Human resource surveys: HR survey questions and templates

How to build the perfect human resource survey and questionnaire.

Although surveys are generally associated with gaining customer feedback or curating market research, they're also quite handy for human resource departments. By garnering their employees' opinions, HR surveys give companies insight into how they are functioning. These insights can help managers learn more about loyalty and productivity issues while making employees feel heard. HR surveys are also a great tool to improve employee efficiency. Discover how you can use HR surveys for your business and ways to use our handy HR survey questions.

Which human resource survey software is best?

You don't need fancy HR survey software to design an HR survey. Whether you need employee-onboarding surveys or a human resource management questionnaire, SurveyPlanet is the perfect option for any survey. SurveyPlanet allows you to produce an unrestricted number of surveys, collating as many responses as needed, and an unlimited number of questions. All with your free account.

Which HR questionnaire tools do I need?

It's important to find HR questionnaire software that includes all the features you need to create and analyze surveys. SurveyPlanet has a variety of aesthetic themes, premade survey questions, and SSL-protected survey responses that guarantees that only you can view the results. Responses can be gathered anonymously, and easily embedded onto your website if you so choose.

By upgrading to a Pro account, you gain access to amazing features, including white-labeling the survey with your brand and giving employees a survey length estimate. The Pro account also features question branching, which enables further questions based on how an employee answered a previous one. This gives you the ability to create a unique survey experience for each employee based on the course of their answers. The Pro account also gives you different export options, the ability to add images to questions or answers, and many other exclusive features.

Best practices for creating HR surveys

When it comes to your company's success, the motivation of your employees is incredibly important. You can gain needed insights about how to better motivate employees—and thus bring greater success to your business—with a well-executed human resource questionnaire.

Begin by finding ways to encourage employees to participate. Without a high participation rate, you won't get the information you need. Increase participation rates with incentives like raffles or a small prize for submitting answers.

Best practices for creating HR survey for employees

The best practice when creating an employee HR survey is to reassure respondents that the survey is completely confidential. If employees feel like they will get into trouble with their responses, then stress to them that answers are incognito and that the survey is strictly for feedback. To reassure them, once the survey is completed report the results company-wide. This will help establish trust and lay the groundwork for future surveys.

When creating a questionnaire for employees, be mindful of the phrasing of questions. Make sure each is relevant to specific participants. If you want to create different survey questions for different departments, split the survey into different paths using question branching. Every employee should be able to actually answer any question asked of them.

You don't need to worry if you are not a seasoned survey writer—we've got you covered. Dig into our treasure trove of survey knowledge , where you will find detailed guides for everything from writing a great survey introduction to well-written examples of good survey questions!

Don't forget about the feedback

As a final best practice suggestion, make sure you really use the feedback you receive. Employees won't want to fill out surveys if they don't feel like doing so helps promote change.

With these best practices in place, expect a higher response rate and better-quality answers from future HR surveys. This will prove a very helpful corporate tool and probably the most important type of employee survey.

Topics and templates for HR surveys

If you've never created an HR survey questionnaire before, it might seem challenging to develop the correct questions to ask employees. For example, there's a difference between HR effectiveness survey questions, exit survey questions, and work-life balance questions. Luckily for you, SurveyPlanet has the HR survey template you need to get started.

Employee benefit surveys

The right employee benefits can greatly improve staff performance—which will only benefit your business. To find out which benefits are most important to employees, give them an annual employee benefits survey. The responses will tell you which benefits they care most about. You might even discover that they would prefer expanded benefits over a pay raise.

The information gained from this kind of survey is crucial for employee retention, as well as overall performance. Questions can relate to paid time off (PTO), health insurance, benefits compared to other companies, parental leave, free meals, flexible hours, remote work, etc. You can ask HR survey questions with multiple-choice answers, ratings, scales, ranges, scores, short answers, or even essay responses. Use our wide variety of HR survey question options to find the answers you need.

Learn more about employee benefits surveys

Exit surveys

Another common type of HR survey is an employee exit survey. Whether they retire, quit, are fired, or finish their contract, these surveys give you insight into an employee's experiences while working at your company. They will provide valuable data into exactly why they're leaving. Such feedback can tell you why employees leave, what areas of your business culture need improvement, and help you improve the employee experience and overall work environment. These are the factors that will allow you to increase your employee retention rate in the future.

Learn more about exit survey surveys

HR assessment questionnaire

Want to find out if your human resources department is doing a good job? Send your employees an HR feedback survey. You can ask questions to see how the HR department can improve the lives of employees. Such surveys can provide feedback about the department's hiring practices, communication quality, ability to solve problems, and much more.

Learn more about HR feedback surveys

Work-life balance surveys

Do your employees have a healthy work-life balance? Is their workload sustainable?

A work-life balance survey can provide information about whether your employees are working overtime off-the-clock, feeling overloaded, or don't have enough work during certain parts of the work schedule. You can also ask questions about projects employees are working on to better understand what they enjoy and what's giving them trouble.

A healthy work-life balance will improve your employees' performance by improving their work experience. Additionally, you can ask about projects or employee roles you might find interesting. Send this survey out several times a year so you better understand your employees' peak periods and when it is a good time to hire more permanent or temporary staff.

Learn more about work-life balance surveys

Employee engagement survey

An employee engagement survey measures the motivation and engagement that your employees experience in their work. It is a form of a satisfaction survey. With an employee engagement survey, you get feedback about employee satisfaction with their management team, daily tasks, and how employees feel in general about working at your company.

Getting such feedback can help you improve employees' experiences, which will, in turn, result in better workforce performance and greater overall satisfaction with your company's management and team functions.

Learn more about employee engagement surveys

Job and employee satisfaction survey

Human resources can use feedback surveys to gain more insight into job and employee satisfaction in the workplace. By sending a comprehensive survey to employees seeking input about what they most and least enjoy about their jobs, HR can make adjustments that will increase employee morale and job satisfaction. Surveys can also help the human resources department to direct employees on the correct career path.

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Company culture surveys

Does your business have a good company culture? HR surveys help you improve company culture simply by giving you information about what could be better. Give your employees a company culture survey to find out what it is like and what you can do to make it better. This will enhance your work environment and have a positive effect on employee performance.

Learn more about company culture surveys

Manager survey

Your company's leadership and management teams set the tone for the rest of the operation. A leadership and management effectiveness survey is a great way to discover whether or not employees are getting the leadership they deserve. Use insights from such surveys to pinpoint the strengths and weaknesses of your leadership team.

Learn more about manager surveys

Ready to start gaining valuable insights from your employees? Sign up for an account with SurveyPlanet to create your first HR survey questionnaire. Or browse through our templates to find the right survey for you.

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