Regular Feedback From My Team

Tony Morris -

As a brand new-ish leader of people at Hyland, I am regularly in search of ways to solicit feedback from my team.

Hyland has a quarterly review process that is completely optional, so it can be tough to get the organizational support that implementing such a process would entail. Additionally, this quarterly review process is not anonymous, so it can be tough for people to provide "true" feedback.

Yearly, Hyland has a Leadership Evaluation Process which does provide that level of anonymity that I require, plus the organizational support around it. Unfortunately, this only reviews the people in leadership, and not necessarily the health of the team. Back to the drawing board.

My wife solves the problem

My wife mentioned to me offhand that she her organization's weekly "Voice of the Team" survey is moving to a biweekly cadence. This sparked my interest, mainly because I had no idea what she was talking about.

She explained it as such:

  • The survey is completely anonymous.
  • The first question is a 1-10 rating: "How satisfied are you with the team?"
  • The second question is a Yes/No, and it's a different question every week. This is typically statements about the leadership or the team in general.
  • The third question is an open response: "Do you have any other feedback?"

That's it. Three simple questions, sent weekly, to gauge the health of the team and to provide the team a manner in which to provide feedback.

My solution

Using Hyland's Microsoft 365 subscription, I created a simple Microsoft Form for the given week, as seen in the screenshot below.

Note that we are not recording names! Totally anonymous.

Then I copied that form multiple times, one for each subsequent week. I gave each of those forms a different second question:

  • AWS Hosting Team Leadership cares about me as an individual.
  • AWS Hosting Team Leadership holds the team accountable for its actions.

For now, those are the only three leadership-focused questions I've come up with. Future questions will likely include state-of-the-team type questions, in addition to some product roadmap ones.

Every Friday morning at 10am Eastern, I send out the following email:

Team,

In an effort to become more a more transparent and feedback-driven organization, I will be sending out a very short survey every week on Friday.

This survey is completely anonymous. While it requires you to be logged into your Hyland Office 365 account, names and emails are not recorded.

I strongly encourage you to respond honestly! The responses to these surveys will drive a portion of every department meeting.

https://forms.office.com/r/---

Thanks,
Tony

How it's going

My team spans three very distinct geographic regions: US, Poland, and India. Because I send this out Friday morning Eastern time, most of the non-US team members are not likely to respond on the same day.

I am not planning on closing the form until the next one comes out, so it gives the team a chance to provide feedback when they see fit.

I would love to get insight into other survey-style questions that anyone else might think fit in this type of feedback gathering! Let's hear it!