How to Gather Employee Feedback That Drives Action

You’ve just finished a round of team meetings and you’re feeling good. You’ve gathered plenty of feedback from your employees, but as you go through the comments, you realize that something is wrong. The feedback is vague, unstructured, and doesn’t provide any concrete recommendations for action. You wonder, 'What am I supposed to do with this?'

Unfortunately, this scenario is all too common. Leaders often collect feedback without a clear plan, resulting in a mountain of information that neither helps to address performance issues nor improves team dynamics.

High-quality feedback is essential for understanding employee satisfaction and driving positive change. When employees feel heard and appreciated, morale increases and your company thrives. However, collecting feedback that can actually be used is easier said than done. We have compiled our best tips for better employee feedback. Below, we discuss the importance of proper feedback, show you the best times to gather feedback, and provide four practical tips on how to gain the insights needed to truly make a difference.

What is employee feedback?

At first glance, this question seems easy to answer, but understanding employee feedback is more complex than one might think. Timely, targeted, and effective feedback has been shown to increase employee retention, but gathering feedback is just as important. At its core, employee feedback encompasses the thoughts and feelings of team members about their work environment, company culture, and much more. It can also include management, processes, work-life balance, or other aspects you may not have considered yet.

In many companies, feedback is decreasing, not increasing. But when employees are encouraged to share their opinions—and are listened to—it strengthens the bond between management and staff. Giving employees the opportunity to express their thoughts boosts morale, helps prioritize workflow issues, and addresses weaknesses before they develop into problems.

Why is employee feedback important?  

There are many reasons to gather employee feedback. Whether it's general feedback or targeted feedback, you gain valuable insights simply by asking your employees for their opinion.  

Some of the main benefits include:  

Team members feel heard and appreciated; their opinion matters – and it should!  

• It strengthens your relationships with your employees, especially when they notice positive changes or your support.  
• It promotes teamwork and allows you to achieve more together.

Even if we don't always like to admit that we need it, employee feedback sharpens awareness of your performance as a leader and helps you identify problems early or make necessary changes. It also provides the opportunity to receive recognition and understand what your team perceives as positive. A feedback culture allows your team to develop together.

When should you gather employee feedback?  

In general, you should regularly gather employee feedback – the exact timing, however, depends on the type of feedback you are seeking. Frequent feedback not only contributes to the success of your team members but also allows you to act proactively, rather than merely responding to feedback you receive a few times a year.

Employee feedback can be divided into three main categories:

• Interpersonal feedback
• Team feedback
• Organizational feedback

These levels are interconnected. For example, trust and relationships built at the individual or team level can give employees the confidence to also speak up at the organizational level.

However, employees do not always find it easy to speak up. Sometimes team members want to remain anonymous, or the timing seems inappropriate to them. Therefore, we have compiled some general recommendations on when you should collect which type of feedback.

Gather feedback in personal conversations  

Weekly one-on-one meetings provide an excellent opportunity to establish feedback loops between employees and supervisors. This is a great chance to build trust within the team from the very beginning and to strengthen relationships.  

It may initially seem difficult to gather feedback from employees on a personal level, but there are many ways to do it. Ask for feedback on the feedback you have given to an employee – this can be a good way to deepen the relationship. Especially with more reserved employees, such conversations offer the opportunity to ask targeted questions and receive feedback.

Gathering Feedback from the Team

There are many ways to gather feedback from the team, for example in team meetings or via email. However, the best time is usually at specific milestones: after important announcements, at set times (e.g., during the quarterly review meeting), or after team events.

This approach at the team level is ideal for getting feedback from your team or closest partners. You can also gather feedback from neighboring teams to optimize best practices. Team feedback gives you insights into your team’s dynamics and daily work and helps strengthen team spirit.

Gather feedback across the entire company

Typically, feedback in a company is collected by management or the HR department, often annually or semi-annually.

This type of feedback looks at the company as a whole. The impact is sometimes hard to feel, but without honest feedback from employees, it is difficult to drive change and promote the development of the company.

As a leader, you can encourage your employees to express their opinions and share the outcomes of potential changes. This is an important form of feedback that can have a significant impact on employee well-being.

4 Tips for Gathering Employee Feedback

It is in your best interest to receive candid and honest employee feedback. However, you can't always tell whether an employee is open. The only way to achieve this is to create a communicative environment where your employees feel supported and respected.

Here are some tips to get started.

1. Build Trust

Trust is the most important foundation for successful collaboration. When employees trust you, honesty comes much more easily – but building trust is neither simple nor quick. There is no magic trick. If you are honest with your team from the start, always keep your word, and encourage your team members to do the same, you create the best conditions for your success.

2. Asking the Right Questions

To obtain relevant and useful employee feedback, it is important to ask the right questions. Otherwise, you might not get any response at all! Relevant questions or detailed surveys are generally better than broad questions. A brief guide on the type of feedback you expect can encourage employees to provide more detailed answers. If you ask for feedback without clear direction or objective, employees have to come up with something on the spot, which is usually not productive—unless, in the end, you simply have silence in the room.

3. Ensure anonymity where appropriate  

Anonymous feedback can give employees a sense of security, especially those who are shy or anxious. Many are reluctant to cause a stir and remain silent – even those who trust you. Anonymous feedback allows everyone to express their opinion.  

However, anonymous feedback is not always appropriate. Before conducting an anonymous survey, consider whether you need to contact the participants afterwards or if anonymity is necessary at all. If you are interested in your team's honest opinion about a guest speaker, anonymity makes sense. On the other hand, when asking about food allergies before a joint lunch outside the company premises, anonymity is more harmful than helpful.

4. Implementing Employee Feedback

It is pointless to do all this preliminary work if you do not use the data you have gathered. On the contrary, inaction can jeopardize the trust you have painstakingly built.

Imagine several employees are having trouble understanding the briefings assigned to them. This may indicate that the team needs more support in creating the briefings. By clearly stating what the feedback is and what measures you plan to take, and then actually implementing them, you not only solve the problem but also make your team feel valued. Once your employees realize that their time is not being wasted and their opinions count, you establish the foundation for trust.

Effective employee feedback is the lifeblood of a thriving company culture, turning potential issues into opportunities for growth. The key is to transform the feedback process from an annual formality into a continuous, structured, and actionable practice. IceHrm provides the ideal toolkit to implement these best practices. Its Performance Management module facilitates structured, regular one-on-one meetings (Interpersonal Feedback) and milestone reviews (Team Feedback). Furthermore, the integrated Surveys and Polls feature allows HR to easily deploy company-wide questionnaires while offering confidentiality where needed (Strategy 3), ensuring candid responses. By using IceHrm, companies gain the necessary structure to gather, analyze, and act on employee feedback, ensuring that every opinion contributes directly to a better, more engaged workplace.