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Boost employee survey participation with incentives using best practices and ethical tips to improve response rates and feedback.
Employee surveys are an important tool for organizations to gauge engagement, satisfaction, and workplace culture. Yet, low participation rates often limit their effectiveness. One effective way to improve response rates is through the use of thoughtful incentives. This article explains why participation matters, how incentives can encourage it, best practices for implementation, ethical concerns, and ways to measure success.
Understanding why employee participation is important helps organizations prioritize efforts to improve it. High participation rates contribute significantly to the quality and usefulness of survey data.
High participation rates are important because they:
Common barriers to participation include:
Overcoming these obstacles is necessary to capture a full picture of employee sentiment.
Incentives can be an effective motivator for encouraging employees to complete surveys. By acknowledging employees’ time and effort, incentives help raise participation, especially when it tends to be low.
Incentives work best when they promote honest, thoughtful responses rather than simply increasing numbers. Used alongside other engagement efforts, incentives can foster a positive feedback culture and improve survey outcomes.
Choosing the right incentives depends on company culture, budget, and employee preferences. Common categories of incentives include:
Organizations can also choose between team-based or individual rewards to best fit their culture. Selecting incentives thoughtfully ensures they motivate participation and align with employee values.
Proper implementation is key to maximizing the benefits of incentives while maintaining survey integrity. Important implementation guidelines to consider are:
Following these best practices helps maintain trust and encourages meaningful participation.
It is important to address ethical issues when using incentives to ensure the process respects employees and survey goals.
By adhering to these principles, organizations can foster a culture of respect and trust in the survey process.
Evaluating the impact of your incentive program helps determine its effectiveness and guides future improvements.
Key metrics to track include:
Regular measurement ensures incentives contribute positively to survey participation without unintended drawbacks.
While incentives can provide a short-term boost, creating a sustainable culture that values feedback is the most effective long-term strategy.
This includes:
When employees see that their voices lead to real change, they are more likely to engage—without needing additional incentives.
Ready to Boost Your Survey Participation?
Incentives can be a powerful tool to increase employee engagement with surveys, but they work best as part of a broader strategy. Discover how Assembly can help you design, distribute, and analyze employee surveys—while maximizing participation and engagement. Schedule a demo with Assembly today!
Popular options include gift cards, extra time off, company swag, and team-based rewards. Choose incentives that align with your company culture and are accessible to all employees.
If not managed carefully, incentives can lead to rushed or insincere responses. Keep incentives modest and make it clear the reward is for participation, not specific answers.
For anonymous surveys, use group-based rewards or raffles where only participation is tracked, not individual responses. Avoid collecting identifying information linked to survey answers.
Yes! Recognition, extra time off, or professional development opportunities can be highly motivating, especially when they reflect what employees value.
Get the foundational knowledge on creating an employee recognition program that boosts employee engagement and helps them feel valued.
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Yes, at Assembly, security is a top priority. Each quarter, we have ongoing security work that is everyone’s responsibility. While we maintain a strong security posture, it was important for us to prove to our customers that we do everything we claim to do. This led us to pursue a SOC 2 Type II report that would provide evidence of our compliance with industry gold-standard security practice.
There is study after study showing that employee recognition leads to increased engagement. This in return creates an environment where employees are happier and more motivated which increase productivity and reduces voluntary turnover significantly. In order to filled critical roles, companies tend to spend nearly twice the value of an annual salary. Assembly is an investment in your employees that supports your bottom line.
Yes, we will offer contracts for companies with longer-term agreements to help larger customers have more certainty around future costs.
The minimum agreement term is a 12-month subscription.
We do and for FREE! Any new customer needing further support to get started with Assembly to ensure you're set up for success can request custom onboarding support. Improving your employee experience is about much more than just using our amazing software; it’s about transforming your business to create a workplace that people love. That’s much easier to do with the personal support and advice from our passionate people experts.
At the time of redemption (when your employees exchange their points for a paid reward) you'll pay face value. If a reward is a $10 Amazon gift card, your cost will be $10. All paid rewards are billed for on a monthly basis.
The good news is that you don't have to pay for rewards upfront because we only charge you when points are redeemed, not when they're earned.
We offer discounts or educational or charitable organizations. In order to secure a discount, you'll first need to book a demo with a customer support specialist.
For all other organizations, we are willing to consider longer-term agreements in exchange for discounts. To set up annual plans or longer, you will need to book a demo with a customer support specialist.
If you're on a month to month plan, you can go here and cancel anytime. If you're having concerns or need help setting up your account for success, you can always book a demo with a customer support specialist.
If you're on a longer-term custom plan, you'll need to reach out to your customer support specialist to cancel your account or email us at support@joinassembly.com.
Great question! You can customize your core values to match your organization's to boost and track alignment. You can change your currency from the 🏆 emoji (our default) to any emoji of your choice. You can swap our logo for your own. You can also set up company culture rewards such as, "Lunch with the CEO," "Buy a book on us," and so much more!
While we recommend a peer to peer set up where anyone in your organization can give or receive recognition, you can set up Assembly however you want. If you need to limit the people who can give or receive recognition, that's perfectly fine and can be done from your Admin, here.
Assembly connects to the tools your employees use every day to offer an easy, seamless experience with minimal change management.
Assembly has integrations with HCM/HRIS systems like ADP, Google, Office 365, and Slack. We also integrate with communication tools like Slack and Teams so you and your employees can access Assembly wherever they work now.
That depends on the company's permissions set up. That said, over 90% of the employees on Assembly's platform are recognized on a monthly basis. That means nearly every employee across all of our customers are receiving regular recognition from their peers, managers, or leadership. We're extremely proud of this.
They are not required. You can use Assembly without having rewards set up. However, we don't recommend it if you intend to have a high adoption and usage rate. You can always keep the costs down by offering internal culture rewards that are fulfilled by you internally.
No, you can remove allowances from anyone or everyone. It's up to you but we do recommend using points whether they're worth a real dollar value or not. Companies that use points have a much higher engagement rate even if those points don't exchange for real dollars.
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