How the global HR listening survey will help De Heus develop as a learning organisation and drive our success

"De Heus is a family-owned company and that's our strength in many ways. At one time, we could meet each other in the hallways or online, and discuss work, give feedback and share knowledge face-to-face in an informal way. It was also relatively easy for management to have a finger on the pulse of the organisation. But we've grown to a scale where that's no longer possible. At the same time, it's uncomfortable for us as a family-owned company not to be in touch with everyone, so we have increasingly used surveys like this and technology to listen to employees in a more structured way."

"As a family, you want to include everyone, so in organising the survey we wanted to ensure all employee groups were heard. Another aspect is including all the themes we want to cover. One set of questions covered engagement: How connected to De Heus do employees feel? What are their concerns? What are the things they celebrate about the company? How supported and enabled do they feel in their work? This particular survey included another set of questions about De Heus as a learning organisation: Are we set up to adapt to a very dynamic business environment? There was also a group of questions about integrity and compliance: How open are we to constructive feedback? Do people feel comfortable raising issues they come across in their daily work? All these themes helped us build a comprehensive and detailed picture of where we stand today."

"We've grown into a large global organisation, so the scale itself is challenging! Talking to some 10,000 employees isn't easy so we had to organise the technology and processes to do that. As I said, we wanted to include all employee groups but not everyone is connected to the company's email infrastructure, particularly in our production facilities. So we organised a paper process in addition to the online survey. Another big challenge is ensuring effective follow-up. It's fairly easy to send out an email questionnaire, but it doesn't stop there. We have to discuss the data in the old-fashioned way, by getting together in a room and talking about what the data outcomes mean, how we can make things better and how we can do it together. It's all about dialogue."

"The response rate was 88.8%, which was higher than the previous employee survey. I've worked at several international companies and I've never seen a response rate at this level. I think that in itself shows that our people appreciate the opportunity to express themselves."

"Apart from the response rate, engagement scores were extremely high across the different parameters. As I said, I've never seen anything like it. A very high number of people feel engaged with De Heus, are proud to work here and have no intention of working anywhere else. Our Net Promoter Score was also very high. People feel heard, supported and equipped with the right resources to do their job. They feel they can speak up if something's wrong and that they make a difference when it comes to achieving the company's business goals. They also feel fairly compensated for the work they put in. It's almost embarrassingly positive. I think this is because employees understand our strategy and objectives and their role in achieving them."

"There were some regional differences, but only slightly. Asia and Latin America showed consistently higher scores and response rates, whereas scores and response rates in Europe were a bit lower. This may show that people in Asia and Latin America are more enthusiastic about taking part in the survey, while employees in Europe are a little more restrained when it comes to participating. But it's tricky to judge, so we need to dig deeper and have a dialogue about these results."

"It's very clear from the numbers that we are way above the industry benchmark when it comes to employee engagement. In addition, ratings were the same or higher compared to our last employee survey which is quite remarkable. So the overall trend is upward."

"Ratings were very high across the different parameters, but it's human nature to look at where the scores were lower and there were three areas that stood out. The first concerns workload. Even though engagement is going up, a significant number of people feel they have a high or very high workload. It may indicate that people at De Heus are willing to go the extra mile. It could also be that the world as a whole is more demanding. But in any case, it's an area we need to watch so that people have a good work-life balance and stay physically and mentally healthy.

A second area relates to De Heus as a learning organisation and psychological safety at work. In this respect, we included questions like: Do you feel comfortable sharing mistakes and failures? Do you feel your manager listens to your suggestions? Are you open to ideas from external sources? Although the scores for these questions were relatively high, they were lower than other areas. So we need to monitor this. It's a strategic imperative that we continue to be a learning organisation that reinvents itself and continuously adapts to a changing world and business environment."

The third area where scores were slightly lower concerns work processes. We're changing our leadership and governance to prepare for future growth, so we need to better structure our work processes."

"We have a whole project team and process in place for the global HR listening survey. The first step is to create excitement and a buzz about the survey. The second step is to conduct the survey itself. The third step is to share the results globally. We train managers on how to deal with the results and communicate them with their people. And the final step is to organise a dialogue about the results at a local level."

"We've started various initiatives related to the results of the survey. The challenge for HR is to maintain and develop De Heus as an organisation that allows people to develop, take calculated risks, learn from mistakes and grow with the company! It's critical to our success, so our HR strategy is largely geared to learning and development.

We've established that we derive strategic advantage from the fact that we have a great many specialists who really know their field and understand their job. At the same time, people don't always know where to turn for knowledge and expertise that will help them in their work and grow their skills. That's why we're investing significant resources to develop a global HR platform that will connect our international community and create transparency. Amongst other things, it will list all the functions within the company and enable people to access that expertise. It will also allow employees to find new job opportunities within the global organisation so they can develop as a leader or an expert in different business units and countries. In this way, we will not only create engagement so that people want to stay at De Heus, we will also leverage the knowledge and talent we have within the company and continue to grow as a learning organisation."

"I've worked at other companies where people focus on the bells and whistles like the compensation package and a company car. Don’t get me wrong, it's important that we provide a good salary and benefits, but I think De Heus' 'secret sauce' is that we are a family-style culture. People at De Heus are engaged in a different way because we're a community. They're personally invested in their work and have a great deal of pride and ownership in what they do."

"We will start implementing the new global HR platform shortly. It will take a few years to complete, but once that happens the technology will enable us to have more focused dialogues with employees more often. It will be easier to target specific groups like, for example, senior managers or colleagues who've just completed their onboarding programme at De Heus. So I foresee smaller, more frequent surveys. We will have the tools to make listening to our people easier."