to keep your business moving. Employees have had to work differently to liaise with clients, to provide good customer service. You’ve had to utilise technology differently together, and work in a different way to keep things moving.

On a most basic level taking all the insight and information your employees have about their experience can help you to build a stronger business for the future. Their insight can help you work in a more flexible way that allows for more changeable situations in future.

Even more important is that your staff will have also learned what matters to them at work. They will have felt strongly, that they missed certain aspects of their old work life, or indeed that they didn’t miss certain things at all. Maybe your workforce love working digitally and have thrived away from the office. Perhaps your entire office culture relied so much on face to face contact, motivation and strength was wholly missing from the team as they had to work separately.

Engage With Your Workforce Now, For A Better Business Tomorrow

It is really useful to truly hear your employees right now, and to learn from the experiences of your staff, and of your business overall. Use surveys, 1-2-1’s, email conversations, votes, and both anonymous and identified options. If there has been a positive experience overall, you can learn about those strengths and the habits the company needs to push. If there are shortfalls, and employee trust and connection has been challenged, you can make the changes you need to improve employee wellbeing.

By actively listening and offering a safe space to your teams now, you can act on the findings and boost your business for the better post-pandemic.