Top 5 Free or Affordable Employee Engagement Software Tools for Small Business

 Research from Gallup tells us that an alarming 87% of employees worldwide are not engaged in their work. We are in an employee engagement crisis. This isn’t some high brow, esoteric HR issue that only concerns blue-chip corporations with high powered HR teams on standby to respond, it has repercussions for the start-ups and small businesses too.

Yes, no business is immune from this employee disengagement epidemic and it’s clear that start-ups and small businesses will be feeling the effects of a disengaged workforce. By disengaged we mean: bored, working to rule, not willing to put in much or any extra effort, and in the case of the actively disengaged they are negative and spread this negativity around your work-force.

So, what can employers do about this employee engagement problem? The first step is around diagnosis and that is finding the cause of staff disengagement, and the second stage involves addressing the issues leading to disengagement.

I recommend the following best-selling books to help with your employee engagement strategy.

1.Build It: The Rebel Playbook for World Class Engagement, published by Wiley. 5 star rated book on Amazon.
2.The Truth About Employee Engagement, by Patrick Lencioni. 4.5 out of 5 star rated on Amazon.

Of course, the first step in improving employee engagement is measuring it, so you can diagnose the reasons for disengagement in your staff body. Organizations typically measure engagement by conducting an employee engagement survey.

Below are 5 free or affordable employee engagement software tools to help you assess the engagement levels and mood of your staff.

1. StaffTRAK  360.  This is an innovative employee engagement tool. It’s often said that staff leave managers not companies and if you can improve the performance of your line managers, you’ll boost team engagement. That’s why a 360 degree feedback tool is one of the most effective staff engagement tools on the market.  Try out StaffTRAK 360, the excel-based, 360-degree feedback system. Included is a 360 Degree Rater Input form with -prepared questions which you can send out to your performance raters to get 360 degree feedback. Once you have received your completed 360 feedback forms you can quickly enter the data into the 360 Degree Feedback Aggregation Form and then view the automatically 360 Degree Personal Report which is an illuminating graphical report, highlighting the individuals strengths and weaknesses based on the aggregated 360 Degree Feedback data. Try StaffTRAK 360 now.

2.Ideabase. This is a totally anonymous and cloud-based suggestion box brought to you by the team here at thecareercafe.co.uk. This has been developed by HR professionals and is an easy to use, entry-level tool for getting feedback from employees. Find out your employee’s gripes, grumbles, suggestions, ideas and innovations, take action and see your employee engagement levels soar.  It’s easy to use and can be set up in under a minute. There is a free suggestion box option allowing 1 box, with fee-paying options offering unlimited suggestions starting at £5 per month. Try it now.

3. Culture Amp. This is an innovative employee engagement survey software tool. This tool is focused on developing a productive and healthy culture by using a mix of 4 types of survey: engagement, identity, growth and sustainability. They have an innovative lifecyle survey – which can be pushed to to staff’s mobile phone – which assesses employee engagement at key stages of the employment lifecycle: Candidates, Onboarding and Exit. They have many more survey types, including a performance based one and a pulse survey which helps you assess the impact of improvement initiatives. Prices are competitive, starting at $3,000 for companies between 50 and 200 employees.

4.Teamphoria. This is another excellent employee engagement software tool pitched at small-businesses. The tools allows you to conduct an employee engagement survey of your staff body. They have a very stream-lined survey which takes just 5 minutes and involves just 12 questions, with 10 questions being based on the core elements of engagement and 2 questions being specific to your company. Thanks to the brevity and conciseness of the survey you can be sure that your staff won’t get bored halfway through the survey and you’ll have a great uptake. Pricing is on an number of employees per month basis.

5.Office Vibe. Like teamphoria above, this is another employee engagement survey tool that markets itself on brevity. They have a refresingly simple survey format which they claim has pushed up their survey uptake rates to 330% higher than average. The survey allows for the traditional annual survey format but also enables continuous feed-back and also allows survey users to respond anonymously. Prices start at $65.83 per month for up to 50 employees.

6. Quantum Workplace. This is a powerful cloud-based continuous feed-back survey which allows you to keep the finger on the pulse of your staff’s fluctuating engagement levels. This survey tool can offer a traditional annual survey format and/or a pulse format where you can program it to survey employees at regular intervals to suit your needs. It comes in multiple languages and surveys.

7.Decision Wise. This is a market leading employee engagement software survey tool. It is a cloud-based tool naturally which means your employees can login anywhere at anytime to complete the survey.

Before you go, here are two more books that can help with employee engagement. Check them out.

1.The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us, by Daniel Pink. Best-selling, game-changing book of staff engagement and motivation.
2.The Five Dysfunctions of a Team, by Patrick Lencioni.

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