Staff Survey – Overview
NOTE:
1. This tool/guidance has been developed based on the experiences of the DaO
Pilot countries.
2. External team to conduct Staff Survey based on UNCT guidance.
10 December 2008
Table of Contents
1
2
3
4
4
Prerequisites ..........................................................................................................4
Tool objectives .......................................................................................................4
Process overview ...................................................................................................5
Activities and Tools ...............................................................................................6
Completion of Tool ...............................................................................................10
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Staff Survey
Prerequisites for conducting a Staff Survey
 There is strong commitment from UNCT, Resident Coordinator and Staff Associations
 Staff are willing to participate – i.e. staff trust that there will be no breaches to
confidentiality
 There has been coordination with agencies to ensure the staff survey does not conflict
or overlap with agency-specific surveys (eg: UNDP and UNICEF have annual Global
Staff Surveys)
 Most agencies are big enough to analyze results by agency without breaching
confidentiality agreements
 Resources (human and financial) are available for conducting the survey
Tool objectives
The Staff Survey template is a tool designed to help the UNCT assess staff readiness for
change.
The Staff Survey intends to gather opinions from all UN staff on the progress, challenges and
key staff issues related to UN Coherence, Effectiveness, and Relevance (CER) in COUNTRY.
The survey can be conducted on a yearly basis to monitor progress.
More specifically, the tool helps assess:
 Overall staff knowledge of and involvement in the CER process
 Current perspectives on progress of the CER process
 Perceived critical success factors for the CER process
 Perceived obstacles to the CER process and potential actions to remove them
A section of the tool also allows to capture some general aspects related to staff well-being,
which are not strictly related to change management per se, but could influence the overall
organizational culture and therefore the readiness to change.
The staff survey is a powerful management tool because
- It provides management with an accurate picture of staff’s views on CER and general
wellbeing
- It identifies key issues and shows management in which areas to take targeted actions
- It serves as a baseline and progress can be tracked by repeating the survey on a yearly
basis
- It is transparent and can be used for communication with internal and external
stakeholders
First learnings from countries that have conducted the survey show that tasking a working
group composed of 2 or 3 Heads of Agencies and 2 or 3 Staff Association members with
developing an action plan works well. Once an action plan has been developed, this can be
presented to staff at a Town Hall Meeting along with the overall survey results.
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Process overview
From finalizing the survey wording to conducting the survey, analyzing and communicating the
results, and developing an action plan, a small team would be involved for 8-10 weeks. The
UNCT and the Staff Associations would provide input, encourage staff participation and take a
leading role in developing an action and communications plan.
UN Coherence - Staff Survey
0 - Planning
Phase 1 – Finalize
survey
Phase 3 - Analyze
survey results
• 2-3 weeks
• 2-3 weeks
Survey
launch
Activities a. Assess need a) Revise survey template a) RCO to send out link to all a) Download results
for a staff
through discussions with
staff, including a note on
b) Analyze responses by
survey
RCO, HoAs, Staff
confidentiality
question as well as by
b. Determine
Associations, Focus
b) Staff associations to
demographic split
timing and
group discussion
actively encourage
c) Aggregate responses by
coordination b) UNCT to take a number
participation
building block/ category
of key decisions
c) Administering party to give
(participation, scope,
daily updates on response
language, distribution,
rate and RCO to send out
tools)
frequent reminders
c) Organize translation of
(especially as deadline is
survey (if required)
approaching)
d) Upload survey onto
online tool (e.g., Survey
Monkey)
e) Compile staff list that
survey will be sent to
• Workplan
• Finalized versions of
• High enough response rate • Survey results presentation
Deliver• TORs
survey (possibly
to guarantee
ables
• (External)
multilingual)
representativeness of data
team hired • Survey distribution list
• Uploaded survey
IV. Memo to Staff requesting
V. Excel template
I.
