Initial Employee Engagement Survey results are available to review

Dear colleagues,

Three years ago, we launched the WMYou Employee Engagement Survey to assess our workplace culture and help measure progress on the University's strategic goals. As a result, we committed to enhancing our collaboration, communication and engagement. From that substrate grew such activities as: establishing our telecommuting and anti-bullying policies, the cross-campus teamwork propelling the Racial Justice Advisory Committee and efforts addressing various needs within vice-presidential divisions. The President's Cabinet developed its Principles of Community among its other engagement survey-inspired actions.

We also pledged in 2019 to regularly survey faculty and staff. Our commitment to doing so comes even amid an unprecedented period of challenge for employees and organizations impacted by a global health crisis, a steep recession and continued labor market upheaval. We also know that while morale isn't where any of us wants it to be, we will not waver in our efforts to advance change and improve our workplace culture. This survey is part of supporting those endeavors.

The 2022 survey’s initial results are now in hand from our vendor, ModernThink, with the full results due to us in coming weeks. Thank you to those who took the survey, which had a response rate of 52%. These initial results report on the “Top 10” and “Bottom 10” responses of faculty and staff springing from the 60-plus prompts the survey featured, such as "The work I do is meaningful to me," and "There's a sense that we're all on the same team at this University." You can find results on the Employee Engagement Survey menu item on the Office of the President website.

Next steps
As the initial results reveal, we have positive sentiments and there are other areas where we have considerable work to do. As we demonstrated in 2019, we will translate survey results into concrete actions. Collaboration, communication and engagement will guide these efforts. For example, the Employee Engagement Survey Action Team of faculty and staff formed to launch the survey will collaborate with the President's Cabinet on the response. The team has generously agreed to work over the summer to analyze the full report when it's available and identify themes. At employee forums this fall, we will determine the actions to arise from the themes identified.

But you don’t have to wait until then to provide feedback on how to improve our culture. You can submit your thoughts and ideas through a form on the Employee Engagement Survey webpage. You also can share ideas with me and cabinet members in formal and informal settings.

As we work to advance change, let us move forward with positive intent and a bias for action. By working together, I am confident we will be successful in strengthening our community in service to providing our students with the high-quality educational experience they deserve.

Sincerely,

Edward Montgomery
President