UAlberta

Pulse surveys: measuring staff sentiment

27 May 2021

Group of tiny people filling out a survey on a giant computer

Since August, the 海角社区 for Tomorrow (UAT) team has sent out monthly pulse surveys to 5600 employees across the institution to gain a sense of how the university community is feeling about both academic and administrative transformation. Each month, the survey is sent to 700 random employees and receives an average response rate of 35 per cent. This survey is an opportunity to take the pulse of our community on a few key questions relating to the UAT initiative, such as: Do staff and faculty have the information they need? Do they feel that their voices are being heard? Do they understand the purpose of UAT?

Of the approximately 2000 responses we received, we also collected more than 1400 individual comments during the past eight surveys that were sent out. These responses were analyzed each month and compared with feedback from previous months, to help guide and adjust change management and communication initiatives. 

Our findings

Overall, sentiment has shifted from staff seeking to provide input to wanting to see real change:

  • August and September focused on the need for more information and representation in the decision-making process.
  • October and November showed a growing understanding of the UAT vision and intent, but significant concerns over increased workloads without immediate solutions.
  • Responses in 2021 thus far have focused on the value of the colleges and the need to see real change, not just planning for the change.

Feedback heard has centred around three themes:

  1. Feeling distress at the situation (including the budget cuts and pressures of COVID-19 as well as pace and size of change) which have placed an inequitable burden on administrative staff.
  2. Recognizing that there are opportunities for positive change, but frontline staff must be engaged for that to happen.
  3. Concern that the colleges must add value and achieve their objectives, not only add another management layer.

Comparison since August

Since January, staff confidence in the outcomes of UAT is shifting upwards after a per