Full version of survey
Tools
participation
II. Short version of survey
III. Head of Agency version In addition: Manual - how to upload
survey into Survey Monkey
of survey
Duration
• 2 weeks
Phase 2 – Conduct
survey
Phase 4 –
Communicate results /
develop action plan
• 1 week
a) Present and discuss survey
results at UNCT meeting
b) Discuss survey results with
staff associations
c) Develop action plan (e.g.
working group composed of
HoAs and Staff Association
members)
d) Present results as well as
action plan at Town Hall
Meeting
• Action plan
• Town Hall Meeting presentation
VI. Staff Survey Results
Template
VII. Action plan template – yet to
be uploaded
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Activities
0 – Planning
0a. Assess the need for a staff survey
 Has a similar survey already been conducted?
 How well is management aware of the issues staff are facing with respect to CER?
 What percentage of staff is affected by/involved in CER?
 Would (external) stakeholders see a benefit in conducting a staff survey?
0b. Determine the timing and coordination of the staff survey
 Recommended timing:
o 1 week for revisions to template, translations (if required), setting up the
survey online, compiling staff list that survey will be sent to
o 2-3 weeks for collecting survey responses
o 2-3 weeks for analyzing survey results and finalizing presentation
o ½ day UNCT meeting to discuss survey results
o 3h discussion of survey results between Staff Associations and Resident
Coordinator
o 2 months for working group to come up with a detailed action plan (however,
communication on results of the survey and the overall strategy forward
should take place right after the UNCT and Staff Association discussions)
o ½ day Town Hall Meeting to discuss results and action plan with all staff
 Coordination:
o Contract external party to conduct staff survey (required to guarantee
confidentiality)
o RC to contact all agencies about timing of survey
o Decide on which agencies take part in the survey (e.g. participation of UNV,
IOM?) (it is recommended for all agencies to take part)
Phase 1 – Finalize Survey
1a) Revise survey template – i.e. adapt survey to COUNTRY and requirements of UNCT, Staff
associations and focus groups: The suggested format would be one on one discussions with
HoAs and focus group discussions as well as a UNCT meeting to finalize the survey
1b) UNCT to take a number of key decisions before launching the Survey
Participation: Who should be included in the Survey? Should all staff in COUNTRY be
asked to complete survey or only those involved with CER? Should consultants, UNVs,
Interns be included in the Staff Survey? Should out-of-country capacity (i.e. resources
providing ongoing support to the country from headquarters or from regional centers) be
included?
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Considerations on making people feel included and avoid frustration need to be
balanced with ensuring that only staff that actually have to embrace change as part of
the CER process should be included. Also, considerations on where to draw the line on
the out-of-country resources to be included have to be taken into account.
Language: In which language should the Staff Survey be conducted in order to maximize
participation?
While all UN staff should be able to speak English, the possibility to have a version of
the Survey in the national language should also be discussed to maximize participation.
Scope:
Will a long, a short and a Heads of Agency version of the survey be available?
It is possible to distinguish between a Heads of Agency version and a staff version.
The Heads of Agency version is a slightly modified version of the staff survey that
excludes questions on ‘My Head of Agency…’ and includes one or two questions on how
well Heads of Agencies see the building blocks of change in place overall.
The reason for having both a long and a short version of the survey would be to
distinguish between staff who have been very closely involved in the CER process and
those who have not. Unless either the level of involvement with CER is relatively
homogenous or there is limited time to take the survey/analyze the survey results,
having both a long and a short version, is recommendable.
Other required decisions on scope:
 What is the cut-off point to determine whether people get directed to long or short
version (recommended: staff who spend less than 10% of their time on CER take the
short survey, the others the long survey)
 Should the survey include open response questions? (max 2 recommended)
Distribution: Should the Staff Survey be offered only in electronic format (using systems
such as Survey Monkey, Zoomerang, etc.) or should it also be made available on
hardcopy, i.e., paper format?
