Top 10 Employee Engagement KPIs

How to Define Employee Engagement KPIs

Contrary to business units like sales, production or advertisement, employee engagement can’t be measured easily with quantifiable data. This complicates the process of estimation and analysis.

Employee engagement boosts loyalty and performance. It can also influence and support key operational objectives, by improving productivity. This is where industry KPIs can provide benchmarks and guidelines for better and more effective analysis.

Choosing your key performance indicators is the first step towards measurable improvement. The question is, how do you choose the right ones? We can’t provide a cheat sheet, because each business is different and KPIs depend on companies’ objectives, size, activity, etc. What we can provide you with is a starter list of indicators that you should consider when defining your KPIs and you can adjust them to your business.

Top 10 KPIs for measuring employee engagement

1. Employee NPS

Net Promoter Scores were originally introduced to measure the levels of satisfaction and loyalty of customers. They have since been adopted internally by progressive employers to ascertain the same information from their employees. So they ask the simple question, “How likely is it that you would recommend working at our company to a friend or colleague?”

Generally, the question is answered on a scale from 0 to 10, where anyone answering 0 to 6 is considered a detractor, answers 7 to 8 are considered passive, and 9 to 10 respondents are considered promoters.

2. Turnover Rate

The turnover rate reveals organizations’ ability to retain top talents. It measures the length of workers’ tenure. Usually, rates differ from one department or team to another, which helps employers identify focus points and key issues.

3. Successful hires after a trial period

This indicator shows the percentage of people who stay in the organization after their trial period, which can speak strongly about the successful onboarding processes. If employees are leaving after the first 3 to 6 months, this can either mean that they were not the right fit for the job or that the company failed to integrate them into the team.

4. Internal Promotion Rate

One of the main drivers for employee engagement is the opportunity for professional growth within the organization. This highlights the importance of the internal promotion rate, as it represents the ability of organizations to keep top performers.

If your emphasis is on human resource management, you might want to consider the Internal Hire Rate (employees switching positions internally) and Internal Employee Referral Hire Rate (new hires acquired after an employee suggestion).

5. Employee satisfaction index (ESI)

Using this indicator, organizations are able to measure the link between employee satisfaction and customer experience. Unlike NPS, the satisfaction index is based on more than one question, but they are still answered on a scale of 1 to 10. The results may differ from 0 to 100, where a higher score indicates a more satisfied employee.

6. Online company ratings

Similar to product review websites, there are multiple public sites that allow employees to review their employers. Ratings range from 1 to 5, which provides insight into the opinions of current and previous employees. Make sure to create an internal communication campaign to encourage reviews on similar platforms.

7. Active intranet users

In the digital workplace, active intranet users are an excellent measure of engagement. The analytics featured in internal communication tools can give insights on employees’ posts, likes, comments and overall information consumption. Users are considered ‘active’ when they connect at least once per day. This measurement can also be compared over time, to follow each employee’s onboarding and maturing phase.

8. Active employee social ambassadors

Creating effective brand ambassadors can be hard if the overall employee engagement level is low. One indicator you should follow is the willingness of employees to share corporate news outside of their professional network. Tracking employee social activity can be tricky, but the use of internal employee advocacy tools can help. Similar to active intranet users, active ambassadors are those who have shared any content at least once per a given period.

9. Employee Suggestion Box Results

Collecting employee feedback is just as important as actually implementing suggestions. The first indicator of engagement here is the number of actual participants. The second type of information that can be extracted is the number of valuable suggestions aiming for productivity enhancement.

10. Absenteeism

Absenteeism is closely linked to employee satisfaction. Not showing up for work is an issue for both employees and everyone else on the team. Once someone is falling behind or missing, the whole team may suffer in their work, resulting in a diminished employee experience. A high absenteeism rate can speak to low motivation and low productivity in the workplace.

Measure the things that matter for your employees’ professional development. Strive to strengthen and grow employee experience through every key performance indicator. Define your measurements well and adjust each indicator to support a given business objective.