The Answers American Employee Study: What Does It Mean For Retail?
By Christine Kern, contributing writer
Retail workers score just 67 for job satisfaction, well below threshold of excellence.
Answers Corporation, a provider of cloud-based voice of customer solutions and owner of the Internet brand Answers.com, has released the results of its inaugural Answers™ American Employee Study, a comprehensive examination employee engagement and satisfaction among thousands of American workers across roles, ranks and industries, including retail and hospitality.
The study used predictive analytics to understand the relationship between employee satisfaction, engagement, and future behaviors to provide strategic insights into employee motivation and tactical insights into employer actions to improve the overall employee experience.
Among the findings of the study were:
- American employees are generally dissatisfied, scoring a 65 in satisfaction, on a 0-100 scale. A score of 80 or higher is considered the threshold for excellence at which a company meets and exceeds employee expectations.
- Only 46 percent of employees have ever been asked to participate in company-led employee experience measurement programs, and only 15 percent of those who did saw any resultant action from the surveys.
- Nearly half (48 percent) stated that their employers don’t seem to understand their career goals.
- Formal training affects satisfaction. Those who received no training scored 52 in satisfaction., while employees who received formal training have a satisfaction score of 72.
- Answers’ analytical engine found that together, Leadership, Compensation and Relationship with a Supervisor are the top three priority areas for improvement.
- While 27 percent of workers are engaged in their work and 28 percent are completely disengaged, 45 percent of employees fall somewhere in the middle. Focusing on moving that “silent plurality” into the engaged column can have a tremendous impact on the organization.
- Over half of Americans work with someone that really annoys them (55 percent) and it impacts their satisfaction (with a score of 58 when annoyed vs. 72 when not annoyed). However, contrary to popular belief, 86 percent of workers actually like their boss, and only 20 percent of Americans identify the annoying co-worker as their direct supervisor.
- Despite their reputation as demanding, job-hopping employees, the study revealed that Millennials are actually the most satisfied (66, compared to 63-65 for other generations) and most engaged (62, compared to 56-59) of all the generations. They are among the most likely to stay at a company (65), second only to the 55+ age group (66).
- Employees in the energy and utility industries are the most satisfied, each scoring 70–the highest of any industry. Retail employees rated 67 for satisfaction, 56 for engagement, and 62 in their intention to remain in their jobs.
Ultimately, the “Answers’ American Employee Study highlights the fact that employers don’t understand their employees, and they are failing to proactively change the situation. “Improving employee satisfaction leads to desirable employee behaviors, such as recommending the company to others, supporting its products and satisfying its customers,” Eric Feinberg, Senior Director, Product Strategy, Answers Cloud Services, said in the press release. “Considering the high cost of replacing employees–anywhere from a fifth to 200 percent of the person’s salary–a true commitment to measuring and improving the employee experience should be an operational imperative for American employers.”
Retail, like other fields, should be proactive in increasing employee satisfaction to leverage it into higher return on investment. Happy employees mean happy customers, and happy customers mean fuller cash drawers.