Considerations on easiness of data gathering and analysis should be weighted with
considerations on making the Survey more accessible to staff who are not very familiar
or do not have regular access to computers.
Demographics: Should survey respondents be requested to name their agency?
(recommended)
Tools: Survey Monkey, Excel, PPT (recommended)
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Transparency/Communication of results: How will staff be informed about the results of
the survey? (Recommendation: make all survey results (including all breakdowns)
available online, discuss results in a Town Hall Meetings)
1c) Contract external translator (if required) – to assure confidentiality, the translator cannot be
affiliated with the UN system. A two way translation is advisable
1d) Upload survey onto online tool (if the tool is Survey Monkey, a version is already available
online and will only need to be adapted to the country specifics. In case a different tool is used,
the online help on uploading may need to be used).
NOTE: SEE SURVEY MONKEY MANUAL FOR HOW TO UPLOAD SURVEY
1e) Compile staff list (to send survey link to). Keeping track is important not only for the
distribution list but also to analyze response rates by agency.
Phase 1 Tools: Full, Short and Heads of Agency version of Staff survey
These are the different versions of the surveys that can be used depending on type of
contract/involvement with CER. Note that whereas they appear as separate documents in the
toolkit, once online, there will only be one survey. Depending on the answers to the initial
questions, the system will direct people who fill out the survey to the relevant version
automatically. In this way, staff will not see that there are different versions of the survey.
Phase 2 – Conduct survey
2a) Send out survey link to all staff (through RCO), requesting their participation in the survey.
The memo needs to include a note ensuring confidentiality of individual responses. It should
also include a statement around how and when survey responses will be communicated to staff
and what follow up actions will be taken.
Assure staff that survey responses will be treated with the strictest level of confidentiality
 Use independent, external translators
 Contract external party to administer survey and guarantee that only external party
will have access to raw data
 Assure staff that no individual responses will be shown
 Demographic breakdowns will only be shown if the number of respondents is at least
5
2b) Staff associations to actively encourage survey participation – Support from the staff
associations will be a powerful tool in boosting the response rate
2c) Daily updates from external party intended to monitor response and make sure reminders
are sent out
Tool: Memo to all staff requesting participation
This is an e-mail template for the RC when sending out the online link to the survey, requesting
participation from all staff and assuring confidentiality
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Phase 3 – Analyze results
3a) Download results into Excel and clean data
3b) Analyze responses by question as well as by demographic split – Do not show if n<5
3c) Aggregate responses by building block/ category – see Excel template on how to conduct
analysis
Tool: Excel Template
This template shows the logic of the analysis when aggregating the individual survey questions
by respondent to form a building block
Phase 4 – Communicate results/develop action plan
4a) Present and discuss survey results at UNCT meeting - Show overall picture as well as key
issues to address
4b) Discuss survey results with Staff Associations
4c) Action plan
The importance of an action plan as well as its communication to staff cannot be overstressed.
o Set up a working group (e.g. 2-3 Heads of Agencies, 2-3 Staff Association leaders)
o Working group to identify actions to take to address issues coming out of the survey,
responsibility and timing (see template)
o UNCT to approve action plan
o Communicate to staff as part of the overall communication strategy
Note: Examples for an action plan as well as a template will be uploaded as soon as they
become available.
Tool: Action plan template
4d) Discuss survey results and action plan at Town Hall Meeting – Resident Coordinator to
present survey results
Tool: Staff Survey results template
This dummy presentation will serve as a useful basis when preparing for the presentation of
survey results.
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Completion of Tool
The staff survey exercise is completed once...
 ...the results of the survey have been analyzed in a way that meets the requirements of
the UNCT, AND
 ...an action plan has been developed and approved by the UNCT and the Staff
Associations, AND
 ...the results of the survey as well as the action plan have been communicated to all staff
and staff have been given the opportunity to comment
It will be crucial to integrate the action and communications plan into the overall implementation
plan developed in Step 5.
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