It’s coming up to World Listening Day (July 18th) – one of those awareness days that could easily pass by, with a few posts reminding us that listening is important – of course it is!
At People Lab we spend a lot of time working with organisations across different sectors on employee voice, experience and culture. And as such I’ve become convinced that we have a much bigger problem than people simply not listening.
The real challenge is that we’ve become incredibly good at collecting feedback… but not so great at designing ways to genuinely hear it.
We’ve never had more ways to listen
- Annual engagement surveys.
- Pulse surveys.
- Manager check-ins.
- Suggestion schemes.
- Town halls.
- Employee forums.
- Social platforms.
- Exit interviews.
- Always-on feedback tools.
The average employee has more opportunities than ever to share their views. Yet ask many employees whether they feel heard and the answer is often far less positive.
Why?
Because listening isn’t measured by how many questions we ask. It’s measured by what changes because we asked them.
Listening isn’t an event
One of the biggest shifts we see with organisations we work with, is a move away from thinking about employee voice as something that happens once or twice a year. Real listening happens throughout the employee experience.
- When someone joins.
- When they’re learning.
- When they’re struggling.
- When they’re working with customers.
- When something goes wrong.
- When they’re trying to improve a process.
- When they’re thinking about leaving.
Every one of these moments tells us something different. None of them, on their own, gives us the full picture.
The goal isn’t more data
This is where I think many organisations have accidentally optimised for the wrong outcome. They’ve become brilliant at collecting data. Dashboards get bigger and more complex, surveys get longer, and sometimes even response rates improve.
But none of those things automatically improves employee experience. The goal was never data, it was better decisions. Sometimes we don’t need another survey, what we really need is a better conversation. Sometimes we don’t need another dashboard. We need leaders who are curious enough to ask, “What’s really going on here?”. Sometimes we don’t need more feedback. We simply need the confidence to act on what we already know.
Listening is something you design
One of the things we often explore with clients is a deceptively simple question:
Where are the natural listening moments across the employee experience?
Not just formal mechanisms. The everyday moments where people tell us how work really feels. it could be manager conversations, team meetings or project retrospectives. And don’t forget about customer feedback, communities of practice. and new starter experiences.
These are all signals. The challenge is designing a system that connects them together, rather than treating each one as a separate source of information. Because no single listening channel tells the whole story.
Voice only matters if it creates movement
Employees are incredibly perceptive. They know the difference between being asked and being heard. They notice when feedback disappears into a black hole. They also notice when small things change because someone listened.
Those moments build trust. And trust is what encourages people to speak up again. In many ways, employee voice isn’t really about surveys or forums at all. It’s about creating confidence that speaking up is worthwhile.
On World Listening Day…
Perhaps the question isn’t:
“How can we listen more?”
Perhaps it’s:
“Have we designed an organisation that makes listening useful?”
Because listening isn’t the finish line. – it’s the start of learning.
And learning is what creates better experiences, stronger cultures and ultimately better organisations.
That feels like something worth celebrating, not just on World Listening Day, but every day.
If you’re looking to move beyond surveys and create a more connected, human-centred approach to employee voice, we’d love to help. At People Lab, we work with organisations to design listening strategies that turn insight into meaningful action, building trust, improving experiences and helping people feel genuinely heard. Get in touch today
