How confidential ARE employee surveys (administered by a 3rd party)?

[Paula Sims]

We are in the middle of employee satisfaction survey of a company over 3000 people. The survey is administered by a well known 3rd party survey company (NOT Survey Monkey) and they have passwords tied to each person. As was told to us (and posted on the 3rd party's web site), the answers are confidential, with our management not getting single responses but grouped responses. If someone has less than 5 people reporting to them then they won't get individual responses.

The thing is, confidential is NOT anonymous and I want to tell the truth (I'm miserable there and it's because of management) by just my ratings, no worded answers.

What do you think? Tell the truth (give low marks) or just go down the middle? I can't afford to lose my job and I doubt that will be the case, but I also don't want to make my life hell. If we get low marks (like we have in the past), who knows what the reaction would be -- and there MIGHT be some sort of positive change (then again, I could have unicorn dust come out of my orifices). . .

Comments?

Thanks

[upaloopa]

1. We have something similar where I work

We had Survey Monkey. We are supposedly in a chang mode. But the steering committee is made up of all the regular managers. They had power things to maintain. I doubt there will be change or our opinions listened to.

[SheilaT]

2. The true confidentiality may well depend

on various things. If the results will be broken down and reported by department, and you are in a small department, you might want to be cautious. If results are not broken down in any way that could potentially identify a responder, than be honest. Giving better marks than the company deserves just insures that nothing will improve. Of course, even if management learns the truth, they may not respond appropriately, but that's not your fault.

Hardly anyone working can actually afford to lose the job. Keep in mind that people literally fought and died for the right to unionize. You say your company has done these surveys in the past, but you don't indicate evidence of retaliation against employees. So go ahead, be honest.

[Paula Sims]

10. Thanks all for the replies

I guess a 3 rating (1-5) is going to be my standard answer.

[winter is coming]

3. Do you have to take the survey from your work computer?

If so, I wouldn't go for extremely low marks.

Was this company used the last time they had a survey? If it was, and there wasn't blowback from the results, you can afford to be honest. I'd be cautious about discussing this with fellow employees, though, especially at work.

[LuvNewcastle]

4. I don't see why they need passwords for each person.

Seems to me that if they really wanted the truth, they would run off copies and have a big box for everyone to put their papers. The password thing makes me suspicious. What kind of history does this company have? Do they lay off or let go large numbers of workers at a time? Is business going good or bad? How do they treat 'troublemakers?' I think I'd be cautious.

[bemildred]

5. Lie your ass off, that's what I think.

If they aren't candid with you, why be candid with them? Do you feel loyal? Do you think they really care what you think?

[Warpy]

6. If there is a way to break confidentiality, it's not confidential.

If they really wanted the truth, they'd have issued forms like the opti scan ballot sheets, where bubbles were blackened with pencils to indicate answers, sheets were not numbered, and tabulation was by machine.

They want to pat themselves on the back while ridding themselves of malcontents. This survey is being done for those reasons, alone. True responses are the last thing they want.

[magical thyme]

9. ^^^ agreed. furthermore, if it's online, it's not confidential

Where I work, they track and record every single keystroke, so I don't trust any online surveys. If they wanted our real opinions they would do as others have written -- give us something we could fill in with a pencil anonymously.

Last Monday our managers told us they were reviewing all private messages historically; the PM system was to be used for company business only.

On Tuesday, they fired 3 employees -- 2 of them had been there for 4+ years and one was a lead CSR -- for mis-use of the PM system.

[customerserviceguy]

7. Same thing happened to me

And there was a lot of worry about confidentiality, so much that they sent out extra emails on the subject, and extended the period of time to answer. I decided to be as negative as I wanted to be, including "fill in the blank" comments.

I figured that they'd never break the illusion of confidentiality by retaliating against me for it, they're kind of stuck with having to deal with my answers, and it would tell them that others were probably feeling the same way, yet not honest enough to say so. Besides, I'm in a union, and they really would have a tough time singling me out for poor treatment.

On top of that, I've let various low-level managers know exactly what I feel about the way things are done, in ways that they cannot dispute, because they know I'm smarter than they are.

[Sheldon Cooper]

8. My company did that about ten years ago.

They used the old fashioned pen and paper surveys, sent from and mailed back to a third party. The surveys were secretly coded to reveal responses by department, but not by individuals. And management never saw the raw surveys, so there was no way to ID handwriting (which could have been done in the smaller departments).

As someone else mentioned, if you are in a small department, I would be very cautious about saying anything negative. Matter of fact, I'd be leery in any case - I don't think much good comes from these sorts of things. Tread carefully.